How quiet are the Samsung Spinpoint drives?

mattbill · 16 May 2007 at 14:37

comtemplating selling my 74gb raptor for a Samsung Spinpoint drive as I have read they are reasonably quick and very quiet.

Can anyone defo confirm this? I would be looking into getting the 16Mb Cache versions i think havent decided on size yet.

Thanks folks

michael baxter · 16 May 2007 at 14:39

Yes, they are very quiet!

Low idle noise, and very low seek noise. They can also be configured to be even quieter, at the expense of a little performance.

blakka · 16 May 2007 at 15:48

My mate has one in his rig, they are almost "silent".

squiffy · 16 May 2007 at 15:50

michael baxter said:
Yes, they are very quiet!

Low idle noise, and very low seek noise. They can also be configured to be even quieter, at the expense of a little performance.

Even for the T series? I guess it won't do anything for idle, just seek? Seek noise is pratically non existant, still get idle hum. Going to get a HD silencer (HTPC)

sugoi · 16 May 2007 at 16:33

michael baxter said:
Yes, they are very quiet!

Low idle noise, and very low seek noise. They can also be configured to be even quieter, at the expense of a little performance.

What do you mean by configured to be even quieter? im looking at these hard drives also.... :confused:

mattbill · 16 May 2007 at 16:38

i think they have an uber quiet mode, which is silent but the down side is the drive reads slower... i think

michael baxter · 16 May 2007 at 16:46

squiffy said:
Even for the T series? I guess it won't do anything for idle, just seek? Seek noise is pratically non existant, still get idle hum. Going to get a HD silencer (HTPC)

Hi Squiffy,

Not sure the T series can be tweaked for lower noise, the Samsung website doesn't appear to support this drive at the moment:

http://www.samsung.com/Products/HardDiskDrive/utilities/hutil.htm

If your after a HD silencer, I've had good results with these cradles:

http://www.overclockers.co.uk/showproduct.php?prodid=SY-006-ZA&groupid=701&catid=57&subcat=399

Regards,

Michael

michael baxter · 16 May 2007 at 16:48

sugoi said:
What do you mean by configured to be even quieter? im looking at these hard drives also....

Samsung provide a utility to tweak the HD for lower noise at the cost of a small amount of performance, and it works very well for the P120 range from my experience. Doesn't appear to be good for the T series, follow the link in my post above.

sugoi · 16 May 2007 at 16:55

im assuming they are quiet anyway even without the utility... as i am considering this one: Samsung SpinPoint T HD501LJ 500GB SATA-II 16MB Cache.

My existing WD drives are getting quite loud, and i want to try something different...

michael baxter · 16 May 2007 at 17:05

sugoi said:
im assuming they are quiet anyway even without the utility....

You are right! I didn't mean to suggest otherwise, I'm just obsessed with reducing PC noise!

If your interested, my rig has the following features for noise reduction:

Samsung P120 in a Zalman ZM-2HC2 cradle
Replaced 40mm northbridge fan with a Zalman passive cooler (ZM-NB47J)
Akasa PAXPower PSU
Coolermaster 80mm Aero Blower CPU fan (the ones that look like a hamster wheel)
Replaced GPU cooler with a Zalman VF700

squiffy · 16 May 2007 at 17:23

Looking into getting Xilence HD Cooler CL Aluminium Enclosure, one big heatsink...seems the totally enclosed silencers (foam) suffer from heat problems.

mattbill · 17 May 2007 at 15:31

I went for the 250Gb in the end! I couldnt spend £80 odd (inc postage) on the 500Gb, just had a mental block about it lol.

I can always get another in the future and RAID them, if i need to add more space

michael baxter · 18 May 2007 at 12:28

Those 250 giggers are excellent, do you think you might consider a RAID 0 array in the future then?

mattbill · 18 May 2007 at 12:41

mine just arrived, gonna install after work! it is a possibility that ill RAID them, dont know if i will cos it can be risky aye?

michael baxter · 18 May 2007 at 17:38

mattbill said:
mine just arrived, gonna install after work! it is a possibility that ill RAID them, dont know if i will cos it can be risky aye?

Nice!

There is an increased risk of failure when using a RAID array over a single drive, but it is small when considering all the other risks related to data loss. Providing you have back-ups of your data, then it's not really a big deal in my opinion.

I'd be interested to know what you think of the drive once you have it up and running!

Good luck,

Michael

Snapshot · 19 May 2007 at 07:49

I must like them as I currently have five of 'em. Peaked at seven but two went in PCs I sold.
I have two in a RAID 1 in my second PC and their idle noise is well below that of the fans. There's a small amount of rattle when they're working but it couldn't be described as loud.
The other three drives get slotted into an IcyBox caddyless cradle when I need to backup either PC.