SPCR

Any idea if running two raptors in Scythe Quiet Drives would be any louder than running four 7200RPM drives. On the 7200RPM side I'm mostly curious in the 500GB from seagate (eg the 7200.11 with 250GB platters), WD and Samsung.

Is it too close to call? How much quieter/louder are we talking about? any links to tests or related questions would be welcome too

thanks

you cant put raptors in a scythe quiet drive box, it will fry your HD's.

Eh, that may or may not be true. My samsung drive is actually cooler for being in the quiet drive

Raptor in a quiet drive will work fine. It doesn't really get that hot. A high capacity 500GB drive will normally run hotter.

The Raptor is just silly loud, even in a quiet drive the seeks are unbearable. At least they are to me. I'd go with the Samsungs.

Aris wrote:you cant put raptors in a scythe quiet drive box, it will fry your HD's.

Prejudiced bs. For the record, my Raptor runs 44c in my SQD. Hardly hot or even close to frying. If I remember correctly, you mentioned in another thread, that your hard drives run even hotter.

Moogles wrote:Raptor in a quiet drive will work fine. It doesn't really get that hot. A high capacity 500GB drive will normally run hotter.

The Raptor is just silly loud, even in a quiet drive the seeks are unbearable. At least they are to me. I'd go with the Samsungs.

QFT. Although I have to remind, that people have difference tolerances for noise. But I will confirm, that the seeks are clearly audible.

Erssa wrote:

Aris wrote:you cant put raptors in a scythe quiet drive box, it will fry your HD's.

Prejudiced bs. For the record, my Raptor runs 44c in my SQD. Hardly hot or even close to frying. If I remember correctly, you mentioned in another thread, that your hard drives run even hotter.

Moogles wrote:Raptor in a quiet drive will work fine. It doesn't really get that hot. A high capacity 500GB drive will normally run hotter.

The Raptor is just silly loud, even in a quiet drive the seeks are unbearable. At least they are to me. I'd go with the Samsungs.

QFT. Although I have to remind, that people have difference tolerances for noise. But I will confirm, that the seeks are clearly audible.

I confirm that as well and am now looking for a better solution. Vibration noise is not properly eliminated by the SQD (in my opinion anyway).

Erssa wrote:

Aris wrote:you cant put raptors in a scythe quiet drive box, it will fry your HD's.

Prejudiced bs. For the record, my Raptor runs 44c in my SQD. Hardly hot or even close to frying. If I remember correctly, you mentioned in another thread, that your hard drives run even hotter.

P.S. My raptor failed about a month ago. But I still don't think it's more dangerous to run raptor in SQD then any other hard drive.

I'd start out with a plan based on eSATA using the whole 6 feet of cable (esp with 2 Raptors)

I'd construct a housing of noise blocking materials, have the drives inside headsinked and vibration isolated. Would have a 120 mm fan in the bottom at 500-800 rpm. Assuming the HDDs are thus 6' further from the back of the case---and probably behind or under some furniture....the percieved noise at the users position should be MUCH less than could be had in the main case.

This 2 HDD eSATA enclosure....not required to be real compact-or pretty-can be more effective than any off the shelf unit....if you apply all the HDD quieting trickery. The fan...at 8-10 ft from your ear...should be inaudible.

Sounds like you want to do a 2 HDD raid with Raptors or a 4 HDD raid with 7600 rpm drives. Doing 4 drives remote....that starts getting expensive in terms of the cost of cables etc.

You CAN get existing eSATA enclosures...and enclose those with a fan. Probably can find the hardware to skip the enclosures....except that I'd get one if just for the software (if you might want to shut them down) If these would be system/OS drives...probably the software is not needed MOST modern boards see an eSATA drive as just another SATA.

echn111 wrote:Vibration noise is not properly eliminated by the SQD (in my opinion anyway).

The SQD has zero vibration damping qualities. What quieting it achieves is based on adding nearly a pound and a half of aluminum mass to the HDD mass, doubling the weight of most HDDs. This should reduce the HDD noise by 6dBA. Is that your experience?

(The aluminum is closely coupled to the HDD at low and at middle frequencies. I suspect if you have an HDD with high frequency whine, the reduction would be less than 6dBA, perhaps substantially less. This is because at high frequencies, the aluminum is not intimately coupled to the HDD. Again, can anyone report on this? I'm talking theory.)

High performance drives (any) and silence? No way. Not only the SQD fails, but also the advanced homemade enclosures that render drives like Samsung SP absolutely inaudible. Noise levels can be redused from unbearable to tolerable, and that's it.

EndoSteel wrote:High performance drives (any) and silence? No way. Not only the SQD fails, but also the advanced homemade enclosures that render drives like Samsung SP absolutely inaudible. Noise levels can be redused from unbearable to tolerable, and that's it.

...which is why I'd do the advanced homemade drive and ALSO move it 3X further from my ear....like way under a desk. Dead silent? Maybe not ...but if a guy is choosing between 4 "quieter" drives running full time...or 2 of the louder Raptors....neither is gonna get totally silent. It's like the guy who's got an 8800 vid card and OC'd an Intel Quad to the max....then wants to make it quiet.

It's relative.

A 700 hp dragster can be made semi-quiet. You could maybe even set it up to get better than 5 mpg....you can't turn it into a Prius.