An altitude of 7000 feet is just over 2100m. I have regularly made
recordings with a Nagra V and with an HHB Portadrive at altitudes over
5000m (16,400 feet) with no problems at all.
To the best of my knowledge, both of those machines use 'ruggedised'
hard drives, well-suited to professional location recording. I cannot
vouch for the hard disk used in the Edirol. However, as one of my
students just reminded me, we have trekked to 5000m and above while
listening to hard-disk-based iPods, again with no problems at all.
I might be wrong here, but I believe that hard disks are all sealed
and airtight, to prevent dust and other external contaminants from
getting in and crashing the heads. So, unless you went to an altitude
where the atmospheric pressure difference (between the outside air and
that inside the drive) was enough to blow the seal, you won't have to
worry about that pillow of air between the disk and the heads.
I'd expect the specifications of a hard disk would include
altitude/elevation limitations, and I'm sure they'll be much higher
than you intend to go. Many people live and work above the elevations
you're talking about with the full gamut of electronic devices. For
example, the city of Lhasa (Tibet) is at an altitude of 3650m (approx.
12,000 feet), and personal computers and so on work fine there.
A bigger problem at altitude is temperature - the higher you go, the
colder it gets. Some batteries don't perform well at low tempertures,
likewise with some mechanical devices (e.g. camera shutters and
perhaps hard drives). We often carry spare sets of camera batteries in
our pockets, keeping them warm and ready to swap out because they tend
to fail quickly when cold.
I remember a great story from many years ago in DPA's newsletter
'Crosstalk' which featured a guy who was recording in the Arctic (or
Antarctic?) with a pair of DPA mics and a DAT recorder. IIRC, he had
to keep the DAT recorder inside his down jacket and pressed against
his body to keep it warm and working. If the Edirol is small enough to
keep in a pocket or otherwise close to your body, you might consider a
similar approach. But I suspect it won't be necessary...
|