WD Black Caviar vs. Black Scorpio, and are they quiet?

Silencing hard drives, optical drives and other storage devices

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Sooty
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Joined: Mon Sep 22, 2003 5:15 am
Location: UK

WD Black Caviar vs. Black Scorpio, and are they quiet?

Post by Sooty » Sat Jul 10, 2010 11:03 am

Will I be happy with the Blacks, noisewise, whether 3.5 or 2.5? I want Blacks because they come with a 5 year warranty, which suggests they’re more reliable. Going on official figures (below), the Caviar and Scorpio seem pretty close, if used in speed-mode 3, and both very close to the Greens, which seem to be rated on here. I don’t require silence, just not to be heard within 2 meters outside an Antec P150 case.

Caviar Black (500/640) / Scorpio (All) / Caviar Green (500)
Idle Mode: 25 / 22 / 24
Seek Mode: 29 / 25 / 29
Seek Mode 3: 26 / 25 / 25
Western Digital decibel figures for seek is what concerns me (never been bothered by idle noise).

As I see it, Caviar vs. Scorpio:

Caviar
Cheaper per GB
Use more wattage
Maybe faster?
Fits securely in P150 standard HDD mount

Scorpio
Maybe slower?
More expensive per GB
Far more efficient on watts
Won’t fit into P150 standard HDD mount without modding. Could use the rubber bands, but not sure they’re as secure as standard mount (they can break).

Does this some up the pros and cons, or have I missed something?

MikeC
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Post by MikeC » Tue Jul 13, 2010 9:40 am

If you use the suspension mount of the P150, the difference between the various drives becomes extremely small, perhaps not really worth worrying about. ie: Go for the black, 2.5" preferred but 3.5" probably OK.

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