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 Post subject: Quiet & Cheap Drives
PostPosted: Tue Jul 27, 2004 9:20 am 
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Joined: Sun Jul 18, 2004 6:24 pm
Posts: 84
Location: Medford, Massachusetts
I've assembled my test unit and am now collecting the final parts to build the real thing to reside under my TV. I've got all the parts collected except a big drive and an HDTV card. Since there is only one HDTV card (the pcHDTV one), the remaining choice is which Hard Drive to buy.

So what do folks recommend on a 200+ GB drives in terms of brands, RPMs, etc. I am much more concerned about noise and cost than I am about heat.

My mobo will handle Serial ATA as well as ATA. Thanks.

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 Post subject:
PostPosted: Tue Jul 27, 2004 9:39 am 
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Joined: Thu Mar 25, 2004 11:00 am
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Location: Arlington, MA
I like the Seagate Barracuda 200Gb that I got as a second drive. it runs cool and is very quiet. Frankly however I get very little noticeable drive noise from my system. Ambient noise generally swamps any system noise, the fans are the biggest component of that, and they're generally just a whisper. For example last night I moved 20Gb from the 200Gb drive to the 80Gb drive and had to get my head within a couple feet of the box before I could hear the drive activity.


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 Post subject:
PostPosted: Tue Jul 27, 2004 10:41 am 
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Location: Nashville, TN
I've heard the seagate's are very quiet, however they are usually a bit more expensive, I personally have the WD 200Gb 7200RPM and it is much more noisy than I would prefer, but budget doesn't allow a change at this point.

Not to mention that seagate just increased their warranty to 5 years.

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 Post subject:
PostPosted: Tue Jul 27, 2004 11:16 am 
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Joined: Thu Mar 25, 2004 11:00 am
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Location: Arlington, MA
I *KNEW* I was forgetting something....

Pricegrabber.com was listing The "Seagate Barracuda ST3200822A 200GB Hard Drive" from highly rated vendors (mwave.com, newegg.com, ...) at about $122-$130, or just over $0.60/Gb. I got mine for ~$100 or $0.50/Gb via a $70 rebate from Seagate. You just have to watch for the deals...

This is in the same ballpark as the good 200Gb WD drives "Western Digital Caviar SE 200GB WD2000JB" which are running about $10 cheaper but which run hotter. There also appears to be a $40 rebate on the WD2000JB for some merchants.

BTW - I do price comparisons for HDs using $/Gb, at a particular performance level. Here I'm using 7200RPM and 8Mb of cache as the "level". When I first set up my system the $/Gb sweet spot for nonrebate prices was around 160Gb, now it's moved up to 200Gb or better.


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 Post subject:
PostPosted: Tue Jul 27, 2004 11:49 am 
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Location: Nashville, TN
note that the WD drive tjc quoted is the exact one I have and it is very loud and very hot. I would not recommend it. I got it at the time, because it was much cheaper than the other alternatives, and you know what they say "you get what you pay for."

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 Post subject:
PostPosted: Tue Jul 27, 2004 12:07 pm 
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Joined: Thu Apr 01, 2004 10:44 am
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Location: WA
Not to conterdict Xsecrets.. but i have the WD2000JB in a antec overture ultra quite case and i cant hear it at all. but different setups can have different results. just wanted to muddy the water alittle bit. :)


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 Post subject:
PostPosted: Tue Jul 27, 2004 1:14 pm 
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Joined: Tue Apr 13, 2004 6:51 pm
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Location: Groton, MA
WD250JBRTL here (ata100 8MB 250GB 7200RPM).
quiet enough..its in a big case, so heat doesnt seem to be an issue.

$199 - $30 rebate = .68 / GB

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 Post subject:
PostPosted: Tue Jul 27, 2004 1:19 pm 
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Location: Nashville, TN
hmmm maybe I got a bad drive then, maybe I should stomp on it or something and get it replaced under waranty. lol

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 Post subject:
PostPosted: Tue Jul 27, 2004 1:38 pm 
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Joined: Thu Mar 25, 2004 11:00 am
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Location: Arlington, MA
I'll note that the original WD800JB in my machine was and still is louder than the ST3200822A, however even with both of them pounding away at a disk to disk copy last night all I could hear from the drives was a little burble or chuckle when I was under 2 feet away. Have you looked at how securely the drive is mounted and how well it's isolated?

khrusher wrote:
WD250JBRTL here (ata100 8MB 250GB 7200RPM)

I think you mean WD2500JBRTL, the other would be a 25Gb disk rather than a 250Gb...


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 Post subject:
PostPosted: Wed Jul 28, 2004 9:33 am 
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Location: Groton, MA
tjc wrote:
I think you mean WD2500JBRTL, the other would be a 25Gb disk rather than a 250Gb...


correct, of course!

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 Post subject: got a deal on a maxtor
PostPosted: Sat Jul 31, 2004 8:37 pm 
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Joined: Fri Jul 30, 2004 8:07 pm
Posts: 31
Location: West Chester PA
Hitachi Deskstar 200 GB 7200RPM ATA mfg part#14R9203-RT

CompUSA had a 4 day sale with an in store rebate and mail in rebate. If I get the mail in rebate then the drive cost $79.99. So .40 per GB if the rebate comes thru if not the drive was too expensive. The rebate was $80.00

I have an IBM Deskstar and I think that these drives are off the same assembly line. Not sure why Hitachi not IBM was on the drive but I don't really care about that.

Anyway. I was recording a show last night and I have the case open in the front and I had to put my ear up to the drive, 1" away to hear it working. Not sure about the heat. Since it is 7200RPM it is probably pretty hot.

Rich Shumaker


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 Post subject:
PostPosted: Sat Jul 31, 2004 10:38 pm 
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Location: Nashville, TN
Hitachi has been making IBM's IDE drives for quite some time now, and I think IBM has actually even stopped branding IDE drives all together now.

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 Post subject:
PostPosted: Sun Aug 01, 2004 8:40 am 
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Location: Arlington, MA
IBM actually sold the business to them, so they're basically the same drives just rebranded.


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 Post subject:
PostPosted: Tue Aug 31, 2004 11:24 am 
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Joined: Fri Aug 27, 2004 8:08 am
Posts: 25
Location: Nashville, TN
There were a very specific model of these HDs that got branded as "DeathStars" about 2 years ago. They had a flaw which caused a high failure rate of the drive.

I'm sure this has been resovled though.

I have 2 of these Deskstars (IBM Branded) from 1-2 years ago, and both drives are very quiet, and very fast. They are in my Main PC, which stays on 24/7 too.

I have a 30GB and a 45GB

I would reccomdend them for sure.


in regards to sound and PC cases in general: if you don't mind a Mid-tower case, Antec Has a Piano Black "Sonnota" PC case that is VERY quiet. Compusa sells them.

Long as you put a Quiet CPU Fan on your processor, this case is the most quiet case I've worked with thats reasonably priced.

It has room for 4 Harddrives, each mounted with rubber Grommets to help reduce vibration and therefor.. noise. HIGHLY recommend this case unless you are wanting to do a Smaller Case/ Specialized case for HTPC.

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