I have a Samsung single platter suspended but it is rill the noisiest thing in my PC!!
What is the quietest Hard Drive available?
Quietest Hard Drive?
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I've got a couple of Samsung drives that I'm replacing. They are still very quiet and running well. Drive space wasn't the biggest concern when I purchased them- quiet was.
Well the time has come to upgrade and I went back and forth before settling on a pair of Hitachi 7K1000.B HDT721032SLA360.
I didn't bite on the WD drives due to head park, casting, and build questions (single/double platter). I was going to go for the Seagate ST3500410AS but that was the same time that the firmware issues came about and didn't bite then since there wasn't a definitive answer whether it spilled over to the LP .12 series.
Maybe you would consider the new Samsung 500GB F3 that just came out?
Ultimately though the quietest is an SSD.
Well the time has come to upgrade and I went back and forth before settling on a pair of Hitachi 7K1000.B HDT721032SLA360.
I didn't bite on the WD drives due to head park, casting, and build questions (single/double platter). I was going to go for the Seagate ST3500410AS but that was the same time that the firmware issues came about and didn't bite then since there wasn't a definitive answer whether it spilled over to the LP .12 series.
Maybe you would consider the new Samsung 500GB F3 that just came out?
Ultimately though the quietest is an SSD.
Hi, ultimate solution will be a SSD with network storage for large media files etc.
If this is not practical then I suggest a laptop drive, probably Samsung or WD 5400rpm in a 2.5" Scythe Quiet Drive, which can then be put in a 3.5" Scythe Quiet Drive (QuietPC.com actually suggest this!) and suspended
I think this would be pretty close to inaudible, but expensive (SQD ~£30 each) and 3.5" SQD is quite large too. Could just use the 2.5" SQD, probably to good effect, I think you can still get 4200rpm laptop drives, maybe worth looking at but probably poor performers and barely quieter than good examples of 5400rpm drives.
One of the 3.5" 5400rpm Samsungs SPCR recently reviewed in SQD (or equivalent) should be good too, I use Samsung F1 (7200rpm) in SQD and it helps idle noise noticeably, to the point where it's no longer noticeable and seeks are barely noticeable, even late at night.
Just at the moment I have WD 1001FALS in my SQD, to me it's significantly quieter than Panaflo L1A at 7V. The L1A pretty much drowns it out at same distance of ~0.5m I was listening at. It's nearly as quiet as the fan at 5V. SPCR measured the FALS at 21dB(A) and the Panaflo at <18dB(A) (pre chamber so couldn't measure lower). The Samsung F1 was measured around 16dB(A), this pretty much matches up with my experience that the WD in the SQD is similar noise to the Samsung drive bare. I.E. the SQD knocks 4-5dB(A) off the WD noise, I guess it does similar to the F1's noise. It's rarely quiet enough when I'm using PC that I notice the noise of the WD.
(I only stopped using the F1 due to question marks in my mind over its reliability, chkdsk had marked bad sectors etc. Samsung tool found the errors and wanted to completely wipe the drive, now says it's OK, may go back to using it again)
SPCR tested the 500GB Samsung at a mere 12dB(A) Say the SQD could knock another 3dB(A) off that's 9dB(A), quieter than SPCR anechoic chamber, should be quiet enough for anyone
Hope my rambling helps, Seb
If this is not practical then I suggest a laptop drive, probably Samsung or WD 5400rpm in a 2.5" Scythe Quiet Drive, which can then be put in a 3.5" Scythe Quiet Drive (QuietPC.com actually suggest this!) and suspended
I think this would be pretty close to inaudible, but expensive (SQD ~£30 each) and 3.5" SQD is quite large too. Could just use the 2.5" SQD, probably to good effect, I think you can still get 4200rpm laptop drives, maybe worth looking at but probably poor performers and barely quieter than good examples of 5400rpm drives.One of the 3.5" 5400rpm Samsungs SPCR recently reviewed in SQD (or equivalent) should be good too, I use Samsung F1 (7200rpm) in SQD and it helps idle noise noticeably, to the point where it's no longer noticeable and seeks are barely noticeable, even late at night.
Just at the moment I have WD 1001FALS in my SQD, to me it's significantly quieter than Panaflo L1A at 7V. The L1A pretty much drowns it out at same distance of ~0.5m I was listening at. It's nearly as quiet as the fan at 5V. SPCR measured the FALS at 21dB(A) and the Panaflo at <18dB(A) (pre chamber so couldn't measure lower). The Samsung F1 was measured around 16dB(A), this pretty much matches up with my experience that the WD in the SQD is similar noise to the Samsung drive bare. I.E. the SQD knocks 4-5dB(A) off the WD noise, I guess it does similar to the F1's noise. It's rarely quiet enough when I'm using PC that I notice the noise of the WD.
