Antec MX-1: Actively Cooled External HDD Enclosure

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Bartender
Posts: 34
Joined: Tue Nov 29, 2005 7:11 am
Location: Washington State, USA

Post by Bartender » Thu Dec 25, 2008 5:26 pm

Picked up one of these at local Staples for $40. Dropped in a Samsung SpinPoint. Fired it up, jeez, what's all the noise. Popped off the top, pulled the fan connection loose, noise stopped. The SpinPoint was essentially inaudible.
Disassembled the thing. In the course of screwing around, realized that a little pressure on the fan duct seemed to help, so cut some thin sticky-sided foam and applied it between the bottom shell and the fan housing.
That helped but I'm still disappointed. The fan makes a distinct "tick" with each revolution. And with the thing all back together, you can feel obvious vibration thru the outer shell, indicating to me that the fan is very poorly balanced.

Charuto
Posts: 43
Joined: Sat Mar 17, 2007 10:46 pm
Location: USA

Post by Charuto » Tue Jan 06, 2009 9:50 am

So I've had one of these for a month now. It's audible, but I took the trade off to keep the hard drive cool

Yesterday I turned it on but my notebook didn't detect the hard drive. After some troubleshooting, I found that it now only works with the top off. I'm pretty certain it's not the hard drive itself. Antec what's going on here?

Gnus
Posts: 1
Joined: Tue Feb 10, 2009 2:15 am
Location: Canada

Post by Gnus » Tue Feb 10, 2009 2:27 am

I've owned this enclosure for about 3 months now and it was pretty damn sweet, kept my drive nice and cool so I never had to worry about turning it off and the best part was it was quiet. Recently though, it started to make these "revving" noises, like a chainsaw/motorbike/etc. like everybody stated. At first, I started freaking thinking that my 640GB hard drive was about to kick the bucket but turns out a quick Google search lead me to this thread and very similar problems experienced by other people. What pisses me off is that it doesn't look like the fan could be replaced, which was the first thing I thought of doing... yay for unique-shaped crap fans by Antec. Dropping $60 only to have the fan start whining is not a good feeling especially with no possible way to replace it.

Out of curiousity, how many of you guys use the enclosure on the stand? What I noticed is that by placing the unit flat, the noise has since disappeared so give that a shot and post back. Yeah it sucks because it takes up so much space on my desk but that's the best for now. >_<

Monkeh16
Posts: 507
Joined: Sun May 04, 2008 2:57 pm
Location: England

Post by Monkeh16 » Tue Feb 10, 2009 3:51 am

Have you considered, y'know, lubricating the fan? They do need to be maintained.

lloydo
Posts: 35
Joined: Sun Jan 22, 2006 5:14 pm
Location: Sydney, Australia

Post by lloydo » Thu Feb 26, 2009 4:46 pm

Just got one of these, and the thing is LOUD. Quite disappointed really.

Hope Antec do a recall..

zeppelin2
Posts: 1
Joined: Wed Dec 20, 2006 12:30 pm

Post by zeppelin2 » Wed Mar 11, 2009 6:21 am

Mine too is annoyingly loud..

I've unplugged the fan, stuck the MX-1 (with the lid off) into a "modded" shoebox (read holes at either long end) and have a Yate Loon 120mm @ 5V at one end blowing across the enclosure. Ain't purdy but it works.

Not really portable anymore though :/

EDIT: Mine's been noisy since day one. I even RMAed it for a new one and the replacement was just as bad. It's the motor noise of the fan coupled with the resonance of the case that's the problem.. poor design choice really.

I sent a support ticket to Antec highlighting this thread and I'm waiting to see if they respond.
Last edited by zeppelin2 on Fri Mar 13, 2009 8:47 am, edited 1 time in total.

sdnative1
Posts: 1
Joined: Fri Mar 13, 2009 12:41 am
Location: California

ANTEC MX-1 FAN NOISE CONFIRMED!

Post by sdnative1 » Fri Mar 13, 2009 12:53 am

I can confirm that after 7 months, there is noticeable fan noise from the Antec MX-1. It's loud enough at times to be heard from 15 feet away. It sounds like a bearing grinding or the fan rubbing against something in the housing. It was SILENT DURING THE FIRST 7 MONTHS. I was originally placing the unit horizontal. However, I accidentally discovered that when I turn the unit on its left side and use the included stand, the unit is SILENT AGAIN and has been for the past 2 weeks. If it keeps working this position, I'll be happy however it is still disturbing.

My only reason for buying this enclosure was that it was one of the only ones with a internal fan. I was surprised at Fry's Electronics to discover that most of the hard drive enclosures on the market do not use a fan and are passively cooled via the aluminum case. Had I known of the fan issues with this MX-1, I would have opted for a fanless enclosure (which Antec also makes). I'm told the usually there are no problems using a well ventilated hard drive without a fan. Keep in mind that most DVRs (other than Tivo) have a hard drive with no fan in the box.

A little background: I went through the trouble of opening up the unit, removing the hard drive and blowing out the fan with compressed air. No change in the noise after reassembly. I believe the problem is caused by a poor quality fan bearings or fan housing.

plumgas
Posts: 1
Joined: Thu Apr 23, 2009 11:31 pm
Location: australia

Post by plumgas » Thu Apr 23, 2009 11:46 pm

I know this is an old review & thread but I have just purchased the MX-1 & have found the blue led light only lights up when first pressing on the power switch & then goes off. Accessing the drive the light never comes on again.

I have a samsung 750gb drive installed, I sent the first one back but this one is the same. Anyone else have the issue of no led light.

By the way I am using by sata connection & the fan is quiet, I cannot hear it. I have to put my hand on it to check if it's working that's how quite it is. I did notice a bit of noise when I was testing the Usb connection but the noise stopped.

tuuleveski
Posts: 5
Joined: Wed Apr 29, 2009 5:07 am
Location: Estonia

Post by tuuleveski » Fri Jan 01, 2010 2:48 am

has anyone tried replacing the fan? or tried to disassemble the fan and study why it is so noisy?

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