DLT 7000 - how hot should it get?

Hi folks,

I have a QUANTUM DLT7000 1624. It's mounted internally. The base of the
unit gets hot. Too hot to touch for more than 5 or 6 seconds.

Is this normal/expected/unusual?
--
Dan Langille
The Technical BSD Conference - http://www.bsdcan.org/

"Dan Langille" wrote in
message ...
Hi folks,

I have a QUANTUM DLT7000 1624. It's mounted internally. The base of the
unit gets hot. Too hot to touch for more than 5 or 6 seconds.

Is this normal/expected/unusual?
--
Dan Langille
The Technical BSD Conference - http://www.bsdcan.org/

DLT7000 drives need a decent amount of airflow to keep them cool. There's a
couple of pretty big motors in that drive that consume a lot of power, even
when stopped. Make sure you have ample airflow through the cabinet to
prevent the drive from frying itself and the tape.

Rob

On Sun, 20 Feb 2005 19:28:45 +0100, "Rob Turk"
wrote:

"Dan Langille" wrote in
message ...
Hi folks,

I have a QUANTUM DLT7000 1624. It's mounted internally. The base of the
unit gets hot. Too hot to touch for more than 5 or 6 seconds.

Is this normal/expected/unusual?

DLT7000 drives need a decent amount of airflow to keep them cool. There's a
couple of pretty big motors in that drive that consume a lot of power, even
when stopped. Make sure you have ample airflow through the cabinet to
prevent the drive from frying itself and the tape.

Thanks for the confirmation.

Now that I've added a bay fan, that airflow alone seems to have cooled
things done. The base is still warm, but not so warm as to force your hand
away. At the same time, I also added two 80mm fans to the back of the
case.

I'm planning to get some more DLT 7000s, and I think I'll go for external
cases. The unit seem to have a good reputation, and are much cheaper than
the DLT 8000 with only slightly tape capacity.
--
Dan Langille
The Technical BSD Conference - http://www.bsdcan.org/

Yup.
BTW, the maximum temperature spec for media is only slightly above 40
C. The drive can run a lot hotter but the bits will fall off the tape
quickly.
You can download the manual from www.quantum.com. It has info on
airflow.

Ralf-Peter

On 25 Feb 2005 15:55:34 -0800, "RPR" wrote:

Yup.
BTW, the maximum temperature spec for media is only slightly above 40
C. The drive can run a lot hotter but the bits will fall off the tape
quickly.
You can download the manual from www.quantum.com. It has info on
airflow.

I found the product manual at:
http://www.quantum.com/am/service_su...ds/dlt7000.htm

It indicates:
Airflow Velocity: 125 Linear Feet per Minute (LFM) measured directly in
front of the front bezel

Eh?

I was planning to get some drive cooling such as this:

http://www.tigerdirect.ca/applicatio...6665&CatId=495

Any comments?
--
Dan Langille
The Technical BSD Conference - http://www.bsdcan.org/

Dan Langille wrote:

It indicates:
Airflow Velocity: 125 Linear Feet per Minute (LFM) measured directly in
front of the front bezel

Eh?

Not quite a storm; comes out at less than walking speed.


Thomas

My experience is that any case (PC or SCSI box) with uncompromised
airflow is sufficient. That is, a closed case with a power supply
exhaust fan is good enough. If you run a drive in one of the (well
cooled) standard SCSI boxes you can just barely feel the airflow if you
put a finger right on the air intake below the handle.

In article l,
Rob Turk wrote:
"Dan Langille" wrote in
message ...
I have a QUANTUM DLT7000 1624. It's mounted internally. The base of the
unit gets hot. Too hot to touch for more than 5 or 6 seconds.
Is this normal/expected/unusual?
DLT7000 drives need a decent amount of airflow to keep them cool. There's a
couple of pretty big motors in that drive that consume a lot of power, even
when stopped.

We were once told that a design flaw in the DLT7000 made them prone to
overheating when they do not have a loaded tape; no tape at all, or a
tape ready to be removed would cause the problem.

This was what the repair shop told us:
If OPERATE HANDLE LED (Green) is on for 20 minutes or longer,
drive will over heat, which could cause PERMENANT Damage to the
main board or to the power supply, so PLEASE KEEP A TAPE LOADED
in your drive to keep it cool.

After replacing a couple drives we changed our procedures to not
automatically eject the tape at the end of the backups. We manually
eject the tape when ready to load another, or load a scratch tape to
minimize the "no loaded tape" condition.

We've had no further problems for several years.

I'm not sure I really believe that one of Quantum's high-end tape
drives self destructs when not in use but you might want to see if
the drive stays cooler when it has a tape loaded.
--
Jim Prescott - Computing and Networking Group
School of Engineering and Applied Sciences, University of Rochester, NY

This has been an issue, but mostly with the DLT8000. The reason is that
the motors apply tension after the eject in preparation for opening the
handle, which never happens. If you have compromised airflow, there is
some failure rate associated with overheating in this mode. If you open
the handle after the drive turns on the Operate Handle LED this isn't
an issue. Leaving a tape in the drive for an extended period of time is
not such a good idea since it is much warmer inside the drive than
outside, and tapes don't like heat. Ejecting only manually via the
button is a good fix.
A firmware fix for this is in V85. The drive locks the handle and
reduces the tension (after 10 minutes IIRC) and you have to press the
unload button [again].