Best quiet hdd

[LamoidZombieDog]

Looking for an 8-12tb HDD under 250$, I want the quietest drive available for that price but also have good performance, this will be an extra storage drive to hold my currently full 4TB seagate drive and other files, so it doesn't need gaming performance, but a 7200rpm would be good. Any suggestions?

[DailyProcrastinator]

All hard drives have moving parts, none will be totally quiet. I would recommend WD Black drives or Seagate Barracuda Pros.

[WoodenMarker]

The quietest drives I've encountered at that size are 8TB Reds and they're fast enough for my needs of mass storage. The larger Reds and higher rpm Red Pros are too noisy imo. 

What kind of speeds do you need? 

[LamoidZombieDog]

1 hour ago, WoodenMarker said:

The quietest drives I've encountered at that size are 8TB Reds and they're fast enough for my needs of mass storage. The larger Reds and higher rpm Red Pros are too noisy imo. 

What kind of speeds do you need? 

as i had stated in the post, its mainly just an extra storage drive. i currently have a 4TB, which is full, it will lose 500GB after i get another SSD for the games on it, but either way i want a bigger drive. its files i rarely access, but when i do access them, i do want it to be a good speed. i also use it for some programs, though that wont be happening anymore being im upgrading to a 970 evo plus m.2

[RejZoR]

I was doing a lot of research as I was looking for quiet HDD recently and it's almost impossible to find a quiet HDD. On paper, HelioSeal drives like WD Ultrastar are by far the quietest, rated at only 20dB in idle even at 7200 RPM and they are not even SMR so they shouldn't suffer with write speeds at all). However, during writes, they tend to get noisy, iirc even up to 34dB. This kind of drive would be ideal for mass storage of rarely accessed data. Coz most of the time they'll be spinning quietly and only get noisy when you move data to them and then go quiet again. Only downside is the price. Only 8TB and above Ultrastar drives are HelioSeal based and people say only 10TB is really quiet.

 

In standard desktop drives realm, from my experience 5400 RPM 2.5" drives are quietest. Low RPM means less motor noise and vibration noise where smaller platters mean less head travel distance meaning less noise from that part. Downside is, 5TB seems to be the largest 2.5" that you can buy. And they cost the same as 8TB 3.5" drives which makes them a bit expensive and limiting with capacity.

 

Personally, in the end, I've settled with Seagate Barracuda 8TB 5400 RPM in 3.5" size (most higher capacities tend to be 7200 RPM for some reason) because those WD Ultrastar are quite expensive at around 320€ where Barracuda was 180€ at same capacity). I'm gonna use it for rare access and more for archiving of bulk data, so 5400 RPM should be reasonably quiet when in idle where it's rated at around 24dB and during writes it's like 26dB. I do have pretty well insulated case and I'm gonna pad the drive somehow to further decrease noise. probably gonna fiddle with its AAM controls too to quiet it down further as it'll mostly do sequential tasks where it won't affect performance much if at all. If you're in no rush to buy one, you can wait for me to get that Barracuda and see how noisy it is. I already have it ordered, but I'm waiting for shop to get the extra cables I've ordered for my PSU. So it might take like a week from now for me to get it. I can tell you first hand about noise then coz this is one of the most important things as my system is almost dead quiet in idle and HDD clicking or motor noise would drive me insane.

 

I wish there was super cheap and massive SSD's where performance side of things was toned down as much as possible to lower the price even if at expense of performance. I'd gladly pay 250€ for a 6-8TB SSD that can't really be used for OS or games, but would be fast enough to store videos, music and images along with other junk like ISO's and big installers that you want archived around. Mainly because only SSD's can operate at 0dB at any time. But there is just no such option. It's only high performance, super expensive SSD's. I don't understand why this isn't a thing in a flood of dedicated drives for NAS, for surveillance and bunch of other stuff, but SSD's are all "high performance". Make an SSD meant for archiving. Call it "Archive SSD" or something. Give it decent speeds for sequential, but don't care how it performs for random access. Capacity and noise is something people would look for even at expense of performance. Coz you need to make some compromises to differentiate them from high performance models and this would be it. They could also be DRAM-less most likely.

