My new mSata SSD get quite hot

I have bought an Crucial M500 SSD for my Lenovo Y500. The normal operating temperature is between 50 and 60 degrees celsius(around 130-140 fahrenheit). This seems a bit too hot for a ssd doesn't it? I can even feel the heat if i rest my hand on the lelft down corner of the lappie.

Should i be concerned?

 

The cut off temps for the M500 (and most newer gen SSD's too as far as I've seen) is 70 C.

While this may be 'normal' - it is way too hot for me for a mobile device - especially when a spinning disk with 1TB storage and 7200RPM idles at around 30 C.


This is one reason why I don't use the Crucial M500's in my notebooks (I want the limited mobile thermal headroom to be available for the cpu - where the performance is immediately felt if it is throttled and not by the storage sub-system, where productivity is hardly affected - even if the SSD does throttle for one reason or another).

Hope this helps.


Good luck.

 

So the idle temps i am getting is normal for the SSD i have, but extra heat inside a laptop is never good?

 

Is that the SSD temperature or some other component?

Run HWiNFO, enable Sensors and check the SSD temperature. It should be listed under S.M.A.R.T.

John

 

Yes it is actually the SSD. See screenshot:

 

That is surprisingly hot. Is it in a hot area of the computer or is it the SSD itself running hot?

Perhaps one test would be to run a storage benchmark (eg Crystal DiskMark) and see the effect that has on the temperature both of the mSATA SSD and the other components. I've just done some tests on my computer and the write parts of the CDM sequential and 512k tests should reveal what is happening. They exercise the SSD but don't load the CPU.

John

 

Wow the max temp during crystal diskmark was 69 degrees celsius. At that point it probably throttled down.

j

This really doesn't seem right?

 

All those storage devices are getting hotter than the CPU. Did you happen to see the GPU temperatures in case that is a source of heat?

However, I wonder whether the monitoring data is getting muddled up. Isn't the WD Elements an external device which shouldn't get very hot? It's strange to see it having exactly the same temperatures as the Crucial M500. The Seagate HDD is also reported to have reached 69C, which is probably outside its rated operating temperature range. It should be possible to get a second opinion on the Seagate temperatures using the Seagate Seatools to read its SMART data.

It is also possible that the programs aren't reading the Crucial or WD SMART data correctly. One check would be to look at the temperatures of those devices immediately after start-up. In your screen dump both those devices have a minimum temperature of 51C whereas the Seagate started with a cool 29C.

John

 

Hi John,

I didn't notice at first that all three storage devices have same max and current temp. I can say that it's definetely hwmonitor showing incorrect data for the two hdd's(WD and Seagate). Other monitoring tools show very normal temps for the two hdd's and exact same temps for the ssd as hwmonitor. The temp of the ssd is after startup around 40-45 degrees celsius. After an hour of normal usage it's around 55 degrees celsius. And during benchmark it gets as hot as 69 degrees celsius and probably throttles because the max temp of the ssd according to crucial is 70 degrees celsius. The gpu temp was around 34 degrees celsius, so that couldn't be a problem.

It is definetely only the Crucial SSD heating up so much. According to Crucial 55 degrees celsius is normal operating temp for the M500, but getting 69 degrees celsius and throttling after just 2 minutes of benchmark with crystaldiskmark didn't really make a good impression on me.

 

Have you tried using the SSD in another machine? From the way it looks, either your computer has poor thermal management in and around the SSD or the SSD itself is bad and should be replaced.