I decided to give this one a try, and it´s actually pretty good With no airflow in a 25°c room it has now settled at 35°c. With no airflow i mean at the bottom of the case with the case open and no fans.

I have it disconnected atm, but i have the homebrew enclosure under the Scythe so its basically sitting on a 40°c surface(no metal to metal contact though), im shure the temperature would drop if i removed the homebrew thing Im not removing it though, because this Scythe will be in another puter. The enclosure gets pleasantly warm, so its transferring heat properly

I have a Samsung SP1213C 120gig sata in there now, and i have to put my ear a few inches away to hear it

I really like the idea that there is not one single hole in it that lets noise escape directly, and it seems to work.

It´s better than the mCubed Vertical Silence, both in noise and temps. And the mCubed is a pretty good enclosure too

Pics in ten minutes.. Have to disconnect the drive and open the box to take pics.

Took them at VGA quality so sorry bout the quality, i just don´t feel like resizing pics at 1:30 in the morning The first and last pics are slightly out of focus too..

As you can see from those pics, the sides of the HDD touch the alu box, the gel transmits the heat from the alu box to the outer skin but it´s soft enough not to transmit vibration. The drive is surrounded by dense foam, and there´s nowhere sound can escape directly.

The other half


The HDD is screwed between two alu things to make a box


Something Scythe calls gel sheet is applied on both sides.


It´s then pushed into the other half of the box


Six screws later the top is on and its finished

Too bad you don't have a smartdrive 2002c to compare.
I wonder which one of the two would do a better job noise wise.

The temperature of the outer surface of the enclosure doesn't depend upon how insulative the foam layers are. The amount of insulation only affects the internal temperature (of the drive itself).

You simply cannot determine any information about how well heat is being transfered from the inside to the outside based on how warm the outside feels.

Im not shure im following you here.. If the heat isn´t coming from the drive, where is it coming from? Im not saying you are wrong, im only saying i need to get more sleep to understand these kind of things

Ill see if i can get a digital termometer inside the enclosure to check what kind of temps that shows. I just have to get one first Should be able to get one for a couple €uros..

No need for a digital thermometer--the hard drive itself already has one that's reporting its temperature for you (admittedly only from one location).

Rather than think about where the heat reaching the enclosure exterior is coming from, think about where the heat generated by the hard drive is going to. It has no choice but to leave via the enclosure's exterior--the enclosure completely surrounds the hard drive on all sides. The same amount of heat per minute is generated regardless of how much or how little insulation there is.

Think it'd keep a Raptor cool and quiet?

This is a fallacy which has become fashionably popular on SPCR in certain circles. Assuming that the heat flux emanating from the HDD remains unchanged in all circumstances (which is a fairly uncontroversial assumption) then the external temperature of the enclosure is a dependable guide as to the effectiveness of the enclosure's heat transport capabilities.


BTW, the idea behind this box is actually genius; use a gel which is thermally but not electrically conductive, so you get heat transmission but not vibration.

Level HDD SHELL II is better. some pictures from older version. There's no metal to metal contact.

Consider the following two enclosures:

1. A Smartdrive enclosing a 2.5" drive; the 2.5" drive is packed in with gel packs.

and

2. A Smartdrive enclosing a 2.5" drive; the 2.5" drive is wrapped within insulative cork.

Both will generate the same amount of heat per minute. Both will reach the exact same temperature on the outside. If you touch the outer surface, you won't be able to tell the difference. But the drive with the gel packs will be cooler than the drive within the insulative cork.

Obviously im aware of the temp sensor on the drive, i was thinking about the digital thingie just to check what temp it shows so i have some reference.

Im not an expert on this thermo physics thingie, but i think im following you with your examples



Sorry, it´s not. Depends on your priorities really. I admit it cools the drive better, but it doesn´t do much for noise. I have three of those LEVELs(the older one) and they cool exceptionally well but don´t reduce noise nearly as good.

They do however work very well like this, they cool the drive enough so no front intake is neccesary, would need some more thought if air-cooled though. That´s how my puter looked a little over a year ago, a couple of months earlier it looked like this. My cable management is much improved since last year The level can also be improved with some mods, mainly by sealing both ends of enclosure properly. The new one is better at this.

