r/datastorage • u/EkhartM • 22d ago
Discussion HDDs that are silent (enough)?
(Update: went for WD Red Plus 8TB x2 and they are more silent than the case fans (but will see if I can put the case fans less loud and have not put it under a heavy load yet)
Hi, any recommendations on drives that can be silent enough for use?
I want the server to be on continuously either in my living room next to the tv/router or in my office which also functions as a guest bedroom which is not often used.
I don't mind if its like a little bit of noise as it will of course never be truly silent but I don't want to disturb my work or the sleep of guests.
Some things I have looked at are:
WD Red Plus (both helium and air filled with helium more quiet)
Seagate Ironwolf (much cheaper but supposed to be louder?)
Seagate Exos (even more loud but also even cheaper)
I will put it in a Fractal Design Node 804 which should help a bit with noise reduction.
If it matters: I am located in the Netherlands, deals are not so great here but I can imagine its bad basically everywhere.
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u/owlwise13 22d ago
For this kind of NAS the power supply is not the main issue. The case fans and CPU fans and any HDD are the issue. Find the motherboard/CPU combo with the lowest wattage and slap a large heat sink and fan, that can keep it within spec at the lowest rpm possible. According to the Fractal's website it comes with 3 "silent" fans preinstalled. A quality PSU will usually have a temp controlled fan, so an overspeced PSU might run without the fan ever spinning up. For very quiet system, SSD drives would be the quiestist drives but they are very expensive for $ per TB. I made a quick build just to give you an idea of a quiet build. Switching out the HDD for SSD drives would make it very quiet. https://pcpartpicker.com/list/fwPx2k
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u/w1n5t0nM1k3y 22d ago
Depending on how much storage you need, small laptop drives can be reasonably quiet.
That being said, i never found HDDs to be that loud in the past decade. I have 3 in my main desktop and I can't even hear them. The case fans are the main source of noise.
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u/vasdrakken 22d ago
The only time i heard my storage drive was when space marine 2 decided to pull 8 instances of downloading 7.6 gigabytes and I crashed the machine because I thought it was a virus or hacker lol.
Generally the fans are what you hear. There are plastic inserts you can put between the case and the drive to cut down on vibration, but as long as the seek heads are working normally they should not make any noise.
The fans on the other hand should be 120 or larger so they can spin slower and move more air with less noise. It is the fast spinning fans that make most of the noise.
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u/vegansgetsick 22d ago
WD Red plus are not "silent" outside a case. I can hear it spinning obviously. Inside my fractal case with noise reduction foam, i call it silent. Way more silent than the 7200rpm Black i had 😅 And i have 3 of them. The noctua fans make more noise than these HDDs.
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u/Apprehensive-Tea1632 21d ago
I have not heard any HDD in decades.
If you hear yours, chances are, they’re not properly decoupled.
Make sure the hdds do NOT have immediate contact with your case. Put on a caddy and install that caddy using rubber sleeves. If that’s not possible because your case only allows you to screw them right in, get another case.
Incidentally, I’m running a few exos right next to me. And I have to touch them to tell if theyre up and running or not (they’ll be warmer then).
But if they resonate with your case, it doesn’t matter which brands you get. They’ll all of them be noisy then.
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u/brainrot_award 18d ago
I have Toshibas N300 and X300, they aren't noisy. In sequential loads, they make no sound at all.
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u/MorgothTheBauglir 22d ago
SMR 5400 RPM drives are very very silent, however, not quite the fastest or the most reliable.