Thinkpads Forum

I have been using the Hitachi 7K200 200GB drive and got used to the 'wind' noise I seem to hear from it. It's not the fan on the T60 for sure...

But this week I opted to upgrade to a 7K320 320GB drive and this has even more 'wind' noise than I really like. In both cases I have played with the acoustic settings using the utility from Hitachi - and it really made no difference.

The 'wind' noise is most noticible as the laptop sits...it will increase for a bit and then slowly subside. Just like a fan but NOT.

Is there an alternative drive someone could recommend that doesnt have this 'wind' noise?
I dont feel a bit of vibration at least in either drive when typing with my wrists on the palm rests.

I was looking at either a Seagate 7200.3 drive or a Scorpio Black drive.

Thoughts? Comments? Emotional outbursts?


-JD

I can´t comment on WD Scorpio Black, but if 7K200 is that loud for you, the Seagate Momentus 7200.3 is definitely not for you I have both 7K200 and 7200.3 and the latter is noticeably louder than the Hitachi. I tend to believe that the 7K200 is the most silent one among all new 7200rpm drives. If you want something really silent, then I would suggest you to go for a 5400rpm or even 4200 rpm drive, some of them are definitely dead-silent, but you will probably have to sacrifice some performance.

So the sound varies? That doesn't sound like the drive. I've found 7200s to have quite a bit of constant whine/hum, and the 5400s are a lot quieter. You can't really do much about it (the acoustic settings are for the access clicks).

@ AuroraGuy:

- although perhaps slightly off topic, I just wanted to suggest that you start dreaming of swapping your present (noisy!) mechanical HDD with a totally silent (silent!) SSD. The Search function doesn't work right now, but when up again, try search this (the T6x) forum for SSD, and see read about the performance of especially the new Intel X25 SSD's. Sure, most of these have smaller capacity than mechanical HDD's, and are far more expensive, but assuming you could live with, say, "only" a 64 GB SSD, and store larger data amounts "off-laptop" or on a removable UltraBay Slim HDD, then... no more HDD noise, zero, nada, none!

See e.g. the thread Ultimate SSD: Intel 80GB X25-M SSD for T60, Pics HDTune!

PS: Even more off-topic, and because of your username; I'm often monitoring this page to be warned of solar storms and judge if there is a probability of visual aurora (Boeralis in this end!).

Johan

I work for Aurora...so hence the nickname.

I have considered solid state drives. I can live with 64GB in size but not sure I want to spend that cash at this point.

I likely will just sit on this for the time being...just like my efforts to replace the T60
with something else. I kinda gave up on that idea-



-JD

toms hardware has a decent hard drive comparison list on their site. When I was looking at laptop HD's I decided that the scorpio blue (400gb and 500gb sizes) was a great compromise between power consumption and speed. Definitely faster than a lot of other 5400 rpm drives.

It will be quieter than 7200 drives, not quite as fast, but not too slow.

GL

I ordered the Scorpio Black. Should be here today.

The newer Hitachi is definately louder than the 7K200 drive..
But once I get the WD, I can then compare the 3 of them.

I have heard possible noise (clicking issues) and was told it was a firmware
update that was needed. Anyone know about this and where to get this?

-JD

I have the Scorpio Black. I've seen this thread before but haven't posted since that's the only 7200rpm notebook drive I have so I cannot compare.

It definitely is more audible than the old 5400rpm drive it replaced. It makes however less noise than the T60 fan, even at the lowest speed (and my fan seems to be working ok, it's not whining or anything). What's also nice is that head moving is almost noiseless. I have to put my ear to it to hear it.

Considering its performance and size, I'm very happy I got this drive.

I purchased a 5K320 supposedly to be a silent drive but it produced the same wind sound as my old 7K100 ATA, then it failed after 30 days of usage so I'm now RMA'ing. The sound issue is most likely a mixed issue, you could get a noisy drive or a silent one. In my experience Hitachi's and Seagate seems to me the noisier of all.
My WD 80GB Blue my T61 came with is pretty silent. So I'd guess the WD5000BEVT and WD3200BEVT both 5400rpm drives would exhibit the same noise pattern.
And heard the 320GB Scorpio Black is silent, post what you think of the new drive Aurora.

so far the quietest drive I have is the 7K200 from Hitachi.

The seagate has a nice high pitched whine.
The Hitachi 7k320 has a rushing wind sound.

The new WD Scorpio Black appears to be the top performer
but I have a palm rest vibration that none of the Hitachi's have
(although very slight...)

But sadly the Scorpio Black is even more windy sounding than my
7k320.

I guess I will be tossing a few of these drives up on Craigslist now.

SSD is the way to go next for me.

-JD

FWIW:

I have a T60 that I am running with a Seagate 7200RPM drive and it is actually quieter (to my ears) than my 5400RPM Toshiba drive in my T42. The drive model I am using is this:

ST9250421AS

Here is the info straight from Seagate:

ST9250421AS

The Seagate® Momentus® 7200.3 laptop hard drive delivers industry-leading 7200-RPM performance while offering the industry’s lowest power consumption levels. Available with G-Force Protection™ for added robustness and durability, the Momentus 7200.3 drive can withstand even the most serious of drops that can happen in a mobile environment. Available with 16 MB of cache and a SATA 3Gb/s NCQ interface, the Momentus 7200.3 hard drive is perfect for performance laptops, workstations and small form factor desktop systems.

Key Advantages

* Highest available notebook performance increases productivity in all environments.
* Developed with proven Seagate 7200-RPM laptop technology
* Available in capacities of 320, 250, 160, 120 and 80 GB
* SATA 3Gb/s NCQ interface
* 16-MB cache on every capacity
* G-Force Protection™ available for added robustness in mobile environments
* Green features:
o Leverages Seagate laptop power management technology, delivering the lowest-power 7200-RPM laptop hard drive yet
o Utilizes ramp load features which remove the head from the disk during idle periods, improving idle power consumption and adding to the durability of the drive
* QuietStep™ ramp load technology enables ultra-quiet load/unload acoustics
* Perpendicular recording technology


This drive is very fast and very quiet. I attribute a great chunk of my system performance to this drive alone. Sure I have 3GB of RAM and a CoreDuo, but this 7200RPM drive really makes data fly around the system. Video's open very quickly, music is darn near instant. Office apps such as Photoshop, Quickbooks, Outlook and so on open in a fraction of the time as compared to stock 5400RPM drive this unit was received with.

I paid $75 for it from mwave.com and picked it up (yes, a big name company allowing will call pickups does in fact exist!) the same day. I backed up my old data, loaded the new drive and was having that 'Is it live or is it Memorex' moment where the dudes face and hair are pushed back due to large amounts of g-forces. Okay it wasn't that dramatic, but the system is far, far faster than it was before.

Just my thoughts on the matter.