(I only stopped using the F1 due to question marks in my mind over its reliability, chkdsk had marked bad sectors etc. Samsung tool found the errors and wanted to completely wipe the drive, now says it's OK, may go back to using it again)
SPCR tested the 500GB Samsung at a mere 12dB(A) Say the SQD could knock another 3dB(A) off that's 9dB(A), quieter than SPCR anechoic chamber, should be quiet enough for anyone
Hope my rambling helps, Seb
The upgrade from the Samsung drives to the Hitachi drives I posted earlier went excellent. I can't believe the difference in the overall sound of my system. I thought the Samsung drives only made mild sound during read/writes - and those were barely audible. The Hitachi drives I can't even hear - nothing, zero, nada, zilch.
I suspected that the Samsung drives did have some vibration, but it was mild. The Hitachi's have none at all. I haven't done anything with the feature tool or the bios to change the audible nature of the drive.
I'm happy - should hold till next upgrade.
Did you make a decision yet - SSD/Standard drive combination or just SSD?
I suspected that the Samsung drives did have some vibration, but it was mild. The Hitachi's have none at all. I haven't done anything with the feature tool or the bios to change the audible nature of the drive.
I'm happy - should hold till next upgrade.
Did you make a decision yet - SSD/Standard drive combination or just SSD?
Last edited by lemmy on Sat Aug 08, 2009 4:05 pm, edited 1 time in total.
The Samsung HD502HI is quiet, I'd say quieter than a 7200 rpm Samsung single platter drive (a Spinpoint F1 HD322HJ) but the difference isn't that big if you decouple the drive and have the case standing 1 meter away from you.Koolpc wrote:Still undecided!
Samsung 7200 rpm vibrates a lot, and the 5400 rpm version almost doesn't vibrate at all. Idle noise is similar in quality for both drives, only the 5400 rpm drive is somewhat lower and becomes inaudible much quicker when you move away from the drive, than it does with the 7200 rpm drive.
If I put my ear against the case, i can hear the HDD humming/whoosh noise, but if I start to move away, say 5 cm from it, the noise quickly drops.
SSD may be the ultimate, but in the meantime I have a practically silent set-up with a WD Scorpio 5400 laptop hard drive wrapped in foam (yes, covering the 'do not cover' holes and all) which is a stunt you cannot get away with on a 3.5".
Seems like nothing kills 'em year after year, and quieter than a mouse too.
Seems like nothing kills 'em year after year, and quieter than a mouse too.
If you don't have very high needs for performance, 5400rpm notebook drive would be the best. SSDs may be quieter but it's the loudest component of the system that matters, and even notebook can be easily drowned by PSU fan, PSU coil buzz or whine, motherboard coil whine, fan woosh or ticking. Regardless how ridiculously you undervolt fans, the fans may still be more audible than a non-enclosed 5400rpm laptop drive. Enclose it, and there's no question: any fan will drown HDD noise.
If you don't need extremely quiet system, 5400rpm desktop HDD is pretty darn quiet as well. More difficult to enclose and slightly louder to begin with, but way quieter than 7200rpm drives you have used so far... and quieter than any 7200rpm driven you have not yet tried.
I find it funny that lemmy recommends 7200rpm 3.5" versus SSD. Aren't they like... the noisiest vs the quietest? Why pick two extremes? 5400rpm laptop and 5400rpm desktop is usually the best way to go for extreme quietness. SSD only brings you extra performance. Unless you have a water cooling system (including PSU cooling) with water pump and radiator/fan located in another room, SSD won't really make any difference in noise when compared to enclosed 5400rpm or 4200rpm laptop drive. It will however, cost you a fortune.
If you don't need extremely quiet system, 5400rpm desktop HDD is pretty darn quiet as well. More difficult to enclose and slightly louder to begin with, but way quieter than 7200rpm drives you have used so far... and quieter than any 7200rpm driven you have not yet tried.
I find it funny that lemmy recommends 7200rpm 3.5" versus SSD. Aren't they like... the noisiest vs the quietest? Why pick two extremes? 5400rpm laptop and 5400rpm desktop is usually the best way to go for extreme quietness. SSD only brings you extra performance. Unless you have a water cooling system (including PSU cooling) with water pump and radiator/fan located in another room, SSD won't really make any difference in noise when compared to enclosed 5400rpm or 4200rpm laptop drive. It will however, cost you a fortune.
It's not so much that I recommended one over the other. If you look at the bottom of my post - I stated SSD would be the quietest. I'm stating from what I have hands on experience with. I think you have to look at utilization as well. Can a quieter drive from another drive manufacturer make one hold off on paying a hefty premium for the one thing you are looking for - quiet.
