On Sat, 7 Aug 2004 09:26:47 -0400, GS
wrote:

snip

... constructive information regarding my questions.

The answer is, yes heat can contribute to early demise of a HDD.
On a portable the jarring from moving it around is another
potential problem... which would kill a drive first depends on
the user. Many people only hook up an external long enough to
transfer a few files and so drive never gets very hot before
being powered off again... for those people a fan isn't
necessary, but for others who leave drive on for long enough to
heat up, the fan does help. Firewire vs USB2... if you need it,
get it.