Is my Y580's HDD running dangerously hot?

Hey guys, just got my Y580 (500GB 7200RPM) today. So far I'm loving it. I installed Skyrim and played it for a couple hours, then I went to check my temps.

Overall the temps were looking good. The highest cpu temp I had was 77C on one core. I didn't go higher than 84C with the 660m. But one thing caught my eye:



I took that picture about 5 minutes after I closed Skyrim and sat idle on the desktop. For 5 minutes, it was at 59C, then when I took the picture it dropped to 58C. As I'm writing this (about another 5 minutes after taking the picture) it is 57C.

I understand that the HDD is sandwhiched between the gpu and the cpu. but isn't this a little too hot than what other Y580 owners have? I haven't seen any hiccups yet from the heat, but maybe it is damaging it and I just can't see it. Am I really hurting it at these temps that it will need to be RMA'd soon? I really don't want to swap out for an SSD, because I need the 500gb space, and I need the optical drive... so what can I do to lower temps besides getting a cooler?

Please help what should I do?!

 

55-60C is getting dangerous for a hard drive. You might experience slowdowns.

 

And the scary part is that isn't even just peak temperatures. It stays in the low 50's during idle... I'm not sure what I should do, but a lot of other people have bought the Y580 with the 500gb HDD so I would like to hear if they came across any solutions. Thanks!

 

Well, my solution was to stick the HDD where the optical disk drive used to be using a HDD caddy; granted, my initial purpose was to install a SSD in the main HDD bay. For instance, over the past week, which included a 2hr session Arkham City, the highest temps for my SSD and HDD have been 43C and 42C respectively. All of this a room temp of 29.4C. With no moving parts, the SSD doesn't generate as much heat as the HDD.

 

Thats good to know. Installing the SSD and HDD caddy will probably be the first thing I do when I get my Y580 in the mail. HDD temp's were my main worry when I bought this laptop, but your temps are very reasonable.

 

My HDD has about the same temperatures as yours. It's ridiculous how the designed it, I bought the U3 cooling pad and haven't noticed anything above 55C, and some people have indicated that the max temp on theses is actually 60C, so I'm just going to back-up regularly and see how this goes. I too need the storage, and was planning on just adding an mSATA but maybe an SSD in the HDD slot and moving the 500GB drive to the ODD slot might be my best option.

 

If you want to use your ODD, there's this option after removing it from the laptop: USB 3.0 External Enclosure for Optical Drive (12.7 mm SATA) [slimSATA-USB-C16] - $26.95 : NewmodeUS, Hard Drive Caddys for Notebooks

 

Thanks for the tip! I'm not familiar with HDD and SSD temps, are those temps fine for extended hours of gaming with both an SSD and HDD?

It seems like that maybe the only solution for our HDD heat issues then. Should I get an mSata SSD rather than an actual 2.5" drive? That way it takes up less space (leaves a caddy open for better air flow?). Also, say I have to RMA this laptop. Can I just put the ODD and HDD back into their places and they can't tell right? Thank you

 

Is there a guide somewhere as to how to remove the ODD and place the HDD there? I have looked but I haven't seen anything.

Also, the only problem I have noticed so far with my laptop is hiccups with youtube. I recorded an example on my phone:
[video]http://www.flickr.com/photos/33700986@N07/7748116090/[/video]

Not sure if this has anything to do with my HDD but I have never experienced this problem on any other computer before. I have flash player installed.

 

Did you uninstalled McAfee anti virus?

 

No, I kept it because it is free, no? Don't tell me that's the reason...


Also I did some extra reading up on putting the HDD in the ODD bay. Would you only achieve Sata II speeds? Would you need to buy a seperate caddy for this? Would a usb 3.0 enclosure for the ODD have slower read/write speeds then in the laptop?

I just need a solution that will yield me normal HDD temps during long hours of gaming. This seems like the only one

 

Yeah, get ride of the antivirus and it will help your computer. There a post I put forward to summarize what would be fix when you get ride of it. I got a laptop cooler and the same model as you. Usually my idle temps are 38-43C and gaming temperature on high resolution/max specs about 47-51C. It usually it does break 50 C, but it usually it is under 50C. Also, you have to take account if your room is cool or not...

 

It's my understanding that SSDs aren't nearly as susceptible to heat as HDDs.

So 55-60C which may be dangerous for a HDD isn't really a problem for an SSD.

That's just what I've heard, but I installed my Crucial m4 in the regular HDD bay and have had no problems with it.

 

I thought I read that this is a known issue with the design, and there was a thread dedicated to this.

http://forum.notebookreview.com/ideapad-essential/672557-hard-drive-heats-up-y580.html

 

Yeah every drive SSD or not has different operating temperatures. The m4's operating temps are 0-70c

The seagate momentus 500gb 7200rpm that came in my y580s are 0-60c.

 

If you scrolled down the threads on the main Ideapad & Essential page, there's a thread titled "odd caddy y 580." In there I included links to videos and guides detailing the procedure, which was pretty easy to be honest.

 

I'm more interested if any owners have already experienced crashing the hardisk because of the heat.

 

Mostly I am concerned about the long term affects, not necessarily of the HDD dying after a week or three of use. I mean like 2-3 years out. I've seen the google hdd study quoted as a 'Don't worry about the temps' a couple of times.

Here is a slice of that study as analyzed by tr:
Google Research: Temperature not a major factor in hard disk failures | TechRepublic

You can see in year 3-4 hard drives over 45c have annual failure rate more then 10 times that of hard drives kept 40 or below.

Clearly the 'temperature-not-a-major-factor' part of the study isn't aimed at HDDs reaching 55 or 60c.

 

If my HDD fails after 3 years of use, I wouldn't be too upset. It failed in my other laptop after only 4 years of use, and that ran pretty cool, unlike in the Y580.

EDIT:

Just to clarify, my HDD reaches a maximum of 58C when gaming/under intense load. I don't think it is that good, but hey ho, not much I can do about it when I do not wish to shell out on a SSD and lose my ODD.