[LamoidZombieDog]

3 hours ago, RejZoR said:

I was doing a lot of research as I was looking for quiet HDD recently and it's almost impossible to find a quiet HDD. On paper, HelioSeal drives like WD Ultrastar are by far the quietest, rated at only 20dB in idle even at 7200 RPM and they are not even SMR so they shouldn't suffer with write speeds at all). However, during writes, they tend to get noisy, iirc even up to 34dB. This kind of drive would be ideal for mass storage of rarely accessed data. Coz most of the time they'll be spinning quietly and only get noisy when you move data to them and then go quiet again. Only downside is the price. Only 8TB and above Ultrastar drives are HelioSeal based and people say only 10TB is really quiet.

 

In standard desktop drives realm, from my experience 5400 RPM 2.5" drives are quietest. Low RPM means less motor noise and vibration noise where smaller platters mean less head travel distance meaning less noise from that part. Downside is, 5TB seems to be the largest 2.5" that you can buy. And they cost the same as 8TB 3.5" drives which makes them a bit expensive and limiting with capacity.

 

Personally, in the end, I've settled with Seagate Barracuda 8TB 5400 RPM in 3.5" size (most higher capacities tend to be 7200 RPM for some reason) because those WD Ultrastar are quite expensive at around 320€ where Barracuda was 180€ at same capacity). I'm gonna use it for rare access and more for archiving of bulk data, so 5400 RPM should be reasonably quiet when in idle where it's rated at around 24dB and during writes it's like 26dB. I do have pretty well insulated case and I'm gonna pad the drive somehow to further decrease noise. probably gonna fiddle with its AAM controls too to quiet it down further as it'll mostly do sequential tasks where it won't affect performance much if at all. If you're in no rush to buy one, you can wait for me to get that Barracuda and see how noisy it is. I already have it ordered, but I'm waiting for shop to get the extra cables I've ordered for my PSU. So it might take like a week from now for me to get it. I can tell you first hand about noise then coz this is one of the most important things as my system is almost dead quiet in idle and HDD clicking or motor noise would drive me insane.

 

I wish there was super cheap and massive SSD's where performance side of things was toned down as much as possible to lower the price even if at expense of performance. I'd gladly pay 250€ for a 6-8TB SSD that can't really be used for OS or games, but would be fast enough to store videos, music and images along with other junk like ISO's and big installers that you want archived around. Mainly because only SSD's can operate at 0dB at any time. But there is just no such option. It's only high performance, super expensive SSD's. I don't understand why this isn't a thing in a flood of dedicated drives for NAS, for surveillance and bunch of other stuff, but SSD's are all "high performance". Make an SSD meant for archiving. Call it "Archive SSD" or something. Give it decent speeds for sequential, but don't care how it performs for random access. Capacity and noise is something people would look for even at expense of performance. Coz you need to make some compromises to differentiate them from high performance models and this would be it. They could also be DRAM-less most likely.

What about this Seagate EXOS Enterprise then? https://smile.amazon.com/Seagate-Enterprise-Capacity-Cache-Internal-ST10000NM0016/dp/B01DSRHFOK/ref=sr_1_2?keywords=8tb+Helium+drive&qid=1579626014&sr=8-2

its 10TB which in my current case should be fine, Cheaper then other Helium drives, while still being the 7200RPM that id prefer. i currently have a seagate barracuda thats only 2 or so years old, still under warranty. its not insanely noisy, but it does have some noise. and if im going to get a bigger drive, the exos seems like a good deal. unless your thinking something like this would be better. and ill just take the drive out of that. https://smile.amazon.com/Seagate-Expansion-Desktop-External-Drive/dp/B07NPMMZ8C/ref=sr_1_5?keywords=10tb+hard+drive&qid=1579626231&sr=8-5

[RejZoR]

Ultrastar drives with helium are somewhat different. If you look their specsheets, you'll have entire row of all sorts of drives that are from 24-36dB in noise and then the Ultrastar drives at 8TB and above all drop to 20dB.

