computers and cold temperatures[OT]

[Gilles Gravier]

Hi!

On 11/11/2011 16:40, Colin Law wrote:
> On 11 November 2011 15:11, Gilles Gravier<ggravier at fsfe.org>  wrote:
>> On 11/11/2011 16:00, Colin Law wrote:
>>> On 11 November 2011 14:57, compdoc<compdoc at hotrodpc.com>    wrote:
>>>>> IS it a bad thing to have a computer operating, say, in a garage during
>>>>> the cold winters?
>>>> [snip]
>>>> Dealing with heat in summer is worse than the cold in winter.
>>> I think that might rather depend on where you are in the world. :)
>> Actually, it is GOOGLE who did a study on computer failure rates in warmer
>> temperatures, and they found that hard disks, in particular, tend to faire
>> better around 35-45°C, which is well above the normally prescribed
>> datacenter temperature of 20°C. Have a look at :
>> http://static.googleusercontent.com/external_content/untrusted_dlcp/labs.google.com/en//papers/disk_failures.pdf,
>> in particular section 3.4 (temperature).
> Not necessarily disagreeing, but my reading of that is that the
> temperatures are *drive* temperatures not *ambient*.  So a room
> temperature of 20C will give air temperature inside the box rather
> more that this and the drive will be warmer again.
True, but drives in properly cooled bays tend to be very close to room 
temp. (If the heat sinks are good - i.e. not in your typical desktop PC.)

Gilles.