Is it just me, or are the optical drives very loud!

Silencing hard drives, optical drives and other storage devices

Moderators: NeilBlanchard, Ralf Hutter, sthayashi, Lawrence Lee

Post Reply
jermaink
Posts: 265
Joined: Sat Mar 05, 2005 1:20 am
Location: Melbourne, Australia

Is it just me, or are the optical drives very loud!

Post by jermaink » Thu Jul 28, 2005 6:32 pm

I'm in the middle of setting up my computer, having problems with the hard drive at the moment (disk boot error...), so I'm not through eliminating noise yet. I have a NEC 3520A DVDRW drive and an Asus Quietrack CRW-5232AS, but is it just me or are the optical drives the loudest part of any system. This is especially noticable when one of the case pannels are left open. Does anyone else agree?

Also, my 5232AS makes a solid noise whenever I open it, is this normal?

frostedflakes
Posts: 1608
Joined: Tue Jan 04, 2005 4:02 pm
Location: United States

Post by frostedflakes » Thu Jul 28, 2005 6:42 pm

Oh yeah, optical drives are the achilles heel of a quiet setup IMO. Luckily, though, it's not something you use all the time. I do whatever I can to avoid using my CD player. All my music CDs are ripped to the hard drive, for example.

Falcon159
Posts: 1
Joined: Fri Jul 29, 2005 6:21 am

Post by Falcon159 » Fri Jul 29, 2005 6:34 am

The NEC drives are actually good as far as noise goes compared to other drives, i have 2 The original ND-3500AG and a ND-3520A. The newer ND-3540A is supposed to be slightly quieter. Cosidering they are some of the fastest drives on the market they are extremely quiet, they make noise when they are going but its more of an even drone, and does not fluctuate very much... overall they are probably the quietest ive ever used and the most reliable, one drive to stay away from for sure are any HP's. Honestly i think my lawnmower was quieter, it was TERRIBLE.

POLIST8
*Lifetime Patron*
Posts: 703
Joined: Mon Jul 14, 2003 12:59 pm
Location: Madison, WI USA
Contact:

Post by POLIST8 » Fri Jul 29, 2005 7:08 am

You want loud? Try a Lite-On.

frostedflakes
Posts: 1608
Joined: Tue Jan 04, 2005 4:02 pm
Location: United States

Post by frostedflakes » Fri Jul 29, 2005 3:19 pm

Falcon159 wrote:The NEC drives are actually good as far as noise goes compared to other drives, i have 2 The original ND-3500AG and a ND-3520A. The newer ND-3540A is supposed to be slightly quieter. Cosidering they are some of the fastest drives on the market they are extremely quiet, they make noise when they are going but its more of an even drone, and does not fluctuate very much... overall they are probably the quietest ive ever used and the most reliable, one drive to stay away from for sure are any HP's. Honestly i think my lawnmower was quieter, it was TERRIBLE.
Good to know. I'm planning to upgrade to a DVD burner soon. I'll have to look at these. I've also heard the Pioneers are supposed to be pretty bearable as well.

The ASUS QuietTrack drives are also very good. I used a 52x QuietTrack in a family member's computer. Unfortunately though last time I checked, there weren't any CD-RW/DVD-ROM combo drives of DVD burners for the QuietTrack line.

And yes, LiteOn drives are pretty annoying. It's not really the airflow noise that bothers me, but I can't stand optical drives that rattle or just plain sound cheap. And the LiteOn's just sound like they're going to fall apart.

merlyn
*Lifetime Patron*
Posts: 149
Joined: Mon Jul 12, 2004 2:14 pm
Location: Jersey, UK

Post by merlyn » Fri Jul 29, 2005 4:37 pm

i had an LG dual layer with my new system but had to dump it because of the noise. i've gone back to my old plextor 708A because it comes with software to reduce it's read speed on the fly which is handy for listening to cd's or whenever throughput is not critical.

jermaink
Posts: 265
Joined: Sat Mar 05, 2005 1:20 am
Location: Melbourne, Australia

Post by jermaink » Sat Jul 30, 2005 2:53 am

Anyone else with the Asus Quietrack CDRW experience a physical thudding noise when they open their drive?? It's quite unlike the smooth noise made by the NEC when it opens.

daremo
Posts: 37
Joined: Mon Mar 21, 2005 2:20 pm

Post by daremo » Thu Aug 11, 2005 12:52 pm

Falcon159 wrote:The NEC drives are actually good as far as noise goes compared to other drives, i have 2 The original ND-3500AG and a ND-3520A.
Man, not mine (3520A) - a screaming banshee while I was installing XP and Office 2003. Maybe different parts? There's another thread here about "How to silence...NEC 3520", so it may have been a change in parts or something.

jermaink
Posts: 265
Joined: Sat Mar 05, 2005 1:20 am
Location: Melbourne, Australia

Post by jermaink » Sat Aug 13, 2005 5:45 am

Anyone else here got a Quietrack? I think I might have got a slightly dodgey one. The noise on opening and closing is pretty harsh. Almost makes the 'noisier while spinning' NEC 3520AS just seem more smoother & quieter.

bomba
Posts: 320
Joined: Fri Jan 16, 2004 12:36 pm
Location: USA

Post by bomba » Mon Aug 15, 2005 7:04 am

I didn't really believe that there were significant differences between optical drives in terms of noise until a bought a Samsung DVD drive, which vibrated and was very loud in comparison to my NEC DVD-RW drives.

For my HTPC, I run NERO Drivespeed, freeware available here:
http://www.cdspeed2000.com/go.php3?link ... speed.html
For DVD playback, I set it at 1x read speed, at which it is silent.

Also, I seem to remember reading a post herein, about specific optical drives designed for silence, with internal damping and sound insolation/isolation.

rpsgc
Friend of SPCR
Posts: 1630
Joined: Tue Oct 05, 2004 1:59 am
Location: Portugal

Post by rpsgc » Mon Aug 15, 2005 8:16 am

bomba wrote:Also, I seem to remember reading a post herein, about specific optical drives designed for silence, with internal damping and sound insolation/isolation.
Pioneer RETAIL burners.

Post Reply