04-29-2018, 11:35 AM
No, I didn't measure the power consumption. I was relying the current draw information printed on the hard disk label. It says how many Amps it will drawn from the +12V rail and +5V rail. for a 120W (12V 10A) power brick, minus 3A for RockPro64, there is 7A left for your hard drive and peripherals. Running 3-4 drives shouldn't be a problem. If not all of them will be running at full seek and spin, you may even add more hard drives.
Regarding the 5V rail, of course you can run multiple LM2596S-5.0 on multiple drives, just make sure you don't short out the 5V rails (GND of course need to be common). I would say powering 2 3.5' HDD per LM2596S-5.0 is pretty safe. Or you can always grab a better IC to provide higher current for your 5V rail.
Regarding the 5V rail, of course you can run multiple LM2596S-5.0 on multiple drives, just make sure you don't short out the 5V rails (GND of course need to be common). I would say powering 2 3.5' HDD per LM2596S-5.0 is pretty safe. Or you can always grab a better IC to provide higher current for your 5V rail.