To be at the front of the technology curve also means paying the most for many PC components. At times there are tradeoffs as well. It reminds me of about 5 years ago when the drive makers were coming out with drives approaching 500GB and WD came out with the 36GB Raptor. Custom builders and boutique PC makers would load 1 or 2 of them in a system for OS and have another drive 10-15 times larger for data.
My PC sits in the common area of my home. In addition I'm hyper-sensitive to PC noise so it has to be quiet. I can understand anyone's desire to wanting to eliminate the noise.
Overall my money-clip rules.
To be at the front of the technology curve also means paying the most for many PC components. At times there are tradeoffs as well. It reminds me of about 5 years ago when the drive makers were coming out with drives approaching 500GB and WD came out with the 36GB Raptor. Custom builders and boutique PC makers would load 1 or 2 of them in a system for OS and have another drive 10-15 times larger for data.
My PC sits in the common area of my home. In addition I'm hyper-sensitive to PC noise so it has to be quiet. I can understand anyone's desire to wanting to eliminate the noise.
Overall my money-clip rules.
Last edited by lemmy on Sun Aug 09, 2009 9:05 am, edited 1 time in total.
Agreedwhiic wrote:If you don't have very high needs for performance, 5400rpm notebook drive would be the best. SSDs may be quieter but it's the loudest component of the system that matters, and even notebook can be easily drowned by PSU fan, PSU coil buzz or whine, motherboard coil whine, fan woosh or ticking. Regardless how ridiculously you undervolt fans, the fans may still be more audible than a non-enclosed 5400rpm laptop drive. Enclose it, and there's no question: any fan will drown HDD noise.
If you don't need extremely quiet system, 5400rpm desktop HDD is pretty darn quiet as well. More difficult to enclose and slightly louder to begin with, but way quieter than 7200rpm drives you have used so far... and quieter than any 7200rpm driven you have not yet tried.
I find it funny that lemmy recommends 7200rpm 3.5" versus SSD. Aren't they like... the noisiest vs the quietest? Why pick two extremes? 5400rpm laptop and 5400rpm desktop is usually the best way to go for extreme quietness. SSD only brings you extra performance. Unless you have a water cooling system (including PSU cooling) with water pump and radiator/fan located in another room, SSD won't really make any difference in noise when compared to enclosed 5400rpm or 4200rpm laptop drive. It will however, cost you a fortune.
lemmy, I'm still wonder how it is possible for a noise-obsessed person to say 7200rpm desktop drive (any of them, including Hitachi) to be completely inaudible. You say you're overly sensitive to PC noise. But does that mean that your computer is quiet?
Because I really have a problem believing complete inaudiblity of two 7200rpm desktop drives in the same case... unless it's masked by other loud components. Did you enclose it? Anyway, 5400rpm should be about the same even without enclosing. Flagship 5400rpm drives can be on par with 1-platter 7200rpm drives but 1-platter 5400rpm drives would be way quieter. Enclose it, and even high quality Corsair PSU alone might drown HDD noise... that is, without a single case or CPU fan. Go 2.5" and you can achieve similar results without enclosing. Ok. Noise character would be different as enclosing attenuates certain frequencies better than other. Enclose the 2.5 incher and claim to hear it through fan-swapped Corsair, and I consider any one of you completely paranoid. SSD is completely unnecessary for silencing.
Ok, so you say you only commented what you have personal experience with, using that as an excuse why you didn't mention any 5400rpm alternatives. Why did you mention Samsung F3 then as you don't own one?
As far as I can tell, you were not only talking about first-hand experience but general knowledge as well. But you left 5400rpm completely off the discussion for some reason. Did you assume that lemmy absolutely need very high desktop performance? Because Samsung F2 can match performance of F1 in STR and fall short in random access time only 20% and in latency (which corresponds to very short seeks) by 25%. It should have more than adequate web surfing or gaming performance. After all, you only need high disk IO for something like video editing. Most other "needs" are actually just "wants".
Booting OS from modern 5400rpm 2.5 incher is no problem either. Perfectly adequate for web surfing or gaming (most games are CPU or GPU bottlenecked).
My suggestion: buy one 5400rpm drive of your liking. Laptop if your computer is well silenced, desktop if you need much capacity. If the performance falls short of expectations, then buy a small SSD that can barely contain OS and applications. (Note: if you really get annoyed by 5400rpm drive's performance, the chances are 20% boost given by 7200rpm would NOT have made a damn difference.)
Because I really have a problem believing complete inaudiblity of two 7200rpm desktop drives in the same case... unless it's masked by other loud components. Did you enclose it? Anyway, 5400rpm should be about the same even without enclosing. Flagship 5400rpm drives can be on par with 1-platter 7200rpm drives but 1-platter 5400rpm drives would be way quieter. Enclose it, and even high quality Corsair PSU alone might drown HDD noise... that is, without a single case or CPU fan. Go 2.5" and you can achieve similar results without enclosing. Ok. Noise character would be different as enclosing attenuates certain frequencies better than other. Enclose the 2.5 incher and claim to hear it through fan-swapped Corsair, and I consider any one of you completely paranoid. SSD is completely unnecessary for silencing.
