HD vibration damper/cooler. New DIY design.

Bluefront · Post by **Bluefront** » Sun Jan 02, 2005 1:23 pm

Two photos

This thing was an easy project....and works well with or without the fan. That's a gel cool-pac the drive is sitting on. It provides a large thermal mass that allows the HD to warm up and cool down gradually. It also transfers heat directly into the aluminum frame of the computer...which acts like a large heatsink. It also dampens drive vibration.....better than any method I've seen thus far.

The aluminum heatsinks attached to the sides of the drive also help with the cooling and keep the drive from slipping off. Since I don't move my computer around much, there is no solid connection to the case....gravity holds it in place. With the Yate Loon fan at 900rpms, this segate drive runs about 5C over ambient. Without the fan it runs a few degrees warmer...

The gel pacs work well for heat transfer....this one came from Walmart...about $2.

greeef · Post by **greeef** » Sun Jan 02, 2005 2:49 pm

Do you have any idea what kind of thermal conductivity rate those heatpacks have?

I'm trying to think of a good way to do some real objective testing - it would be lovely to come up with a reuseable, thermally invisible micro-coolpak to replace thermal compounds.

Bluefront · Post by **Bluefront** » Sun Jan 02, 2005 3:58 pm

They do work pretty well for heat transfer. Consider what they're designed for....freeze or boil one, then pick it up and you'll see.

To make one work best with a hard drive, find one without any air pockets. With an air pocket it becomes almost useless for heat transfer...

greeef · Post by **greeef** » Sun Jan 02, 2005 5:18 pm

makes sense yeah..

I didnt really want to hijack your thread, but i loved your under-the-cpu concept, was considering doing it and coupling it to a big ol heatsink i got given a while ago - Don't really want to cut the holes in my case unless it's going to make a real difference to temperatures though.