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Listen to just Hard Drive on a PC?

C

Computer_Phreak

macrumors 6502
Original poster
Jul 15, 2002
375
0
Hi,

I'm contemplating buying a FDB (fluid dynamic bearing) hard drive, but i want to see how quiet my current hard drive is first.

Is there any way to just turn on the HD without all the other fans?

Thanks
 
Re: Listen to just Hard Drive on a PC?

Originally posted by Computer_Phreak
Hi,

I'm contemplating buying a FDB (fluid dynamic bearing) hard drive, but i want to see how quiet my current hard drive is first.

Is there any way to just turn on the HD without all the other fans?

Thanks
Click to expand...

Here's what you do, but be careful:

Disconnect all the fans from your PC except for the power supply fan. Then boot your computer the way you normally would, but only for a few seconds, as more could cause your processor to overheat (if it's fairly recent).

The hard drive is probably less of a contributing factor to the noise level in your PC. Things like the fans are much louder. You might want to look into noise treatment for your computer, which would be cheaper than buying a new hard drive, unless you need the extra capacity anyway. This is a product you could try. Don't worry about ordering from Directron; I have a friend who bought a case from them and everything was fine. If you're wary check resellerratings.com.
 
-Computer_Phreak

Not a software method.

Simply put, disconnect the power to all of the other noisemakers, e.g. fans.

I assume you are going to be doing this in a PowerMac. This is good because, with the case open, there is enough ventilation to allow a startup to login screen without danger from an overheat. Once you get to that login screen, shutdown right away!

You should have all the information you need and you don't want to push your heating luck.
 
Originally posted by patrick0brien
I assume you are going to be doing this in a PowerMac. This is good because, with the case open, there is enough ventilation to allow a startup to login screen without danger from an overheat.
Click to expand...

He said PC, but leaving the case open is a good idea, and seems obvious now that I think about it...
 
Re: Re: Listen to just Hard Drive on a PC?

Originally posted by ibookin'@mwny
Here's what you do, but be careful:

Disconnect all the fans from your PC except for the power supply fan. Then boot your computer the way you normally would, but only for a few seconds, as more could cause your processor to overheat (if it's fairly recent).

The hard drive is probably less of a contributing factor to the noise level in your PC. Things like the fans are much louder. You might want to look into noise treatment for your computer, which would be cheaper than buying a new hard drive, unless you need the extra capacity anyway. This is a product you could try. Don't worry about ordering from Directron; I have a friend who bought a case from them and everything was fine. If you're wary check resellerratings.com.
Click to expand...

Well,
I have an 80 GB western digital special edition HD and I'm thinking about selling my current PC and making a new one.

Should i stick with the HD i have now, and put it in the new one, or get a FDB hard drive for the new computer?

I think the power supply fan is the loudest of the fans in my PC, so the above methods wouldn't work too well.

Is there any way I can hook up batteries to it or something?:confused:
 
Re: Re: Re: Listen to just Hard Drive on a PC?

Originally posted by Computer_Phreak
Well,
I have an 80 GB western digital special edition HD and I'm thinking about selling my current PC and making a new one.

Should i stick with the HD i have now, and put it in the new one, or get a FDB hard drive for the new computer?

I think the power supply fan is the loudest of the fans in my PC, so the above methods wouldn't work too well.

Is there any way I can hook up batteries to it or something?:confused:
Click to expand...
Try this:

1) Disconnect the power to the HD
2) Boot up
3) Observe loudness
4) Power down
5) Reconnect HD
6) Observe loudness
7) Compare

Or, if you want to be super anal, this:

1) Get a power extension cord for the HD that connects the power supply to the HD
2) Unscrew the HD and remove the IDE cable
3) Pull the HD out of the chassis, holding it by its edges with one hand - touch ONLY the edges
4) Hold the top of the HD up against your ear or close enough to be able to hear it
5) Power up, wait for the drive to spin up completely, observe how loud it is, and power down.

If you can't tell how loud your HD is, it's probably not that loud.
 
i would say turn on your computer and read a really big file. if you don't hear clunks or something like that (hard to describe) over the fan noise, you have a quiet enough hard drive. hard drives generally do not make noise when they are spinning, except spinning up when you turn on the computer, and even that is generally pretty quiet. it's when the head moves to read a disk, and it does kinda sound like clunks. if you never noticed it before, don't go by the FDB thing, i recommend.
 
i changed the fan in my power supply to a quieter one.

I also tried to connect the hard drive to a battery.

I think i screwed up the hard drive some how because now the BIOS says it cannot find any bootable devices. The hard drive isn't listed when I go to select which device to boot from.
 
update:

I loaded the "failsafe defaults" from the BIOS setup, and now everything works ok.

Whew!
 
Re: Re: Re: Listen to just Hard Drive on a PC?

Originally posted by Computer_Phreak
Well,
I have an 80 GB western digital special edition HD and I'm thinking about selling my current PC and making a new one.

Should i stick with the HD i have now, and put it in the new one, or get a FDB hard drive for the new computer?
Click to expand...

Um, as I recall the Western Digital WD800JB is a fluid bearing drive.
 
best solution for this in my opinion:

1. keep the WD 80gb SE and put it in a new system if thats what your doing.

2. if you can, get a p4 chip, cause the fans on the p4's are bigger and A LOT quieter than those on AMD chips [because theyre bigger, they spin at lower rpms = quieter]. if you have an AMD chip right now, i can almost guarantee that the cpu fan is making the most noise of anything.

3. buy that sound dampening material that ibooken@mwny linked to. its really cheap and will probably help a bunch. [im buying some for my PC as soon as i get the chance]

4. also, if you get a p4 you really only need 1 80mm case fan, most likely mounted in the back, pulling air out of the case. p4's dont get as hot as AMD's, and you dont need the extra fan pulling air in from the front. [this also pulls in extra dust and makes extra noise].

5. p4s are also competitively priced now, so... yeah get a p4 :D

some other stuff: i have 3 hardrives in my pc: 2 15gb maxtors and a WD 80gbSE [same as yours, computer_phreak], and those 3 drives combined with all the other fans in the case STILL dont make as much noise as the cpu fan. i know cause ive manually/phisically halted the cpu fan for a couple seconds, just to observe how much noise it was actually making.

hope that helps.
 
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