250gb expansion card runs warm, even when not mounted

Community Support
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1

I’ve got a new 250GB expansion card in my new 12 inch framework and it’s warm even when not mounted. It’s definitely not dangerously warm and it works but, it’s a bit unconfortable when used on the lap and I don’t think it should be generating heat when it’s not being used. If it’s constantly wasting my battery then I probably wont want to leave it in there when I’m not using it, at which point I’m not really sure why I should have it as an expansion card rather than a dongle (apart from the reduced risk of breakage).

NixOS 25.11

Laptop 12

250GB expansion Gen 2

2

I have the same problem on Fedora Silverblue 43, Laptop 13 AMD Ryzen AI 5 340.

3

I have an older SanDisk USB drive with an A & C connector that gets stupid hot when plugged into USBC for whatever reason. Even if it is just “idle”. Someone can probably chime in as to the reason it gets so warm aside from the fact that if it is “plugged in” the OS sees it as an active drive mounted and polls it regularly.