Overall i think the Scythe is a better compromise between cooling and noise reduction.

This one doesn´t have metal-metal contact, shure, but it has metal-gel-metal contact wich is almost as good for heat transfer but much better for noise reduction.

And ye i think it would keep a Raptor cool and quiet, that´s probably what ill be puttin in this. After all a Raptor doesnt produce much, if any, more heat than 7200rpm drives. Especially if you compare it to a 500Gb drive.

Isaac is right. Insulation changes the time that it takes for the heat to move from the drive to the shell, but the heat will still get there eventually. Since the drive is producing heat at a constant rate, a well-insulated drive will get warmer, since the heat energy is not being removed as fast as it is being produced. As the drive heats up the rate of transfer increases until there is equilibrium. A well-insulated drive will have a warmer internal temp than an less insulated drive will, but the shell temp will be the same since its temp is controlled by its rate of transferring heat away from itself and in to the case.


We had a test sample of the Level Shell years ago....we elected not to review it because it actually made the drive louder than just suspending it bare in a drive cage. There's variability in the actual production width of HDD's...if your drive is off by half a millimeter from what the Level people thought a HDD would be it either won't fit, or rattles. There's a discussion of it somewhere in the forums here. I have found that it makes an excellent enclosure for 2.5" drives though...I sandwich the drive inside there with blocks of sorbothane.

I agree with Isaac's and Rusty's analysis of insulation. However, I suspect that it falls into the "all else being equal" pile with so much other scientific analysis.


The problem I see here is that the temperature of whatever spot a user might measure isn't related solely to total heat output. Different enclosures can have obviously different thermal resistances between the drive and box as well as between whatever pieces may comprise the box. Therefore various designs will achieve more or less efficient cooling. If an enclosure can't easily transfer heat to its large top panel, that area of the box will feel relatively cool while the sides (and drive!) run hotter with less effective heatsinking.

Anyone care to disagree?

Another way to look at what Isaac and Rusty are saying is that with a well-insulated drive the drive will get hotter before the exterior of the enclosure reaches the equilibrium temperature, and the drive will remain at a hotter temperature. With a less insulated drive the drive doesn't get as hot before the exterior of the enclosure reaches the same equilibrium temperature, and the drive remains cooler.

Yes, the internal layout does matter, true enough. We've been assuming the temperature distribution is roughly equal all around.

Hmm...it occurs to me that the outer temperature of an enclosure DOES matter, and it DOES tell you something about the drive's temperature--it puts a lower limit on what the drive's temperature could be.

For example, if the outer temperature is 30 degrees, then the drive's temperature inside is at least 30 degrees.

So, even without knowing the conductivity of the enclosure layers, it seems that a COOLER outer temperature is desireable. How can this be acheived? Well, it isn't really affected by the conductiveness of the internal layers, but it IS affected by the enclosure's outer geometry and airflow. An enclosure with heatsink ridges should be able to run cooler than without them, and thus help the hard drive within run cooler also.

I'd greatly appreciate it if you could keep us updated on this! Its been driving me mad trying to find an enclosure other than the SmartDrive that'll cool and quieten a Raptor.

Here's hoping...

Hi nici, seems like you got the homebrew enclosure working eventually. How does it compare to the Scythe?

nici
This is the thing that baffles me about enclosures and your experience in particular.... Even without an enclosure, with no airflow my drives typically reach low-mid 40's depending on ambient temperature, so it really amazes me that you put your drive in an enclosure and got such low temperature.

Can you do some more tests?
1. Did you make sure that your drive idled long enough for thermal equilibirium to be reached?
2. Are you sure that there is absolutely NO airflow over the enclosure?
3. What were your temps without enclosure as measured by HDD sensor?
4. Can you do a subjective test, can you put test the temperature of the bare drive, subjectively with your finger (or with that cheapo thermometer if you can get your hands on one), then put the drive in an enclosure wait till thermal equilibrium is achieved, take the drive out and once again subjectively test if it's hotter or cooler than running bare? If you can also test the temperature of the PCB board on the bottom of the drive that would be awesome too...

