Hi - I have a Samsung 840 250gb SSD drive and a Seagate Barracuda 3TB (ST3000DM001) in my DAW system. I need three separate drives (for audio, samples and operating system) so for the third I just bought a WD Blue 1tb, having read on various sites that it was a quiet drive. Well, it isn't! I have it suspended but it's still now the loudest thing in my system, quite a bit louder than the Seagate. I'd like to replace it with another 1tb drive, can anyone recommend a really quiet one? I could get another Seagate, but I've recently been reading mixed reports about their reliability and am wary of buying another one... There don't seem to be any quiet 7200rpm 1tb drives, which seems a bit crazy. I used to have a 1tb Samsung F3 which was very quiet and worked well (until it died and took a load of my data with it that is).

Caveat emptor: IMO/IME no 7200rpm drive can be said really or enough quiet.

Said that, I would give a look to the Seagate SV35, as IMO it is a tad quieter and should be rather more reliable than the Barracudas (and - I would add - than the WD Blue, even if it's not clear if you have the EZEX or EALX variant).

Another option could be encasing a 2.5 drive into a Scythe Quiet Drive and then suspend it: I've done so with a WD Scorpio Black and it's really very quiet (but not as a 5400rpm drive); such an option has indeed some serious drawbacks, as it costs about two times a regular 7200rpm desktop drive, and it's somewhat slower than it.

Thanks QFS - I'll certainly look into the Seagate drive, weird that I've never heard of it before. I think my other option is to go back to using the 3TB Seagate drive for samples and audio (although this does cause performance problems) and wait for the Samsung EVO 500gb to come down in price...

Actually I'm kind of confused as to why my WD Blue is so noisy, all the reviews seem to say how quiet it is and it's only a one platter drive - seek noise isn't a problem but the sort of white noise it makes while spinning is noticeably louder than my Seagate drive. Weird.

Oh, and it's the EZEX model I have...

The EZEX should be quieter than EALX, anyway, from your description it would look like airborne noise: you may try either muffling the drive into foam or using some suspension like the NoiseMagic NoVibes (require a 5,25 bay, and it cost around 9-10 euros).

You're right - it's the airborne noise that's the problem. It's actually already suspended so I think there's no hope for improvement. I'm baffled as to why this supposedly quiet, single platter drive should be louder than my 3TB Seagate. Weird. Anyway, I'm returning it now, see what happens with its replacement.

Do you have any comments about the replacement?

Yes, the seagate sv35 is a lot quieter than the wd drive, I'm happy with it...

Ok, thanks!