Harddrives in SLK3000B

Procyon · Post by **Procyon** » Wed Oct 11, 2006 10:02 am

Hello, long time reader first time poster.
I have a question on how to properly mount the harddrives in a SLK3000B case. When I added two more harddrives into my system I noticed an oscillating humming noise caused by vibrations. I began to question if I had mounted to harddrives correctly. As you can see in the image, the harddrives are resting on the metal bar under it. This doesn't look good at all, because of the rubber grommets the harddrive isn't fixed to the casing so I imagine in the worst case the harddrive could even rattle against the metal under it.

I've tried to put them upsidedown, or let the rubber grommet rest in the bigger hole only to notice that then the harddrive will be pressed against the metal above it instead. I haven't seen any whine about this issue in the forum, maybe it's my unfortunate choice of harddrives. Does it work for you and what harddrives do you have?

Antec SLK3000B
Samsung SP2504C
Samsung SP2014N
Samsung SP2014N

Sooty · Post by **Sooty** » Wed Oct 11, 2006 11:40 am

Are you saying the drives are touching those bent-in metal tabs? Can you not bend the tabs out of reach of the drives? There's been a number of mentions of drive noise/vibrations with this case. Some people have turned the drive cage 90 degrees and suspended it from above.

Sooty · Post by **Sooty** » Wed Oct 11, 2006 12:05 pm

Found this thread: http://forums.silentpcreview.com/viewtopic.php?t=6764 Haven't got time to read it in detail, but seems he removed those tabs, but there was a secondary noise problem with the cage mount.

Example of suspension here:

From this thread: http://forums.silentpcreview.com/viewtopic.php?t=29627

P150/Solo are a better case overall, especially drive damping.

teejay · Post by **teejay** » Wed Oct 11, 2006 12:19 pm

That oscillating hum is due to interference in the vibration frequency of your hard drives, causing you to hear beats. Unfortunately, most grommet-based solutions won't eliminate case resonance. You can read more about that in this sticky thread (HDD vibration & noise reducing methods - ranked). The best method is probably suspension.

When my 3000B was filled with 4 hard-mounted Maxtor DiamondMax 9 disks, I could hear this phenomenon 2 rooms away... which led me to a suspension setup. IMO, whether the metal tabs touch the hard drives or not is a bit irrelevant: the drive cage will pass it vibrations to the case regardless (basically what Sooty already stated below).

shades_of_blue · Post by **shades_of_blue** » Wed Oct 11, 2006 12:48 pm

i found that the elastic cord method did not last long, too much weight. better method is this.

Procyon · Post by **Procyon** » Wed Oct 11, 2006 1:09 pm

Yes, the drives are touching those bent-in metal tabs and it's definitely the interferance in vibration frequency i'm hearing. I don't think grommets will completely eliminate the case resonance but will certainly help. But what's the point of grommets if the drives still touches the metal? I would prefer not to cut or bend them without thinking this through. Harddrive suspension does infact look like the most effective solution to reduce vibrations from harddrives. I wonder if I would hear any improvement if I bend the metal tabs, or if I should go for suspension directly?

jhhoffma · Post by **jhhoffma** » Wed Oct 11, 2006 1:41 pm

With the 3000B, suspension is so easy, you'd be silly not to do it.

There are so many methods posted here, and no one method is the "best", but suspending the whole drive cage is one of the easier ones and only requires some bungie cords.

Myself, I suspend the drive directly, but it's not the most secure method.

YMMV.