How should I put my external hard drive to stand without damaging it.

[sagooding]

I have a western digital 4tb my book external hard drive.

I dont know whether to have it standing up like vertically or on its side.

It is much less prone to falling on its side because its a rectangle and the center of gravity will be closer to the ground making it much more stable.

Will having it lying on its side while transferring data affect its functioning or damage it or should i keep it upright at all times ?

 

[christop]

Your hd will be fine either way on its side or standing up..

 

[RetiredChief]

Age old question - orientation of HDD. will not effect read / write performance and General no difference for under 3 years. The question would be long term bearing wear. Bearing wear would probably be less (more uniform) in he Horizonal position and that is what orientation I generally use. Horizonal is what is used in the vast majority of internal desktops and in all laptops.
You identified one big Plus - less likely to knock over, and YES I've wiped out at least 3 HDD that were vertical and knocked over.
However, I have some very old system at work that ave the HDD installed vertically. These drives are around 15 years old and are stil in use. There are high end SCSI drives and as such were manuf to a higher quality than current consumer model HDDs which I dought would last much passed 5->8 years no matter what orientation.

Bottom line - GO with what works best for you. If vertical just locate to minimize the possibility of knocking them over.

 

[sagooding]

Age old question - orientation of HDD. will not effect read / write performance and General no difference for under 3 years. The question would be long term bearing wear. Bearing wear would probably be less (more uniform) in he Horizonal position and that is what orientation I generally use. Horizonal is what is used in the vast majority of internal desktops and in all laptops.
You identified one big Plus - less likely to knock over, and YES I've wiped out at least 3 HDD that were vertical and knocked over.
However, I have some very old system at work that ave the HDD installed vertically. These drives are around 15 years old and are stil in use. There are high end SCSI drives and as such were manuf to a higher quality than current consumer model HDDs which I dought would last much passed 5->8 years no matter what orientation.

Bottom line - GO with what works best for you. If vertical just locate to minimize the possibility of knocking them over.

Oh and one more question. If i wrap the hard drive in Styrofoam or something will that lead to overheating and damage it in any way ?

Should i wrap it in Styrofoam to prevent any damages ?

 

[RetiredChief]

Ship the Styrofoam, Yes it will increase internal temps also unless you use antistatic styrofoam you will also introduce ESD concerns (primarily winter time with LOW relative humitity).