Power adapter question

[TnT]

So I have this external hard drive enclosue that was boxed when I moved and apparently got separated from its power adapter. I found a stray power adapter which *I think* belongs to it, but not really sure. It's a generic enclosure from CompUSA that says Mobile Disk on it and the power adapter is from Sunny. Nothing on the enclosure says what the specs of the power adapter should be.

The hard drive that is in there I didn't really care about so I just tried the two together. It seemed to have worked with the drive being loaded. It did sound louder then I remember, but I haven't used it in a year and a half. Was this smoke test good enough to put those together? Or could I work for a while and then blow up if they aren't compatible?

Thanks,
Thien

[Gurm]

Well, if you're giving it too much juice you could eventually melt it, yeah. But ... *shrug*

[ND66]

....Or could I work for a while and then blow up if they aren't compatible?

I couldn't help myself, I just had to look up to your Forum name (TnT), then "blow up" and the TnT again......

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[TnT]

Hehe, I... blow up, nice catch. I think I changed the idea behind that sentence half way through.

[Evildead666]

If the external HDD enclosure has a fan, and the fan is running louder, you may be putting too many volts through it.
A fan with (way) too many volts will fail quickly.

I accidentally put a 12V fan into a Laser printer without noticing it was 24V rail.
The fan was very loud for the ~5seconds it was on for, i noticed the extreme speed compared to the other fan and switched off.
The air smelled like someone had just used a hair dryer. Burnt hair smell.
Not good.

[ND66]

I accidentally put a 12V fan into a Laser printer without noticing it was 24V rail.
The fan was very loud for the ~5seconds it was on for, i noticed the extreme speed compared to the other fan and switched off.

You almost did discover a way to levitate a device, didn’t you?

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