New HD: hd502hi or hd502hj ?

[axee]

Hi!

I finally decided to change HD for my PC, but i'm not sure what to get. There's my system:


-Intel Q9550 @ 3.8GHz -> HR-01+, ducted and with AF 12025 PWM, most of time running at 480RPM
-Mushkin Redline 8GB of RAM
-Antec P182
-two Slipstreams running at 620RPM (one at back with cut grills, one on drive cage in front of GPU), top fan hole is covered with acoustic foam
-ATi HD 4670 with Accelero S1 running passive
-Corsair HX 450W with S-FLEX 1600RPM, 99% of time running at 450RPM

Right now i'm using WD6400AAKS in Scythe Quiet Drive, mounted with rubber grommets (from P182) on home made 5.25" plate. All 5.25" covers have heavy acoustic foam to reduce any vibration or noise from hard drive.

As you can see my PC is very quiet, but it's not enough for me (obviously). I still hear irritating spinning and seek noise from WD6400AAKS, but fortunately I can't hear or feel any vibrations (rubber grommets with SQD in 5.25" bay is doing fantastic job!!).

When I saw review of HD502HI on SPCR I was impressed, I almost bought it but than I saw speed tests of HD502HJ, which are amazing! I haven't seen any noise tests so I'm still wondering what to buy. I know that buying HD502HI would be great choice for further silencing, but speed of HD502HJ is just so tempting!

What do you recommend? What are major differences between these two drives? Is far as I know they are both single platter drives with 16MB of buffer. I wonder how louder HD502HJ (7200RPM) must be.. and if it's enough quiet for me..

Thank you for any suggestions, and pardon me for any language mistakes.

[Michael Sandstrom]

I have used many Samsung SATA drives mostly three platter models in 500GB and 1TB. All have been very quiet. Right now I have 3 HD103UJ drives and 1 HD103SJ drive in an Antec Solo. Three of the drives are suspended and one is in a sled. The Solo contains chassis, cpu and psu fans all of which are very quiet with speeds less than 700 rpm. I do not have any problem with HD noise.

I would say go with the fast Samsung.

[Nighthog]

I have the Samsung F3 HD502HJ 500Gb single platter drive.

It's a very quiet drive. Low vibrations as well.

I just replaced this whit a 5+ year old Maxtor 200Gb drive. Damn heat, noise and vibrations. Lol Everything is XX times better.

I did a whole drive format whit the case open and the hdd laying open in the case loosely on top my dvd-drive. I could barely hear it at all. I could only feel when I touched it a slight vibration. I even migrated my whole 200Gb drive unto it whit took 10hours and it really didn't make a sound through it all.

Now it's in it's right place inside the chassis which is sound proofed and I can't hear it inside there. Only my louder fans do make a lot more sound though.

I could compare it to my laptop 2.5inch 40Gb drive. I can say it's more silent than it.. (haven't used laptop in a while so can't remember fully how silent/loud that drive was, but I remember the seek noise was fairly audible, but the Samsung doesn't make a squeal in seeking)

I believe you will be completely satisfied whit this choice. Looking as you will mount it inside a scythe quiet drive enclosure to boot. I believe you can't hear it at all unless you place your ear in surface contact whit that solution. (though do mind this is speculation )

[axee]

There's one more thing.

This year I'm planning to buy SSD. With SSD for system, faster Samsung would be pointless and slower Samsung is like holy grail for us silencers. I actually have experience with HD502HI's noise (I tried it when building some cheap system for friend) but I never tried it in my system to judge speed.

Buying SSD can be delayed for some time and speed is what I'm afraid of. I'm using this rig for professional designing (photoshop, illustrator,d reamweaver, flash ecc) and heavy multitasking..

[ficod]

I don't want to complicate things but... what about the HD503HI (Samsung EcoGreen F3)?

[axee]

You have just complicated it But thanks anyway!

The problem is that there aren't any reliable tests about acoustic output, only SPRC's for HD502HI. I really want to eliminate HDD noise but and I want to be sure that I'm buying the best

[axee]

What type of acoustic measurement is "Bel" ?

Samsung site:

HD502HI:

Idle 2.20 Bel
Seek 2.70 Bel

HD502HJ:

Idle 2.5 Bel
Seek 2.8 Bel

HD503HI:

Idle 2.2 Bel
Seek 2.7 Bel

Considering this HD503HI should be best buy due to it's speed and silence..

[dhanson865]

What type of acoustic measurement is "Bel" ?

You have heard of decibels or dBA? deci is the prefix for 1/10th or .1 so a Bel is 10x a decibel.

2.2 Bel = 22 dBA

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Decibel

[MikeC]

What type of acoustic measurement is "Bel" ?

You have heard of decibels or dBA? deci is the prefix for 1/10th or .1 so a Bel is 10x a decibel.

2.2 Bel = 22 dBA

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Decibel

This is a common misconception, easy enough to see why because decibel is used so many different ways.

BEL is indeed the root word of decibel, but its usage is limited only to SOUND POWER, not SPL. Sound power is a complex concept, a measure of acoustic power like WATT not sound pressure (SPL) which is intensity at a certain distance and point in space. In theory, the BEL measurement does not change with position or location. It describes the total acoustic energy emanating from the measured object.

There is no scientific conversion factor from BEL power to dBA@1m SPL. But I've observed that the BEL measurement is usually higher than the dBA@1m SPL measurement. For example, a couple samples of the the HD502HI drive Samsung rates at 2.2 Bel measured 12 dBA@1m in SPCR's lab.

btw, a quick glance at the 502HI and 503HI specs fail to reveal any significant differences in basics.