Thinkpads Forum

I recently purchased a (refurbished) X61T that is a wonderful machine save for one thing. It has a 100GB 7200 RPM hard drive that vibrates. A lot. Even when the laptop is on a solid surface one can feel the vibration through the palm rest. Is this "normal" or expected?

I will likely replace the drive to increase storage capacity (to run at least one good-sized VM) when the upgrade to Win7 arrives (it should, one of these days, right?). Do the newer generations of 7200 RPM drives vibrate similarly? How about the 5400 RPM drives?

Yes, a SSD would be much better in this regard, but they still are too pricey for my pocketbook.

Dr-J:

The disk in my X61T vibrated so badly that when you picked up the laptop it felt like holding a pair of barber's clippers. Lenovo exchanged it for another 7200 rpm disk; same model (Hitachi) and the new disk does not vibrate. I would try to exchange it under warranty if possible. I was surprised that the head tracking servo could still work with this much vibration. Who knows how long the disk would have lasted...

Good to know, Mark. I may well exchange it after I get the new larger disk. 100MB sure goes fast, and I want the space for at least one 20GB VM.

So how does the exchange work? One mirrors the drive somewhere, wipe it clean, send it in for replacement, and then remirror to restore the image? Seems like a lot of work for at $50 part.

Dr-J:

Lenovo will send you a replacement and you will then ship your defective disk back to them. If you have imaging software then save an image of the current disk and restore it to the new disk. I use Acronis True Image, but there are some free alternatives like Macrium Reflect, Clonezilla, etc.

That they send you a new drive first helps a lot. Thanks for the info!

There is some comments here also. I just installed a Seagate 250G 7200 specifically after doing a little reading about the bigger 7200 rpm drives. It looked like the WD500g had the most serious vibration issues.

When I had the Seagate in the enclosure for cloning I did notice a tiny bit more vibration than with my other 7200rpm drives. But in the X60 it is not noticeable at all and i am very happy about that. I think the rubber side rails help dampen most of the vibrations.

This is just from my recent experience.

Some good information in that thread. I was considering the 320GB WD Black, but they do have a vibration issue. At least the desktop 1TB one that I have do. I may reconsider.