Or am I asking for too much?


Rusty075

So does this mean that there exists, or potentially can exist an enclosure with perfect heat transfer, i.e. the one that keeps the drive it the same temperature as the drive idles bare? Maybe I was fundamentally wrong when it came to enclosures being afraid to use one because I believe they raise the temperature too much...

Yeah i got it working, its better at reducing noise than the Scythe but the box is huge(222x146x55mm) and the HDD will eventually after several hours get up to nearly 20°c above ambient at least with no airflow. So overall it´s good

As for the whole Raptor in Scythe, sounds nice together those two, it will have to wait at least a few days. The raptor is now in this computer, if i put it in another computer i have to phone microsoft and re-activate my copy of windows because of "significant hardware changes". Even re-sizing partitions or adding slow memory for troubleshooting is a "significant hardware change", goddamnit. It´s sh*t like this that makes me want to throw my Windows out the window.

On second thought, ill just test it with something else than the Raptor unless someone wants to phone MS for me 250Gb samsung me thinks, the raptor has quieter idle than the samsung and gets maybe a few degrees warmer.

No wait, on third thought i could just temporarily use the Scythe in this computer with the Raptor in it and see how that works. Yes ill do that (And hope windows doesn´t count a change in HDD enclousre a significant hardware change"...)

And the computer im going to put the Scythe in has my DFI nF4 board in it, and the fookin chipset is driving me up the wall! No aftermarket cooler will fit, except the 65€ Borg, and i cant have the GPU in the lower slot because in "SLI" mode the board doesn´t power the lower slot and since my card doesn´t have a power connector i just get a damn error beep. Where can i get new pushpins for the chipset HS anyway? The stock cooler is now on with nuts and bolts!

GreenBunny-->

What´s your ambient temp if your drives

1. I only had it one for a couple hours, bu the temp did rise when defraggin and drop when idling.

2. Im shure the was no airflow. Lots of empty pace around it though and case was open. So there might have been some air moving, but not enough to affect tmeps imo. I did a test out of curiosity though, a 192CFM Delta wich draws 36W blowing on it for ten minutes. Temp dropped 1°c, let the thermo guys explain this because i can´t. A bare drive would have dropped down to maybe 2°c above ambient with 192CFM and bleeding ears blowing over it.. So would a HDD inside the LEVEL HDD shell. Crap at reducing noise, but cools extremely well(if the hdd fits tightly) because it basicall at least tenfolds the surface area of the drive.

3. Can´t remember, have to test that.

4. Spose i can do that, a good excuse for me to get one of those infrared termometers

Yes. See SPCR's enclosure review with a Scythe Silent Box and a Smart Drive.

nici
I've got 2504C as the only drive in the system. Ambient temps are about 25-26 right now and the drive idles at 32-33, that's 7 degrees rise above ambient. But, and that's a big but, I've got PSU pulling air over my hard drive (see sig), if I let it idle in free air it would have gotten much much hotter, at the very least 37-38.

That's why I'm amazed that you got only 10 degrees rise over ambient and that's in an enclosure with no airflow over it.

The price on the enclosure looks very attractive compared to other enclosures out there (35+S&H at crazypc), if it works well at keeping the drive cool it might be a worthwhile investment. By the way, how good is it at reducing idle noise? I don't really care about seeks and vibrations as it's going to be decoupled anyway, but I do care about idle noise most.

Are we going to see SPCR review the Scythe Quiet Drive (vs Scythe Silent Box)?

It´s very good at reduceing idle noise, i have the 250Gb shasmung in there now and i can hear it from maybe 30cm away but it´s not annoying. I get seriously annoyed by a 2,5" samsung in free air.

I notice my highly subjective measurments are not very constant, ill do some proper testing tomorrow

I haven´t actually mounted the Scythe in a case yet but i suspect the drive wont be audible outside the case. Especially after my extensive damping work. My light alu case is not so light anymore... Probably about 5Kg worth of damping in a 5.9Kg Lian-Li 6077B. Ill make an interesting front for it too, keep an eye on the gallery...

