Question for 180GXP owners

Herb W. · Post by **Herb W.** » Sat Feb 08, 2003 7:01 pm

I've noticed a few comments in this forum about these latest GXP drives making a chirping or cricket-like noise every 10 minutes or so. I was planning on picking up 2 of these drives in the next few days, and wondered if you could weigh in as to whether you have this happening on your drive, and if so how intrusive it is- i.e. is it louder or quieter than the normal seek sounds? I am also wondering if it is limited to specific sizes of this drive - I am looking at the 180 Gig version.

Any help here is appreciated - nothing would be more frustrating than dropping a bundle on these drives and then finding you were stuck with irritating intermittent noises.

jinu117 · Post by **jinu117** » Mon Feb 10, 2003 12:04 am

It does happen (less frequently now than when I just got it). Funny enough, when I am not using the computer at all (ready to go to sleep) it doesn't do that. But when I am occasionally accessing HDD, it will make the noise every so often. I can definitely live with that considering the performance gain.

Herb W. · Post by **Herb W.** » Mon Feb 10, 2003 1:03 am

Thanks for the feedback. I have subsequently read on some other hardware forum that your experience of a drop in the noise frequency is a consequence of some kind of calibration/"learning" process that occurs with new 180GXP drives.

Lithium · Post by **Lithium** » Mon Feb 10, 2003 1:06 am

I've had my IBM Deskstar 44gig make chirping noises a TON I thought I was nuts but I guess it really is an issue.

Either way I'm not going IBM again.

jinu117 · Post by **jinu117** » Tue Feb 11, 2003 1:59 pm

Lithium wrote:I've had my IBM Deskstar 44gig make chirping noises a TON I thought I was nuts but I guess it really is an issue.

Either way I'm not going IBM again.

If it is 75GXP, it is well known that drive is PARTICUALARY bad line in IBM's line of drives. 180GXP is nothing like 75GXP (yes I have one of 75GXP for occasional ghosting back and forth purposes on external enclosure). A drive worthy of IBM's reputation IMHO.
However, if you don't have immediate need for new drive, it would be interesting to see if WD can come out with 10,000 RPM one with less noise. (or even better Seagate coming out with 10,000 RPM and going to level of cuda IV's acoustics... and hopefully making the firmware compatible with RAID for once)

pingu666 · Post by **pingu666** » Tue Feb 11, 2003 3:31 pm

WD has realised 10k sata drive
8meg cache, 36gig

says it uses "high quality barings" 5 year warrenty
sounds to me like a scsii drive but wid sata

Herb W. · Post by **Herb W.** » Tue Feb 11, 2003 8:36 pm

If you survey the noise tests on Storagereview, faster drives are generally louder; I'd be surprised if the 10,000 rpm WD was anywhere near as quiet as a Barracuda. I am likely to go with the new Barracuda 7200.7+ (see other post for specs).

jinu117 · Post by **jinu117** » Thu Feb 13, 2003 2:25 pm

By reading the manufacturer's spec sheet.
Their 10k RPM drive is actually 3dBA quieter than 2000JB in idle and 1dBA quieter in active seek. This sound quite respectable with the amount of performance the new drive is going to pull in. Just can't wait till I get my hand on one as soon as prices dips to reasonable level. (I am willing to go up to $2.50 per gig now considering their awesome MTBF)

Herb W. · Post by **Herb W.** » Fri Feb 14, 2003 8:21 pm

It's still going to be much louder than the 7200.7. Whether the extra 10-15% performance will be worth all the extra noise I guess is a personal choice. Plus I expect this 10,000 rpm WD will be one very pricey (for an IDE) drive.

DaveSimmons · Post by **DaveSimmons** » Sun Feb 16, 2003 1:11 pm

The "cricket chirp" description is appropriate -- the first few times I heard the 120 GB (120GXP? not 180) in my server box doing this I was spooked, thinking it was some weird power supply or fan failure. It's the weirdest drive noise I've heard in working with drives since the MFM / RLL days.

Dru · Post by **Dru** » Fri Mar 07, 2003 6:52 pm

I was curious about this 180GXP drive since people have been talking about it, so I picked one up 2 days ago (60GB model). With AAM off, the seeks are audible, about the same as the 7200.7 with direct mounting. The idle whine is a small notch higher than the 7200.7, too. However, you can barely hear the idle whine when the case is closed (I'd say it's acceptable). With AAM off, the seeks are a lot more pleasant -- almost like the Barracuda IV like MikeC said.

jinu117 wrote:It does happen (less frequently now than when I just got it). Funny enough, when I am not using the computer at all (ready to go to sleep) it doesn't do that. But when I am occasionally accessing HDD, it will make the noise every so often. I can definitely live with that considering the performance gain.

Now to the chirping noise. I must say this is the most annoying part of the drive! I didn't hear it for a while. Then, once I got the OS installed and started using the system, I heard it. It was much louder than I had expected. This is in a near silent system. It lasted for about 2 seconds. It does sound like some type of full disk seek. Will this thing go away after some burn in time?

