Of particular interest to SPCR's readers, they claim :
They list only 3 SATA models for now but, according to the press release, PATA models are available too. All these drives are 1 platter only and use 6.5W at idle, 8W for read/write, 9.5W for seeks. The prices quoted by the french website where I read about it are 45€ for 80Go and 60€ for 160Go models. For comparaison I should add that existing 160Go Samsung HDDs are sold around 55€ here.Benchmarking tests on sound power have shown that competing hard drives (80GB and 160GB models) generate on average 2.8 bel (1 bel = 10 decibels) in idle mode and 3.2 bel in seek mode, while Samsung’s S166 series generate just 2.4 bel and 2.75 bel respectively. This significant fifteen percent noise-level reduction makes the drives ideal for use in office computers, as well as in home consumer electronics such as DVR/ PVRs, or any other hard drive equipped products intended for use in a quiet environment.
Although this 2.45 Bel / 2.80 Bel should be a good improvement compared to the Spinpoint T HD400LJ (2.7 Bel / 2.9 Bel) currently on top of SPCR's list of recommended HDDs or to another featured drives like the Spinpoint P80 SP0802N (2.7 Bel / 2.8 Bel), it should be noted that according to Samsung's specifications the P120 SP1603N was already close (2.5 Bel/ 2.8 Bel), and the T166 HD160HJ was already lower in noise(2.35 Bel/ 2.7 Bel) at least according to specifications.
EDIT: "SpinPoint" -> "Samsung" in the subject