Quietest 320GB 5400 RPM today?

Hey Fellow Hard-Drivers -

Which is quieter -- the WD3200BEVT (Scorpio Blue 320GB) or the 5K320 (Hitachi Travelstar 320GB)?

Silent performance is my top priority and I am looking for something that can best replicate the pin-drop silence of my WD1200BEVS (Scorpio Blue 120GB), which cannot be heard at all even in a completely silent room (no hum, no whir, no clicks).

I would be especially interested to hear from anyone who has had comparative experience with both.

Thanks!

 

5K320 is definitely the quietest 5400rpm drive.
Many people upgraded from the WD3200BEVT to the 5K320 and noticed that the 5K320 was quieter.
The search button is your friend

Ive had experience with the 5K320 and it is a very quiet drive, possibly the quietest harddrive I have ever had

K-TRON

 

Thanks for your response, K-TRON.

The friendly search button shows that not a few of those 5K320 "upgrades" were instigated by you, Mr Hitachi!

I went ahead and ordered the Hitachi. Across the board, prices of the 5K320 seem to be 20-25% cheaper than the 3200BEVT, so if the product lives up to your billing, then I will have gotten a truly awesome deal!

 

Specialista, plz report back if your drive is quiet, I had to RMA a failed 5K320 drive (320GB) that before failure it was as loud as any 7200rpm but without the vibration.

 

Western Digital WD3200BEVT is the quietest drive.

The 5K320 may be a quiet drive but the WD3200BEVT is a silent drive. This is based on direct comparison between my just-received Hitachi TravelStar 5K320 and a Western Digital Scorpio Blue WD3200BEVT that I borrowed for this purpose.

The 5K320 generates a constant hum while in operation producing a noise level equal to 5% of my ThinkPad T61 fan. There is also light but high-pitched screeching whilst Windows boots.

The WD3200BEVT, on the other hand, produces no noise at all (not even a hum), only some fluttering when there is random access. This is identical to the silent operation I enjoyed with my OEM WD1200BEVS.

However, not all WD drives are silent. I had initially tried the 7200 RPM WD3200BEKT which produced a constant hum equal to 50% of fan noise.

Also, one should note that the hard drive location on the ThinkPad T61 laptop is in the wrist pad and not far from one's ear. Noise may be more masked when the hard drive is located somewhere else or if one is talking about a different appliance like a PlayStation.

Needless to say, I am returning the 5K320. I value silent operation above all else!

 

Interesting.

Wonder if the 5K320 single platter 160GB HDD is even quieter than the 320GB 5K320 model

 

Have in mind that K-TRON is a hitachi-fanboy (no offense) so he may be very partial to hitachi's favour in all cases. Which kinda sucks as you're not going anywhere on what info is correct when he comments anything about hitachi vs anything in most cases


Oh well, i guses you noticed this by now according to your reply above Too bad that you had to order it to find out that the info he had wasn't true huh?

 

Michel is right. I always recommend Hitachi products. But in my usage the 5K320 is the quietest drive Hitachi makes. I own basically every laptop model hitachi released, and I can say the 5K320 is the quietest of them all. Second place goes to the 7K320 single platter drive. Third goes to the 7k200, and so forth.

I stated my claim with confidence because a few months back a guy came on these forums complaining about how loud his WD 3200BEVT was.
He rma'ed it and it was still just as loud. He tried the samsung drive which he claimed was quieter, but than he tried the 5K320 and he said the 5K320 was the quietest.
This was why I stated what I did. I try to be fair in my opinions even if I am a fan of something.

K-TRON

 

Respect to you for admitting it! But most of the forum-users already knew that, though some may not be aware of it hehe

Nothing wrong in being a bit fanboyish about a company, aslong as you can admit it, and you are. So i see no problem in it That's why i meant no offense, cause i meant no harm, so it is good to see that you didn't take it personal hehe

I'd +rep you for that if i could, but i've already done that to you just the other day Respect!

 

Thanks, K-TRON, I truly appreciated your advice in the selfless spirit it was given. Going in, I knew that all your direct experience was with Hitachi but also tremendously valued your often encyclopedic knowledge of the many discussions on this board.

This comparison was not meant as a gotcha, just an answer to my insatiable desire to get the most silent drive. Having made the comparison side-to-side, I wanted to make it available to anyone else interested in this information who could not find it previously.

I have discovered that quiet means different things to people on this board based on different noise tolerance, machine types, distance from machine, etc. It would have been nice to have some sort of sound meter to provide quantitative comparison (especially to prove what I believe are misleading acoustics metrics on the WD site) but I don't run a lab, so all I had to go with was my ear's and the dog's!

 

I know this is an older thread, but I wanted to add a little something to it.

I recently purchased a Dell Studio 15, and it came with the Hitachi 5k320 320gb drive. It produces the same noticeable constant "whirrrr" sound that others have reported. Sure, its not LOUD by any means, but its there, and I notice it. A lot. When I'm in my quiet bedroom trying to do homework, it starts to grate on my nerves after a while.

My roommate wants to upgrade his PS3, so I think I'm gonna buy a WD 320gb notebook drive and sell him my Hitachi. The noise won't be noticeable in his PS3, and I think I'll appreciate the more "silent" aspect of the WD drive in my laptop.

Other than the constant "whirrr", the Hitachi is in fact very quiet. I do hear it click on occasion, but not that often. Even with heavy drive access, I can barely hear it. Although, drive access noise does not bother me as much as the constant whirrr does

Thx
Eric

 

I will start looking into a single platter drives, I'm sure thats where the catch of quiteness comes.

 

Yeah it makes sense... less moving parts *should* equate to less noise

The noisy Hitachi I have has two platters...

Thx
--Eric

 

A single platter solution will always be quieter and produce less vibrations, because for one there are generally two or more less heads moving at any given time, and there is only one spinning disc rather than two. If you have ever opened a harddrive while it was on you would notice that those spinning platters generate quite a bit of turbulence. The less moving parts the quieter the drive will be.
If you are interested in quiet, check out the 250gb models of the Hitachi 5K500.B and the Samsung HM500JI

K-TRON