DaveSimmons wrote:The "cricket chirp" description is appropriate -- the first few times I heard the 120 GB (120GXP? not 180) in my server box doing this I was spooked, thinking it was some weird power supply or fan failure. It's the weirdest drive noise I've heard...

I must agree it is the weirdest drive noise I've heard, too. To me, the first half of the noise sounds like a full seek across the disk. The 2nd half sounds like 1 second of random seeks.

I find the interval to be unpredictable. I will have to pay more attention now that I've "caught" these 2 second seeks at least 3-4 times now.

Dru · Post by **Dru** » Sat Mar 08, 2003 9:08 am

I've been monitoring when my 180GXP makes these recalibration type noises. They do happen about every 10 minutes. That's too frequent in my book. It's hard to explain the exact type of sound. I think I'll try to anticipate the next occurrence and upload an mp3. Time to look in my pile of junk for a mic

To shorten the search time for some of you interested in reading more about 180GXP noise, read this thread from StorageReview:

http://forums.storagereview.net/viewtopic.php?t=7674

Dru · Post by **Dru** » Sat Mar 08, 2003 10:11 am

Here's the mp3. I have a bad microphone. The sound is "staticy" but the noise from the 180GXP doesn't happen until about the 2 second mark. The sound recording of the HD also feels distorted, but this should give a "feel" for what happens every 10 minutes on this drive. The loudness of the recording is subjective. I think it recorded lower than the actual sound level. *shrugs*

http://q2jb.com/180GXP-10minutes.zip

Archeon · Post by **Archeon** » Mon Mar 10, 2003 5:19 am

Wow, that's a very unsettling noise!

I was still considering a 180GXP up to this point, maily because to me it still seemed like that drive is still the best combo of storage capacity/noise level, but now I'm not so sure anymore.

But I really haven't got that many options, do I?

Maxtor? Ugh. Had a few bad experiences with those drive in the recent past, and I don't know if I'm willing to try again. Of all the drives with FDB motors, Maxtor is also still the noisiest, right?

Seagate? Had a few bad experiences with them in the distant past and when it comes to reliability they seem to have improved quite a bit since then. So I'm woul give them a new chance, if only they had drives larger than 160Gb. I'm aiming at 180-200Gb here.

I absolutely LOVE WD, never had any problem with them. Their drives are lightening fast BUT they are pretty LOUD. *sigh*

I sure hope that WD will soon release a drive with a Fluid Dynamic Bearing motor of some sort.

dioSRL · Post by **dioSRL** » Mon Jun 23, 2003 1:19 am

if you still have the recorded sound, could you please post it again? I think it has been erased. Also, I believe this sound came from Hitachi manufacturing. I had an notebook drive (40gb/4200RPM Hitachi) who had exactly the same sound, let's say 3 times / 6 hours. It didnt bother, because it was a silent drive.

ez2remember · Post by **ez2remember** » Mon Jun 23, 2003 8:43 am

I have had loads of notebook IBM drives ( 7 or 8 ) in the past and every single one I had made that chirping/cricket sound you describe. It only happens intermittantly which is more annoying.

I have never had a desktop variant so I cannot comment if they have it in their desktop GXP range too. But I would not be suprised if it happens, It's like a trademark of their drives.

MGP · Post by **MGP** » Mon Jun 23, 2003 6:35 pm

the "chirping" for me is almost nonexistent...not bothersome, barely audible in my case, just a very low, short hum. don't sweat it

dioSRL · Post by **dioSRL** » Tue Jun 24, 2003 2:16 am

i dont know.. I will probably go for one.. but I doubt it's silence.. now I have an 800JB and it's driving me mad and I dont want to replace it with another noise maker..

MGP · Post by **MGP** » Tue Jun 24, 2003 6:01 am

i wouldnt sweat it that much...i had a 120GB WD1200JB drive and the 120GB Hitachi 180GXP w/ 8mb cache was a HUGE improvement in noise...completely worth it if you still want top performance

MGP · Post by **MGP** » Tue Jun 24, 2003 6:02 am

i wouldnt sweat it that much...i had a 120GB WD1200JB drive and the 120GB Hitachi 180GXP w/ 8mb cache was a HUGE improvement in noise...completely worth it if you still want top performance

***and don't worry! i felt just like you one week ago (until I got my drive from newegg)!

dioSRL · Post by **dioSRL** » Tue Jun 24, 2003 9:18 am

i'd go for it.. i am not so sure but it's the only hdd on the market witch satisfy me .. it's a performer and quite silent, much better than any western digital ide hdd.

Dru · Post by **Dru** » Tue Jun 24, 2003 10:40 am

Unfortunately, when my former ISP went south, so did my files. No customers were able to get their files back. How crappy is that? I'm glad I wasn't running a business with that ISP. So.. sorry, but I don't have the wav file anymore.

As for the 180GXP, I loved the performance. However, I am very sensitive to sound. So, the chirping annoyed me. Again, I can hear it when everything else is near silent. For those of you who have some other noise in the room (PSU fan noise, music going, etc.), this chirping shouldn't bother you.