3 ms·

The drives are filled with helium. What happens when the helium leaks? I assume the drives will slow down or fail instantly. iPhones use MEMS-based clocks th

• cptskippy 6y ago
  The pressure differential between the drive and the atmosphere isn't going to be that great, if any, so it's pretty unlikely that a leak will occur. If the Helium were to leak out then the drive would probably fail much more quickly than it otherwise would have but there isn't nearly enough helium to affect any MEMS devices. Also consider that these drives are going to be in a system with forced air cooling so any Helium that might escape will be quickly vented. Additionally, MEMS devices don't fail but rather behave differently while under the influence of helium.
• himinlomax 6y ago
  As cptskippy said, the helium is at atmospheric pressure, so a leak would not fail catastrophically. Helium would more or less slowly diffuse. If the leak is small enough, helium could get out but larger molecules would have a harder time. Thus the pressure inside the enclosure would get slightly lower than atmosphere and leaking would slow down. The iPhone MEMS failed when a rather large amount of pressurized, cryogenic helium was leaked during an MRI machine servicing. The quantity of unpressurized helium in a tiny HDD enclosure is minuscule, and thus the slow diffusion is unlikely to register above background levels, even at very close range.