It was now on for six hours, and it didnt rise anymore.



Yes.



It has now been outside the enclosure for ten minutes in the same place as the encolusre, and its still idling at the same tempereture as in the enclosure according to the on board sensor.



Ok here goes... These temps were measured at 26.4°c ambient with a Fluke 62 IR termometer just after the drive was removed from the enclosure and still running. I didn´t want it to cool down before i could measure temps.

Ambient: 26.4°c
On-board temp by DTemp: drifting between 37-38°c
Eclosure, outside: 36°c
Gel, top: 34°c
Gel, bottom: 37°c
End of drive with connectors: 39.8°c
End of drive without connectors: 40.8°c
Top of drive: 40.4°c
Bottom, metal part: 42°c
Sides: 42°c
Memory: 44°c
A chip with lots of components around it: 49.2°c
The hottest components around the chip: 57°c
A chip with a Marvell logo: 47°c

Now after ten minutes of idle;

Ambient: 27°c
On-board temp by DTemp:drifting between 38-39°c
Top:41°c
Bottom, metal part: 43.2°c
Sides: 42°c
Memory: 44,2°c
A chip with lots of components around it: 50°c
The hottest components around the chip: 59°c
A chip with a Marvell logo: 47°c
On-board temp with 192CFM of Delta blowing over the HDD: 23°c, at this point ambient near the intake side of the fan is 26°c so the onboard sensor is a bit optimistic, as shown by my earlier measurments.

EDIT: Might have been a bit unclear here i think. The first temps are just after it was removed from the enclosure and still running, so those are effectively the temps it has inside the enclosure. The second temps are after ten minutes of idle without the enclosure in the same place as the enclosure was, with the bottom of the drive facing down and room for air under it.

So as you can see, at least with no noticeable amount of airflow the drive is about the same temperature inside the enclosure as it is sitting bare. With the difference that the drive is a whole lot quieter in the box

I tried to write down the hottest part of each component. But obviously i can´t get the measurments from exactly the same spot both times. The Fluke 62 has an accuracy of + 1% of reading or +1 °C (+2 °F), whichever is greater.

Please comment if you notice i forgot something or if you find faults in my measurments I thought about leaving the decimals out, but decided its better to just report what the meter told me.

EDIT: Lot´s a typo..
EDIT#2: Cleared things up a bit..

Forgot to mention the drive i used, a Samsung SP2504C wich is a P120 nidec 250Gb sata

Btw. does this qualify as a user review if all the info is put in one post and edited to look not too cluttered?

Thanks a lot for the mini-review nici. I'll probably try and buy one next month and see for myself how it performs. If worst comes to worst I can always use it as an enclosure for 2.5" drive. That's a poor way to use it, but... Anyway, we'll see what comes out of it. Thanks again for the effort!

Im glad i can help. If there´s any more testing anyone wants me to do just ask At the moment, this enclosure is looking pretty damn good to me

This thread seems to get a lot of views.. And apparently windows thinks that removing two sticks of ram is a significant harware change.. That´s just ass balls.

whoatethepies--> I can still test it with the Raptor if you like, but it should run at the same temp as without the enclosure.

One improvement i think Scythe should do is include a third gel piece to put on the bottom of the drive like in the old Scythe enclosure. I assume it would lower the temperature on the components on the PCB.

And the componets that got nearly 60°c are resistors, so nothing to worry about there

nici: You've made a copy of Alleycat's (coolpacks) enclosure before, right ?

How good would you say that the Scythe Quiet Drive enclosure is at reducing noise compaired to the homebrew coolpack solution ?

The homebrew thing with coolpacks is slightly better at reducing noise, but its not quite as good at cooling the drive. I haven´t tested the homebrew thing as thoroughly as this one though. I´ve only checked the external temperature of the box and the on-board sensor.

To reach the point where the drive wont get any hotter, equilibrium or wahtever, will take at least several times longer with the gelpack thing because of the gelpacks. So if you only have your computer on a few hours at a time, the drive will never get taht hot. If you have it on 24/7 it will be about 15° above ambient. At 22°c that would be 37°c.

If you think it'll be OK then thats enough for me! Thanks