Are 8cm CDs/DVDs much quieter than 12cm ones?

[mathias]

And has anyone tried using 8cm DVDs instead of 12cm CDs? I've heard of drives that are quiter with DVDs, so it seems to me that if slower edge speed reduces noise, those two things could add up to a big difference. Is this often impossible, do games and other things that need that need the CD to be used(like windows install discs) often refuse to work with a DVD?

The other problem is that 8cm DVDs are expensive.

I don't see any reason why this wouldn't workwith knoppix and the like, for which it would be really useful.

[mathias]

I've tried one.

I got a double sided optodisc 8cm DVD-RW and burned knopix 3.9 and the latest ultimate boot cd version on it, both worked. The biggest difference was the complete lack of turbulance-ish and motor hum type noise that I hear a lot from my NEC 3500 drive(whenever there is humming noise, there is also turbulence, so the main noise is the combination of those two). The other type of characteeristic optical disc noise was still there, but it was a lot quieter than just the turbulance noise alone(not sure if it was quieter than with a regular CD). IMO it was very useable, especially ultimate boot CD which was close to unnoticable due to very infrequent and perhaps quieter tertiary noise.

However, when I checked how a CD compared, I noticed that knoppix 3.9 apparently throttles down CD speed and the very annoying primary noise rarely occurs and the lone turbulence noise doesn't occur very often either.

[Techno Pride]

drives read those smaller discs at a slower speed compared to the usual discs.

No surprise that they are more quiet. If you're using Nero DriveSpeed to control the read speed, it probably doesn't make much of a difference.

[mathias]

Why would that be? Discs are burned from the inside to the outside, so any disc with a small amount of data will be read slower on average than one that's near-full.

IMO the complete lack of turbulance noise was surprising. With nero drivespeed, my drive still has considerable turbulance noise at 7x IIRC, and it's still slightly audible a bit more below that, how much slower are minidvds?

If you're in windows, you could also just forget about nero drivespeed and use daemon tools instead in a lot of situations.

[mathias]

It definitly is not simply because of lower speed that the 8cm discs are quieter.

I did a speed test, at the start of the discs the transfer rate is practically the same(3.3x) for an 8cm DVD and a 12cm DVD, but the bigger discs are far louder when undergoing that test.

[michaelb]

Thanks for the updates; I may try this someday.

I tried Knoppix (full size) DVD version instead of CD, thinking the higher density of a DVD would mean slower spinning, or at least less spinning.

With Knoppix, the notebook fans are more of an issue for me than the optical drive. But, if I ever come across some cheap small DVDs, I may try the CD version of Knoppix on them, just for fun.

(With Windows, there's an easy utility to have the fans temp driven, and they seldom come on.)

[wwenze]

If a disc is lighter with smaller radius would it vibrate less?

[mathias]

If a disc is lighter with smaller radius would it vibrate less?

I would guess that the worst noise I get, which would be more accurately described as very similar to some vacuum cleaners, probably does come from some vibration(of the case or maybe even inside the drive).

[PositiveSpin]

DVDs are quieter because they spin more slowly, I believe.

I've burned both DVDs and CDs in the 8cm sizes - they are more conveniently pocket-sized. Can't say I've noticed them being quieter, but I don't regard burning or reading optical discs as a "quiet moment".

I usually have the drive silent because it's stopped