I need a hard drive cooler. Suggestions?

[meow2222]

??

There's no increased friction with reduced starting torque.
The lower the torque the lower the friction.

its normal for motor bearings to increase in friction over time, due
to a few causes. Its a well known cause of fan failures.


NT

 

[kony]

its normal for motor bearings to increase in friction over time, due
to a few causes. Its a well known cause of fan failures.


NT

Yes, but less than you might think. If the bearing is
frozen already it's not going to be good for more than a few
power cycles. If the bearing is dragging so badly it would
effect spin-up, it's days are still numbered, contrasted
with total life of many years if it were a good fan.

I guess the main point is, with a good fan running at very
low RPM, it comes closer to being the last failure point in
a system instead of the first. It just won't reach a point
where the bearing degradation matters before other factors
take down the system. In worst case you may have a PSU that
you don't want to void the warranty on, so it's left in
original state until the warranty has expired (or you dont'
care about the warranty, as I usually don't when it ends up
resulting in more downtime and same cost to ship it off and
wait weeks or longer for a replacement than to just fix it
(if after popping it open, it's deemed worth fixing, but if
it isn't, it brings into question whether an equivalent RMA
replacement would really be a good solution either)).

 

[meow2222]

Yes, but less than you might think. If the bearing is
frozen already it's not going to be good for more than a few
power cycles. If the bearing is dragging so badly it would
effect spin-up, it's days are still numbered, contrasted
with total life of many years if it were a good fan.

I guess the main point is, with a good fan running at very
low RPM, it comes closer to being the last failure point in
a system instead of the first. It just won't reach a point
where the bearing degradation matters before other factors
take down the system. In worst case you may have a PSU that
you don't want to void the warranty on, so it's left in
original state until the warranty has expired (or you dont'
care about the warranty, as I usually don't when it ends up
resulting in more downtime and same cost to ship it off and
wait weeks or longer for a replacement than to just fix it
(if after popping it open, it's deemed worth fixing, but if
it isn't, it brings into question whether an equivalent RMA
replacement would really be a good solution either)).

I guess PC fans must behave differently to mains fans in this
respect. Mains ones often get progressively stiffer until they stall,
and can have their bearings cleaned out and relubed, and will carry
on running for years or decades. I guess PCs dont last long
enough for the problem to occur to any significant extent in the
first place.


NT

 

[kony]

I guess PC fans must behave differently to mains fans in this
respect. Mains ones often get progressively stiffer until they stall,
and can have their bearings cleaned out and relubed, and will carry
on running for years or decades.

A high RPM PC fan could need relubed in a shorter interval
if cheap/junk, but a good mains fan shouldn't need bearings
cleaned and relubed for many years, unless it ran quite hot,
heating up the bearing (which some do, due to differences in
design).

I guess PCs dont last long
enough for the problem to occur to any significant extent in the
first place.

A PC fan can easily last 20 years if only of good quality,
appropriate for the use, and ran at moderate to low RPM.
It's when the fan is low quality, higher RPM, or
inappropriate that there are problems.

Sometimes "inappropriate" is a matter of engineers using a
fan where they just don't care, or rather other constraints
like thickness and cost require abandonment of best
practices for longer life.