Hard Drive Temperature

M

Mighty Mike

Geek Trainee
my computer is rebooting itself every now and then, and i think that it's because my hard drive is boiling! it's so hot you can't even touch it. is it normal? can this be the cause of the rebooting?
 
Hard drives can get pretty hot but I think this is going a bit too far.

I am no expert on the "ins and outs" of HDDs but you should be able to touch your HDD without leaving evidence on your hand. I know I have many times.

As for cycling, I am not sure. Have you got a spare drive which you can try?

I know my drives avrage about 30C-35C

Hope this helps.
 
sabashuali said:
Hard drives can get pretty hot but I think this is going a bit too far.

I am no expert on the "ins and outs" of HDDs but you should be able to touch your HDD without leaving evidence on your hand. I know I have many times.

As for cycling, I am not sure. Have you got a spare drive which you can try?

I know my drives avrage about 30C-35C

Hope this helps.
Click to expand...
thanks.
i don't know the exact temp, but it's hotter the 35C.
i don't have a spare drive. maybe somebody knows what can cause a HDD to heat?
 
I would guess mechanical fault.
I cannot see that an electrical one will have the drive working so hot (short-circuit???) and still function at all.
Then again I am not an expert and really only guessing….
Different drives use different types of bearings.
Maybe yours has gone kaput?

Do you know what type of drive it is? Is it a SCSI drive (these tend to spin much quicker and logically might run hotter)?
What make is it? Is it new and under warranty or old and used?
 
sabashuali said:
I would guess mechanical fault.
I cannot see that an electrical one will have the drive working so hot (short-circuit???) and still function at all.
Then again I am not an expert and really only guessing….
Different drives use different types of bearings.
Maybe yours has gone kaput?

Do you know what type of drive it is? Is it a SCSI drive (these tend to spin much quicker and logically might run hotter)?
What make is it? Is it new and under warranty or old and used?
Click to expand...
it's IDE, and it's 2 years old.
 
Mighty Mike said:
maybe somebody knows what can cause a HDD to heat?
Click to expand...
Yep, usage :p
Bad case airflow, poor quality bearings as sabashuali mentioned, working it too hard among others can cause it to overheat. Try placing a 80mm fan infront of it if applicable.
 
Mike

Try and give a few more clues about your system.
Did you build it yourself?

When, how and why did you noticed that your drive is running hot?
You could run a program which will tell you how hot different components run but it depends on your hardware.

Try and give the forum a bit more information on the different components which make your system.
 
sabashuali said:
Mike

Try and give a few more clues about your system.
Did you build it yourself?

When, how and why did you noticed that your drive is running hot?
You could run a program which will tell you how hot different components run but it depends on your hardware.

Try and give the forum a bit more information on the different components which make your system.
Click to expand...
ok.
i bought it 2 years ago, and until now it ran flawlessly.
two weeks ago it started rebooting itself randomly. i first tought it was the power supply, and replaced it's fan. then i cleaned everthing inside. nothing.
yesterday i noticed that the HDD is very hot. i don't remember it being so hot before. so i figured it is the problem.
 
I would bet you have a software problem. It is very unlikely a computer would keep rebooting because of a bad hard drive. At worst, this would cause your computer to lock up, but not reboot itself.

Do you have S.M.A.R.T enabled for your hard drive? This might be causing it to reboot if it senses a problem. S.M.A.R.T can detect when a hard drive is likely to fail and automatically shut your PC down or reboot.

As i said though, I think it's a software/driver issue
 
jonbenge said:
I would bet you have a software problem. It is very unlikely a computer would keep rebooting because of a bad hard drive. At worst, this would cause your computer to lock up, but not reboot itself.

Do you have S.M.A.R.T enabled for your hard drive? This might be causing it to reboot if it senses a problem. S.M.A.R.T can detect when a hard drive is likely to fail and automatically shut your PC down or reboot.

As i said though, I think it's a software/driver issue
Click to expand...
what's SMART?
 
Self-Monitoring Analysis and Reporting Technology.
As jonbenge said, S.M.A.R.T can detect when a hard drive is likely to fail by running a few simple tests on the drive in question.
Grab a copy of windlg over at Western Digital Download Section and run a Quick Test on your drive and report back with the results.
 
pelvis_3 said:
Self-Monitoring Analysis and Reporting Technology.
As jonbenge said, S.M.A.R.T can detect when a hard drive is likely to fail by running a few simple tests on the drive in question.
Grab a copy of windlg over at Western Digital Download Section and run a Quick Test on your drive and report back with the results.
Click to expand...
ok, i checked it through SMART and it says that it's alright, so maybe i was wrong all along.
what else could cause my computer to reboot randomly?
 
Well, in this case it sounds like a heat related issue!
Can you tell us the temperatures of your system?
 
Look to see if you have any conflicting hardware. Go into device manager 'control panel - system - device manager', and check to see if any of your hardware has an exclimation mark.

Failing that, have you checked for viruses?
 
Mighty Mike said:
alright, i got a new power suply, a new video card, and it's still happening. i'm clueless.
Click to expand...
Wish I could've seen this earlier... RAM causes all sorts of funky problems. Try running memtest overnight (or during the day... whatever suits you). Let us know if it comes up with any errors. While I'm at it.. Do you know what brand of RAM is currently in your system?
 
it's more than likely to be cooling you must keep the drive as cool as possible try sticking an exhaust in there to disappate the heat from inside the case. it'll reboot due to the cpu getting too hot as the heat will be transfered. the cooler the better!!!!
 
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