External hard drive always on?

Is this a good thing to do. I have an external hard drive and have it always
powered-up. It is quite warm since there are not heat sinks or cooling fans
that I am aware of.

I'm just wondering if these externals were meant only for backing up data or
for mobility of large amounts of data rather than to be additional drive
space.

Any opinions?

Thanks,
Dennis

On Mon, 2 Jul 2007 06:30:32 -0400, "dennis"
<dennis@home.net> wrote:

>Is this a good thing to do. I have an external hard drive and have it always
>powered-up. It is quite warm since there are not heat sinks or cooling fans
>that I am aware of.
>
>I'm just wondering if these externals were meant only for backing up data or
>for mobility of large amounts of data rather than to be additional drive
>space.


Well "these externals" is not a type of product that can be
classified for this purpose, some are not designed as well
as others for various reasons including how longer term use
might effect the PSU or the drive, and not all drives are
equally susceptible to overheating induced failure at any
"X" degrees temp, whether it be logical errors that corrupt
data or a more permanent physical failure.

Yes it's quite possible it's overheating beyond being
prudent to leave it running continually. A better design
for continual use will have a beefier PSU, that PSU in the
enclosure and a fan in the enclosure. Yours "might" be too
hot or might not, "quite warm" isn't a good index, an actual
temp might help.

"dennis" <dennis@home.net> wrote in message
news:mr4ii.7$g6.5@newsfe18.lga...
> Is this a good thing to do. I have an external hard drive and have it
> always powered-up. It is quite warm since there are not heat sinks or
> cooling fans that I am aware of.
>
> I'm just wondering if these externals were meant only for backing up data
> or for mobility of large amounts of data rather than to be additional
> drive space.
>
> Any opinions?

Does the case open easily? Try running it with the side off and see if it is
significantly cooler. What are you measuring the temperature with? SMART
info + Windows software or 'hand on the side'?

On Mon, 2 Jul 2007 06:30:32 -0400, "dennis"
<dennis@home.net> wrote:

>Is this a good thing to do. I have an external hard drive and have it always
>powered-up. It is quite warm since there are not heat sinks or cooling fans
>that I am aware of.
>
>I'm just wondering if these externals were meant only for backing up data or
>for mobility of large amounts of data rather than to be additional drive
>space.
>
>Any opinions?
>
>Thanks,
>Dennis
>


There is another option, cracking the case open, cutting a
hole where the case will allow to mount a very low RPM (to
keep noise down) fan, wired either to the 12V rail or some
fans will run acceptibly from 5V. It might look a bit
hackish though.