Temperature Too High? Seagate External's Run around 50C

[itakey]

Is 50C steady for an external drive too hot? I have 2 Seagate external's that both run around 50C-52C always. My other drives typically run in the low 30C's range. I'm guessing its a bad design or the drives naturally run hot since the cases are different and the drive sizes are different.

Is this simply too hot to run these drives? I know I can pull the drives and install them into my machine as Internal's but I want to keep these as external drives.

 

[panathas]

Those temps are high but it depends whether they are normal or not. What's the ambient temp inside the room? If it's high you'll be seeing higher drive temps than normal.

Now about those HDDs, if they are 7200RPM, 3,5 inch drives and you are getting those readings when you are transferring files one them, then it's normal. However if they are working 24/7 with those temps then you'll likely kill them in the near future. Those temps should only be the max readings you are getting and they shouldn't last for too long.

 

[nobspls]

The external drives are usually wrapped in plastic enclosures with poor cooling. I am no surprised they are running around 50C. They are not intended for 24/7 operation. They for you to copy stuff from your PC to the drive and then you power them off and take them off line.

 

[panathas]

OK if they are 7200RPM drives then those temps are normal. Generally those plastic external enclosures have very poor cooling capabilities. What you could is to leave a lot of open space between them and don't place them near heating elements, lamps, etc. Also make sure that their exhaust grills aren't covered and that the drives aren't sitting on them. Anyway most HDDs have a 50-55c maximum temperature ceiling and as long as the don't work 24/7 at that temp range, they should be fine. I once had an old 300GB external drive that hit 55c during file transfers. It was a USB 2.0 enclosure that had a 3,5 inch 7200RPM drive inside which was pretty pointless.

 

[itakey]

The external drives are usually wrapped in plastic enclosures with poor cooling. I am no surprised they are running around 50C. They are not intended for 24/7 operation. They for you to copy stuff from your PC to the drive and then you power them off and take them off line.

OK if they are 7200RPM drives then those temps are normal. Generally those plastic external enclosures have very poor cooling capabilities. What you could is to leave a lot of open space between them and don't place them near heating elements, lamps, etc. Also make sure that their exhaust grills aren't covered and that the drives aren't sitting on them. Anyway most HDDs have a 50-55c maximum temperature ceiling and as long as the don't work 24/7 at that temp range, they should be fine. I once had an old 300GB external drive that hit 55c during file transfers. It was a USB 2.0 enclosure that had a 3,5 inch 7200RPM drive inside which was pretty pointless.

Thanks for the feedback. So after poking around some more, it seems HD Tune Pro is giving problematic reads, the temperature in CrystalDiskInfo, Speccy, and HDDScan show one at 31C and another at 40C, MUCH more reasonable numbers.

Thanks for the help!

 

[seagate_surfer]

Hi itakey! Seagate here. Specifications for operating temperatures for modern hard drives range from 0 to 60 degrees Celsius, therefore your drives are within operating range. You may also use our Free Seatools Software to check on the health of the drive if you have any concerns about their health.