Affixing HDD to cabinet

[jardine]

Hey guys, just a quick one. Can I just stick my hdd to the side of my cab using double sided tape? It will have the electronics side out but any real problems? 

Not really liking any of the brackets at my local hardware store.

[Knightlore]

Not sure about tape but I've used Velcro for my bar top in the past, been going for about 3/4 years with no problems.  Maybe give that a go?

[Louis Tully]

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[jardine]

Thanks guys. The double sided tape seems solid so fingers crossed it goes ok. I guess there's no issue regarding damage or such to the hdd.

If it fails, I'll go the velco way, cheers.

[Gatt]

Thanks guys. The double sided tape seems solid so fingers crossed it goes ok. I guess there's no issue regarding damage or such to the hdd.

If it fails, I'll go the velco way, cheers.

Actually,  there is,  alot of Hard Drives were designed to be used in a horizontal installation,  and mounting them vertically can significantly increase wear and decrease lifespan.

I remember one facility I worked at,  they'd bought a dozen Dell desktop units (Yes,  it was a while ago),  and mounted them all vertically.  Within 6 months, all of them had the drive fail twice and Dell began refusing to service the machines until the facility started mounting them in their proper orientation.

Forcing the drive arm and heads to fight gravity as they try to focus on one incredibly tiny track seems to cause increased wear over time.  Plus,  with modern drives,  you're insulating heat on one side and forcing heat to travel the length of the drive case and platters rather than dissipate upwards and away from the internals.  Depending on the drive model,  some of them can get pretty hot even when well ventilated.

Overall,  I'd say it'll function well,  but over time you're going to shorten the life of the drive.

[boardjunkie]

Noted.

The Velcro trick works well but do make sure you use *good* velcro. I can only recommend 3M/Scotch as it has a very aggressive adhesive. I used that stuff to hold a 1 rack space audio amp to the side of the coin box enclosure in my mame cab. It works great.

You sure as hell don't want you HDD falling off the side of the cab and crashing to the bottom....
I would use brackets just for my own sanity....

[dmarcum99]

I'm cautious about having the hard drive mounted vertically. 

I went to home depot and bought a small length of thin aluminum angle stock.  I drilled holes in the alumionum to line up with the hd mounting holes.  I wasn't perfect with the spacing, so a dremel slotted the opening to help.  I then drilled holes on the other side of the aluminum so I could attach pcb mounting legs.  This way, I had the HD mounted horizontally, and could mount the hd on the bottom of the cab (where it's coolest) and the pcb mounting legs got the hd off the ground, giving some air space underneath so it wouldn't trap any unwanted heat.

[Necro]

Uh...HDD mounting orientation doesn't matter - at all.  Maybe a long, LONG time ago it was the case but enterprise level solutions - where reliability is necessary - regularly have HDD's vertically oriented within them.  Many small cases have the HDD's oriented this way as well.

The biggest thing to be aware of is heat dissipation - make sure there's enough exposed surface area to adequately dissipate the heat generated by the drive or it will shorten it's lifespan.

Personally, I mounted two of the 'adapter' metal pieces that let you mount a 3 1/2" drive in a 5 1/4" bay to my cab, then put the HDD in there.  Airflow around the entire thing, held a bit off the surface, etc.  Works well. 

[Gatt]

I'd venture it's actually worse now.  A long time ago the sector and track layouts were consistent and easy to settle to,  my understanding is that today,  due to the incredibly small size,  there's variance between where tracks and sectors lie.  So the heads aren't just trying to settle onto a track by hitting everything around it until it finds the right location,  but it's also gotta fight gravity to keep the head there,  since the sectors are so tiny any minute shifting can easily cause problems.

I've seen nothing but complaints regarding drives > 1 TB and failure rates,  and I wouldn't be surprised if there's a relation there.  Enterprise level solutions are also in RAID setups,  with redundant backup,  so problems would be seemlessly bypassed and invisible to all but IT.

I could be wrong,  I'm not saying I'm absolutely correct,  but TBH,  the tech in a hard drive really hasn't changed in 10+ years aside from perpendicular sectors,  even the seek times and rotation speeds are very similiar to what you would've used for a Pentium 2.

But honestly,  the failures I've seen could just as easily be attributed to heat dissipation as well,  so I'm just going to bow out here as I really don't have anything else I could add that I'd feel accurate about.

[jardine]

Well I know nothing about vectors, sectors or RAIDS etc so your input is appreciated. Thanks guy.

It sounds like the one thing I need to do is ensure there is air flow around my hdd as at the moment there really isn't. It's just stuck to the side with the tape and this may not be enough  bugger.

[severdhed]

i'd be hesitant to use tape or velco to hold my hard drive to a cabinet.  a few angle brackets and screws are cheap and easy, and make sure it isn't going to fall.