Apparently, the iron particles in a hard drive disk stick up more than I thought and that causes turbulence!!
Seems all our HDs have been more or less open to the air, which may account for the move away from water-cooled computers? Hitachi has announced that they will be making new drives filled with Helium and sealed so we won't hear the higher pitched noises that will cause. OK, that last part I made up. But the new drives reportedly will allow the heads to be much closer to the platters because Helium is less dense than "air." This will also reduce friction and save up to 20% of the energy needed to keep those platters spinning! I'm familiar with 'air turbulence' and I'm all in favor of less of it, especially if it also saves energy! <
Helium-filled hard disks will lead to higher capacities>.