 

Btw, I was also thinking of cannibalizing the external drive, until I watched some repair guides where guy took out the 2.5" drive and the thing had some weird non standard interface with USB bolted straight into the part where SATA should've been. They seem to be doing dedicated external drives no it seems, so do good research before you do this so you won't be left with drive you can't hook up to SATA...

[seagate_surfer]

Here is some additional information on the subject, some tools can also be used to reduce noise:

 

[RejZoR]

Ok, I just got the Barracuda 8TB 5400 RPM and I can confirm it's VERY quiet. But this is 5400 RPM model since I'll only use it for bulk storage so random access isn't really of any priority. It still does 200MB/s sequential which is alright. So, I'd certainly recommend this one if low noise is your priority. It was mine too and I'm satisfied. Was quite worried since my other main drive is 2TB SSD which is, well, absolutely silent.

[LamoidZombieDog]

19 hours ago, RejZoR said:

Ok, I just got the Barracuda 8TB 5400 RPM and I can confirm it's VERY quiet. But this is 5400 RPM model since I'll only use it for bulk storage so random access isn't really of any priority. It still does 200MB/s sequential which is alright. So, I'd certainly recommend this one if low noise is your priority. It was mine too and I'm satisfied. Was quite worried since my other main drive is 2TB SSD which is, well, absolutely silent.

its 5400 though. not only would that be a pain in the ass when transfering my 3TB of files to it, its also slow. i really want 7200RPM

[RejZoR]

1 hour ago, LamoidZombieDog said:

its 5400 though. not only would that be a pain in the ass when transfering my 3TB of files to it, its also slow. i really want 7200RPM

RPM doesn't define sequential speeds all that much. Platter density does. RPM's only decrease random access time. I've transferred 40GB from my SSD to HDD and it was copying at around 200MB/s. It took a couple of seconds.

 

If you want speed and silent operation in idle you need to look at WD Ultrastar 8TB or larger helium filled drives. Those are 7200 RPM drives that have idle noise rated at only 20dB. But they cost like 30% more than regular consumer drives. They are around 50MB/s faster. Not really a ground breaking change...

[Alexander Shirshov]

Since I get there from google I think posting in such an old thread is not a crime. I have two Barracuda 8TB 5400 RPM in RAID 0 and it's super quiet and was performing well for sequential operation, above 300 MB/s read and write. But now as it 50% filled look at the performance... 70 MB/s write for RAID 0!!! It's not acceptable by any means. I'm guessing this happens because it's SMR. I thought it will be ok for sequential access only... But at least it terribly inconsistent. 

Also have two old Toshiba P300 2TB 7200 RPM in RAID 0. It's CMR, even at 90% filled it's performance is fairly acceptable, more than 200 MB/s sequential read and write. Also perfectly quiet, as all other desktop HDD's (Barracuda, P300 and WD Blue). Do not confuse with desktop performance series (Barracuda Pro, X300 and WD Black), those are not quiet according to specs.

Searching for a replacement for Barracuda's, but P300 and WD Blue has 6TB capacity max, while 6TB P300 is SMR and 6TB WD Blue has issues with head parking. All other series are louder. This is BS there is no quiet CMR high capacity HDD.

 

P.S. I ended up buying Seagate Ironwolf ST6000VN001. It's 28 decibels - quite quiet, but only 6 TB and 5400 RPM. There was ST8000VN0022 - 29 decibels 7200 RPM 8 TB drive, but it's not available anymore. BS again. All other quiet 8 TB without SMR are helium filled, which is not acceptable for home use.

Edited November 8, 2020 by Alexander Shirshov