Another Question for the Computer Genius' at CAF

[MarieVeronica]

I was wondering if this is true. I heard (or read somewhere) that an electric desk fan, running… while sitting next to your computer or lap top will damage the drive. Is that true? And why? (I vaguely remember something about a damaging magnetic reaction. Sound familiar? Or did I hear wrong?).

Also… if it IS true… will a ceiling fan have the same effect? AND… will any kind of electric fans (desk or ceiling) have an adverse effect on a DSL box?

I’m curious… because we run a LOT of fans in our house. And I have a new computer that I don’t wanna “fry”.

Thank you, Computer Genius’! And God bless!

 

[jmcrae]

I was wondering if this is true. I heard (or read somewhere) that an electric desk fan, running… while sitting next to your computer or lap top will damage the drive. Is that true? And why? (I vaguely remember something about a damaging magnetic reaction. Sound familiar? Or did I hear wrong?).

Also… if it IS true… will a ceiling fan have the same effect? AND… will any kind of electric fans (desk or ceiling) have an adverse effect on a DSL box?

I’m curious… because we run a LOT of fans in our house. And I have a new computer that I don’t wanna “fry”.

Thank you, Computer Genius’! And God bless!

As long as the fan is a reasonable distance away from the computer, I can’t think of any harm that would be done - quite the opposite, since computers need to remain cool.

 

[passus]

I was wondering if this is true. I heard (or read somewhere) that an electric desk fan, running… while sitting next to your computer or lap top will damage the drive. Is that true? And why? (I vaguely remember something about a damaging magnetic reaction. Sound familiar? Or did I hear wrong?).

Also… if it IS true… will a ceiling fan have the same effect? AND… will any kind of electric fans (desk or ceiling) have an adverse effect on a DSL box?

I’m curious… because we run a LOT of fans in our house. And I have a new computer that I don’t wanna “fry”.

Thank you, Computer Genius’! And God bless!

No, that’s ridiculous.

In fact, there is a fan (or fans) inside your computer unless you just bought a MacBook Air!

 

[flyingfish]

It doesn’t sound right. There are in fact countless “cooling pads” with built in fans that are meant for you to put your laptop on so that it stays cooler when you are running applications that consume a lot of resources and heat up the computer.

 

[pamsparkle]

If the fan is blowing directly on the computer, it can force dust and microscopic particles into the computer. This can cause the computer to overheat.

The fans inside the computer, and those of cooling pads for notebooks, draw air away from the computer, not into it.

Always arrange fans to draw hot air away from computers.

 

[MarieVeronica]

Thanks guys, for your responses. :thankyou:

It’s not the fan, blowing air on the computer, that I’m concerned about. I know that computers must stay cool.

But I had heard (somewhere ) that the fan MOTOR has some kind of damaging “magnetic pull” on a computer drive. That was my concern. (fyi… it IS a laptop; not a desk model).

So… if anyone knows about this particular thing… I’d love to hear your responses. Thanks again, and God bless. I appreciate your knowledge.

MV

 

[jwashu]

Things are much more “shielded” today than they were say… 30 years ago.

What you have heard and are putting together is the fact that data stored on a hard drive is magnetic (like a old cassette tape). If you place a powerful enough magnet on it or near it, it could erase the hard drive.

At the same time, electric motors also have magnets and when plugged in and turned on these increase in strength.

Those are true however the magnets are not powerful enough, unless you had some giant fan (like a commercial one) and took the hard drive out of your system and sat it on the motor of the fan.

As another poster noted, there are small fans in computers themselves to keep the system cool.

People use to worry more about computer speakers than anything else because most speakers have some decent sized magnets in them. For years you may have seen the term “shielded” on the computer speakers meaning that the magnets are shielded to keep them from distorting the image on the CRT. Since almost all speakers are done that way now though, and very few new CRTs are being produced, you don’t even see that anymore.

I would keep your DSL modem, if it’s also a wireless router, away from strong fluorescent lights, large fans (ceiling fans are always fine), floorstanding speakers (big ones) etc… because it could effect your wireless signal but shouldn’t effect your DSL itself.

The one thing I will so though is don’t put your computer on the floor, especially if you have carpet. The very few motherboards I have seen fried for seemingly no reason were because of static electricity and people vacuuming right up next to a system sitting on the floor. Minimal static is no problem unless you are actually working on the system in which case you just ground yourself before you start. The case will usually protect everything. However a vacuum creates a LOT of static electricity right in front of the brushes so… just keep your computer on a desk or stand or if it’s on the floor, don’t vacuum right up next to it.