Ok, so you say you only commented what you have personal experience with, using that as an excuse why you didn't mention any 5400rpm alternatives. Why did you mention Samsung F3 then as you don't own one?
As far as I can tell, you were not only talking about first-hand experience but general knowledge as well. But you left 5400rpm completely off the discussion for some reason. Did you assume that lemmy absolutely need very high desktop performance? Because Samsung F2 can match performance of F1 in STR and fall short in random access time only 20% and in latency (which corresponds to very short seeks) by 25%. It should have more than adequate web surfing or gaming performance. After all, you only need high disk IO for something like video editing. Most other "needs" are actually just "wants".
Booting OS from modern 5400rpm 2.5 incher is no problem either. Perfectly adequate for web surfing or gaming (most games are CPU or GPU bottlenecked).
My suggestion: buy one 5400rpm drive of your liking. Laptop if your computer is well silenced, desktop if you need much capacity. If the performance falls short of expectations, then buy a small SSD that can barely contain OS and applications. (Note: if you really get annoyed by 5400rpm drive's performance, the chances are 20% boost given by 7200rpm would NOT have made a damn difference.)
I can't hear my drives.
Koolpc - good luck in your purchase decision. By the way - what Samsung drive are you looking to replace?
I did purchase 2 of the F3's the day after I ordered my Hitachi drives. One of my sons Raptors died - thank goodness for Raid 1 - and I was back on Newegg. I could barely hear the writes during the Ghost process to the F3 drives configured in Raid 1. With the rig buttoned up can't hear the drives at all. The 92mm front fan on his Dimension XPS Gen 5 wouldn't be considered SPCR material by any stretch.
Koolpc - good luck in your purchase decision.
By the way - what Samsung drive are you looking to replace?I did purchase 2 of the F3's the day after I ordered my Hitachi drives. One of my sons Raptors died - thank goodness for Raid 1 - and I was back on Newegg. I could barely hear the writes during the Ghost process to the F3 drives configured in Raid 1. With the rig buttoned up can't hear the drives at all. The 92mm front fan on his Dimension XPS Gen 5 wouldn't be considered SPCR material by any stretch.
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whispercat
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Which, if either, do you feel is quieter..the Hitachi or the F3? Also, did you mount them in any special way?lemmy wrote:I can't hear my drives.
Koolpc - good luck in your purchase decision.
I did purchase 2 of the F3's the day after I ordered my Hitachi drives. One of my sons Raptors died - thank goodness for Raid 1 - and I was back on Newegg. I could barely hear the writes during the Ghost process to the F3 drives configured in Raid 1. With the rig buttoned up can't hear the drives at all. The 92mm front fan on his Dimension XPS Gen 5 wouldn't be considered SPCR material by any stretch.
Thanks
No special mounting in either. The XPS Gen 5 uses standard Dell green plastic screw brackets - which is where the Samsung F3 drives are.
My rig has a drive saddle/cage that the Hitachi drive sits in with pins in the holes on the side of the drive. When slid into the drive cage in the case it creates gentle pressure that locks the drive in.
Hands on I have to say the Hitachi is quieter primarily due to no vibration and imperceptible read/writes from 6 inches and the case side off. I fired up the Hitachi feature tool to check the default setting and they were both set to disabled.
To test the Samsung F3's I disconnected the front 92mm fan from my sons XPS Gen 5 and ran some drive read/write tests. With the case open the drives are rather muted during the read/write process and a barely audible "whoosh" from the drives - this from about 18 inches. Since they are configured Raid 1 they are both active during any disk activity. I did the same thing with the case buttoned up and the 92mm front fan disconnected - can't hear any drive activity at all - only the drive activity light indicates anything.
My rig has a drive saddle/cage that the Hitachi drive sits in with pins in the holes on the side of the drive. When slid into the drive cage in the case it creates gentle pressure that locks the drive in.
Hands on I have to say the Hitachi is quieter primarily due to no vibration and imperceptible read/writes from 6 inches and the case side off. I fired up the Hitachi feature tool to check the default setting and they were both set to disabled.
To test the Samsung F3's I disconnected the front 92mm fan from my sons XPS Gen 5 and ran some drive read/write tests. With the case open the drives are rather muted during the read/write process and a barely audible "whoosh" from the drives - this from about 18 inches. Since they are configured Raid 1 they are both active during any disk activity. I did the same thing with the case buttoned up and the 92mm front fan disconnected - can't hear any drive activity at all - only the drive activity light indicates anything.