Seagate Barracudas run HOT

[Winston Marmaduke III]

Hey all, make a long story short, my Maxtor OneTouch 750 GB of 2 years external died on me for the last time so I got aggravated and smashed the enclosure.

Anyway, I decided to throw the bare drive into my system to see if it worked, and sure enough, the Seagate Barracuda 7200.10 formatted just fine internally connected via SATA cable. (All reformatting attempts via USB in the Maxtor enclosure failed....I'm assuming it was Maxtor's lousy firmware/OneTouch crap).

Anyway, while formatting, I noticed this thing really started to heat up my system. Is it normal for these drives to run so hot? I have it in a bay right below a Hitachi Deskstar low power 2 TB (5900 rpm) and am worried that the heat from this 750 Barracuda will interfere with/degrade my Deskstar, which I use as an internal backup drive containing important docs.

Should I be worried here, or am I being paranoid? My system (Thanks to a wonderful Antec 300 case) idles at around 27C, but when formatting this drive, it hit 50C.

 

[Gigantopithecus]

Formatting a drive raised your internal case temperature by 23C?! Did you measure what the drive itself was at?

I sure as hell wouldn't keep a disk like that in my case.

 

[Winston Marmaduke III]

Nope, I didn't measure drive temp alone. Once the format was over the temp dropped back to 29C. But that was very concerning. This thing is LOUD too. Not sure if Barracudas are this loud and hot normally, or that I'm on the verge of failure here. I've never owned a Seagate drive before, but have read they are known for running hot...but this hot? I don't know.

The drive itself gets hot to the touch when trying to format, like potato out of the microwave kinda hot.

 

[Elixer]

While they do get hot, I never recall them getting hot enough that you can't touch them.

Sounds like the bearings could be shot, causing more heat.

 

[bryanl]

If your case heats up 23C due to HD activity (as opposed to something else, like heavier CPU use related to HD access), the HD has to heat up at least that much, which I seriously doubt it's doing. I suggest you check HD temp with a SMART utility.

Old 7200 RPM 3.5" HDs draw as much as 15W during random access, compared to 10W for newer designs. Neither is enough to make the case interior average 50C.

I try to install HDs with an empty bay between them, for better air circulation.

 

[Emulex]

number of platters has a great deal of impact.

the platter of the savvio 2.5" 600gb and the cheetah 3.5" 600gb are the same size. they run the same speed in a server with proper fluid dynamics airflow design and ducting

 

[jiffylube1024]

Hey all, make a long story short, my Maxtor OneTouch 750 GB of 2 years external died on me for the last time so I got aggravated and smashed the enclosure.

Anyway, I decided to throw the bare drive into my system to see if it worked, and sure enough, the Seagate Barracuda 7200.10 formatted just fine internally connected via SATA cable. (All reformatting attempts via USB in the Maxtor enclosure failed....I'm assuming it was Maxtor's lousy firmware/OneTouch crap).

Anyway, while formatting, I noticed this thing really started to heat up my system. Is it normal for these drives to run so hot? I have it in a bay right below a Hitachi Deskstar low power 2 TB (5900 rpm) and am worried that the heat from this 750 Barracuda will interfere with/degrade my Deskstar, which I use as an internal backup drive containing important docs.

Should I be worried here, or am I being paranoid? My system (Thanks to a wonderful Antec 300 case) idles at around 27C, but when formatting this drive, it hit 50C.

I've built lots of systems with Seagate hard drives.

7200.10 series drives with more than 1 platter (anything bigger than 250GB) run extremely hot. That was pretty much the hottest series from seagate. For the record, a lot of older Maxtors ran really hot too!

Do you have a fan that blows on your hard drives in your case (ie. an intake fan [typically from the front of the case] or an exhaust fan [typically out the side]? If not, 50C isn't too surprising - I've seen them get into the low to mid 50's.


If you don't have active cooling on your hard drives, then having that drive next to another drive will heat up both of them tremendously.

--------

There's big debate on whether heat truly degrades the life of hard drives or not; if you're concerned about those temperatures (I'd be), then you should get a fan on your HDD's pronto, put it somewhere else, or get a new, cooler running hard drive.

For the record, the new 7200.12 series 500GB Seagate drive is the coolest running 3.5" drive I've ever used - it's thinner than most drives because it's 1 platter, and idles in the high 20's C and loads in the low 30's. The 7200.11's ran cooler than the 7200.10's as well.

I've got a spare 7200.10 500GB drive that I use in a SATA hot swap bay (open to the air) and when copying files to it it can easily heat up to the high 40's degrees C.

 

[Winston Marmaduke III]

Thanks a lot for the input! coretemp said my temp was ~50C when I was formatting this drive, but since it is done my temps have come back down. I have an Antec 300 case, but no fans in front of the HDDs yet. I also have this drive spaced one bay apart from the other drive.

I plan on using this as a backup drive that won't be accessed much at all, would you still worry about the temp then?

 

[tweakboy]

Hey all, make a long story short, my Maxtor OneTouch 750 GB of 2 years external died on me for the last time so I got aggravated and smashed the enclosure.

Anyway, I decided to throw the bare drive into my system to see if it worked, and sure enough, the Seagate Barracuda 7200.10 formatted just fine internally connected via SATA cable. (All reformatting attempts via USB in the Maxtor enclosure failed....I'm assuming it was Maxtor's lousy firmware/OneTouch crap).

Anyway, while formatting, I noticed this thing really started to heat up my system. Is it normal for these drives to run so hot? I have it in a bay right below a Hitachi Deskstar low power 2 TB (5900 rpm) and am worried that the heat from this 750 Barracuda will interfere with/degrade my Deskstar, which I use as an internal backup drive containing important docs.

Should I be worried here, or am I being paranoid? My system (Thanks to a wonderful Antec 300 case) idles at around 27C, but when formatting this drive, it hit 50C.

What is your load temps. Intel recommends 50's to 60'c and low 70's is ok. 5900rpm wow talk about LOUD!!! how do you get work done.

After Seagate and Maxtor hopped into bed together, Seagate is no longer,, Maxtor makes it and just puts seagate name.
Those external Maxtors are also horrible, it will die on you.

wow 50c while installing,, your hard drive can survive even 60c but 50c is nice and hot. Try taking out opening the case and keep your climate cool in your room.. Use AC or open window.




So no worries.

 

[jiffylube1024]

Thanks a lot for the input! coretemp said my temp was ~50C when I was formatting this drive, but since it is done my temps have come back down. I have an Antec 300 case, but no fans in front of the HDDs yet. I also have this drive spaced one bay apart from the other drive.

I plan on using this as a backup drive that won't be accessed much at all, would you still worry about the temp then?

If it's in a system that is on for several hours at a time (or more), then the temps will still get hot. Your data will be fine, but a fan is especially recommended for using with a 7200.10 drive since they run so warm.