Joe

 

[RebeccaJ]

Read this doc…scroll down there is a section on “clean power”.

I’ve worked in IT for years. The rare problem I’ve seen with fans is that the power use fluctuates and causes “dirty power” when plugged into the same circuit as the computer. Especially if it is the same power strip. I’ve also seen it happen with space heaters.

 

[musicality]

If the fan is blowing directly on the computer, it can force dust and microscopic particles into the computer. This can cause the computer to overheat.

The fans inside the computer, and those of cooling pads for notebooks, draw air away from the computer, not into it.

Always arrange fans to draw hot air away from computers.

pamsparkle makes a good point. To address your question of the magnetic “pull”-- This myth probably originated from the concept of magnetic flux. I don’t really feel the need to explain it, but you should know that it is virtually impossible that an electric fan would be harming your hard drive due to electromagnetic forces. (As long as you don’t pull the magnets out of the motor and stick them on the hard drive, you should be fine! )

 

[cthulhubryan]

Fans do cause minor disruptions to surrounding magnetic fields, but only enough to every so often make you screen look a bit off. Degauss the screen and that will go away.

 

[Imryl]

If the fan is blowing directly on the computer, it can force dust and microscopic particles into the computer. This can cause the computer to overheat.

The fans inside the computer, and those of cooling pads for notebooks, draw air away from the computer, not into it.

Always arrange fans to draw hot air away from computers.

Actually the fan doesn’t technically draw air away from the processor as it’s primary function. It helps by running air over or under the processor, or around, under or through the heat sink to help in dissipating the heat from the heat sink on which the processor is mounted. While a build up of excess particles can cause your computer to over heat, that is fixed simply by getting a “can of air” and spraying it over the different boards and getting the big lumps of dust out of the case.

Yes, they really do sell cans of air.

A few microscopic particles aren’t going to hurt a thing. Unless they happen to land on the die before it’s packaged. But they test for that before and after packaging.

And an interesting fact. It is predicted that processors will have the same heat density as the surface of the sun by 2013.

(Site: Somewhere on Intel’s web page… they like to post interesting facts like that)

 

[Imryl]

The one thing I will so though is don’t put your computer on the floor, especially if you have carpet. The very few motherboards I have seen fried for seemingly no reason were because of static electricity and people vacuuming right up next to a system sitting on the floor. Minimal static is no problem unless you are actually working on the system in which case you just ground yourself before you start. The case will usually protect everything. However a vacuum creates a LOT of static electricity right in front of the brushes so… just keep your computer on a desk or stand or if it’s on the floor, don’t vacuum right up next to it.

Joe

I’ve never heard of a mother board frying as the result vacuum cleaner being run close to a computer. The only time I’ve really seen carpet being the culprit is when someone puts a board down on the carpet, or… as you say, walking around and then not grounding themself before picking up a piece of hardware.

 

[Imryl]

Thanks guys, for your responses. :thankyou:

It’s not the fan, blowing air on the computer, that I’m concerned about. I know that computers must stay cool.

But I had heard (somewhere ) that the fan MOTOR has some kind of damaging “magnetic pull” on a computer drive. That was my concern. (fyi… it IS a laptop; not a desk model).

So… if anyone knows about this particular thing… I’d love to hear your responses. Thanks again, and God bless. I appreciate your knowledge.

MV

I can assure you this won’t happen. I mean not unless you took the mother board out of the case, removed the processor from the pcb board and then removed the packaging that holds the silicon wafer… then you’d have to remove the motor from the fan and placing it right next to the wafer.

That might cause something to screw up. But by that point, it’s rendered completely useless since processors are surface mounted onto the boards, and you can guarantee you’ve killed your chip by removing the wafer from the packaging.

Chips are terribly finky and very sensitive, but the designers who work with the technology know that and put precautions into place to protect the hardware.

 

[Alex246]

I think people are also forgetting one thing: there is a quite powerful motor inside your hard drive. If motors could harm your computer’s data…

 

[MarieVeronica]

You guys are awesome! Thanks so much for all your knowledge. I’m planning on moving my dsl modem to another room… where we have like… 3 fans going at any given moment. Our house is hot… and AC doesn’t work too well.

I feel better about it now. God bless. :thankyou: