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Silencing a Hard Drive Using Household Items
Posted by
kdawson
on Sun Nov 02, 2008 05:22 AM
from the bread-olives-and-silence dept.
from the bread-olives-and-silence dept.
Reader Justblair recommends his blog entry detailing how he made a hard drive silencer for a pittance. "This article demonstrates a very easy-to-make hard drive silencer that not only outperforms most commercially available devices, but is cheaper to implement as well. Requiring very little in fabrication skills, it is an ideal addition to a media PC or HTPC. It may even suit you if your head is aching after many hours of being whined at by your hard drive."
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Haven't read TFA (Score:5, Funny)
Re:Haven't read TFA (Score:5, Funny)
Does it involve bludgeoning with any number of common household items?
Only if you use reiserfs on the disk.
Parent
Re:Haven't read TFA (Score:5, Funny)
too soon.
Parent
Re:Haven't read TFA (Score:5, Informative)
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Re: (Score:3, Funny)
Gel cooling bags?! Pfft. Real men use socks.
Re: (Score:3, Funny)
Re: (Score:3, Funny)
No, he put the hard drive in a big aluminium case, with those gel cooling bags surrounding the drive. Sorry, I just spoiled the whole thing. That's pretty much all it says.
This is what it said to me:
Forbidden
You don't have permission to access /hdsilence.html on this server.
Apache/2 Server at www.justblair.co.uk Port 80
Seems JustBlair /.ed himself.
i have never found hard drive noise a problem (Score:5, Interesting)
ive seen another hard drive silencing technique elsewhere that's even cheaper, although possibly not quite as effective, which is simply to mount it with rubber bands in a 5.25" bay rather than screws.
http://www.spodesabode.com/archive/content/article/hddnoise [spodesabode.com]
Re:i have never found hard drive noise a problem (Score:5, Funny)
Well, sulky, then apply this technology to your fans. Put them in a box, pour in a lot of cooling gel and voila.
Parent
Re:i have never found hard drive noise a problem (Score:5, Funny)
Make sure you seal the box. It's the key to keeping fan noise down.
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Re:i have never found hard drive noise a problem (Score:5, Insightful)
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Re:i have never found hard drive noise a problem (Score:4, Funny)
Parent
Re:i have never found hard drive noise a problem (Score:4, Funny)
I'm just curious, but what kind of gel do you use to silence your wife and kids?
Parent
Re: (Score:3, Interesting)
Most of the time I can't hear the fans in my media box as it's running cool enough not to spin them up very fast (high load in the middle of summer is an exception).
But I get a high-pitched whine from the HD's spinning vibrating the entire case (which acts like an amplifier of sorts). If you're old enough I spose you wouldn't hear it. But being the spring chicken I am, I can hear it. By decoupling the HD from the case by suspending it in elastic it completely silences the box.
Re: (Score:3, Informative)
The loose rubber grommets which attach my drives serve the same purpose. The screw inserts directly through, but it only has enough turns to keep the disk from falling out.
I can't remember which case it is, but it should be difficult to spot from would be myth box builders.
Re:i have never found hard drive noise a problem (Score:5, Informative)
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Re:i have never found hard drive noise a problem (Score:5, Funny)
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Re: (Score:3, Insightful)
the fans are the noisiest part of my computer
Now see what happens when you silence the fan, like you would in any silent computer that this article is meant to be used for
Re:i have never found hard drive noise a problem (Score:4, Insightful)
Larger slower fans are pretty much the key for noise to displacement ratio.
I've been fairly happy with my antec case which even incluedes a very very large fan at the top of the case.
My only complaint is these fans are managed via switch attached to each fan. Sure, I never have to turn them up, but let the board regulate the flow would be better.
Parent
Re:i have never found hard drive noise a problem (Score:4, Informative)
It also comes with an optional 5-1/4 bay panel with 4 dials that let you control minimum fan voltage, vcore, and one other voltages.
I guess not exactly the same as direct motherboard control, but then you don't need like 4 chassis fan headers on the board to achieve a similar effect. If you have those 3 position Low/Med/High fans antec sells, they suggest setting it to High if using the TrueControl II to control them.
http://www.antec.com/usa/productDetails.php?lan=us&id=22552 [antec.com]
Parent
Re:i have never found hard drive noise a problem (Score:5, Funny)
Much easier to outrun but they do more damage if they catch you.
Parent
Re: (Score:3, Interesting)
One thing that may or may not be a factor... At least on my cases if I touch the mounting bracket it's usually quite warm. In other words, it seems that mounting the drives normally plays a part in cooling down the drive itself.
Re:i have never found hard drive noise a problem (Score:4, Informative)
Same here. Hard drive noise is a non-issue for me, despite having a dozen under my desk. Now, older hard drives had an annoying whine, but today's gear is near-silent.
Take any consumer drive from the last 2-3 years, mount it sanely, either via grommets or elastic suspension as the parent suggested, and the only time you might hear something is when it is spinning up at power-on. Once it reaches normal operating revs, that thing should be noiseless.
I just built a bunch of office machines, simple little things really. Core-2 Duo, WD 500gb drive, Antec chassis... Those cheap little things are perfectly noiseless, I shit you not. You could stick your ear right up to the hard drive and barely hear the modest clicking of the heads seeking around. In fact, the Antec 120mm fan, even at 800rpm, is easily the loudest component. Now, Antec doesn't make the quietest fans, but they're certainly in the Top 5.
Parent
Re: (Score:3, Informative)
Rubber bands will eventually dry out and then your HDD goes for an unexpected drop inside the case. No thanks!
Re: (Score:3, Informative)
Someone else way down in the comments mentioned using foam pipe insulation to fit a 3.5 drive into a 5.25 bay. That's quick, cheap and easy to do, but doesn't really work nearly as well as it could. Most types of flexible plastic and rubber do very little to dampen vibration.
The better material to use here is Sorbothane. In the US, McMaster-Carr is one place that sells small pieces online/mail order. (also be warned--Sorbothane is tacky and tends to sti
Re: (Score:3, Informative)
The speed of a drive is highly related to the noise that it makes. With 10,000 rpm and even 15,000 rpm hard drives in the wild things can get noisy.
However, ideas like suspending it with rubber bands may well have a serious flaw. We don't know to what degree physical contact with the metal in the drive bay acts as a heat transfer medium. A drive suspended in air might suffer a melt down or early death.
Re:i have never found hard drive noise a problem (Score:4, Funny)
What's with you kids these days? Hard disks belong in the computer, not running hither and yon around the room. Lack of discipline causes all these problems, I say!
Show me a nice, well restrained hard drive and I'll show you a nice, well behaved hard drive. Take the time to teach your computer discipline - you'll be glad you did.
Parent
Solution (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:Solution (Score:5, Funny)
Or you could just buy some newer hard drives out there with high ariel density.
So how many mermaids can they fit into a hard drive these days?
Parent
Super-Heated (Score:3, Interesting)
Those things get way too hot. My mom has a new hard drive (as of this summer) with three directories of files recovered from signatures. Nasty.
Drives should be covered with moving air. They should also be mounted to the ground plane (which is the PC case.)
Re: (Score:3, Informative)
Yep this gel-mounting is disaster waiting to happen.
Hard drives put out a staggering amount of heat. By sealing the drive inside a blob of gel, he's effectively created a pressure cooker! Now there are some exotic drive coolers that envelop the drive in a liquid-filled sleeve, but those kits actually cool the liquid via radiators and natural convection, a huge difference!
If I see a hard drive without airflow nearby, I tense up because I know that thing's going to die prematurely. When a hard drive is run
cooling pads + box (Score:5, Insightful)
I'm not sure that the 'cooling pads plus box' enclosure is a good idea. It looks like it will make the drive less efficient at radiating heat away. Might lead to overheating, especially in the fanless system in the article.
Re: (Score:3, Insightful)
TFA claims that the gel would transfer the heat to the aluminum enclosure where it could radiate away, but I'm not so sure of that. Doesn't it store the heat more than transfer it?
However, I suppose you could combine this technique with a watercooling system. Just wind some copper tubing around the HDD a few times and lead it to the outside of the enclosure.
The catch is (Score:5, Interesting)
There is a reason why Apple uses (used to use) FEA programs to design the cooling systems of their computers, and it is not marketing. In the good old days, you often found bad engineering practices in cheap PCs - such as the hard drive being screwed wrong side down to the chassis - and it was then not unusual for them to work OK as a desktop but fail quickly if used as a server, because the HDD was now actually doing some work.
cat hair (Score:3, Interesting)
I've got about 6 years worth of cat hair coating my hard drive and it's very quiet now... also heats my feet during the winter... you get used the smell after the first year...
More DIY Hard Disk Drive Silencing Techniques (Score:3, Interesting)
I've found a better solution a few years ago (Score:5, Interesting)
I simply cut some pipe insulation foam in halves, and rolled both parts around the disk, one near the front side, one near the rear side. I used some electric wire around the foam to hold it in place. Now my 3"5 disk fits perfectly in a 5"25 slot in front of the case's fan, and the foam's thickness prevents it from moving. I can't hear it *at all* now, eventhough it's a SCSI 15k rpm, because the noise from the motor normally conducts through the metal and the fixations only.
It requires very little material, skills and time to do this, and the disk can be
extracted at any moment without hassle.
Common Household Item - (Score:3)
Gun
A less recommended apporach (Score:4, Funny)
Yeah, see, I was getting tired of hearing my hard drive whine, but rather than dampen the noise coming from it, I decided to drown it out: I had kids.
403 Forbidden (Score:5, Funny)
So it seems that they just prohibit access to the drive.
Slashdotted - instructions below (Score:5, Funny)
1. post story to slashdot
2. watch server burst into flames
3. apply fire extinguisher liberally
4. enjoy perfectly quietened hard drive noises
(there's no "profit" in there... I must've missed a step!)
Slashdotted! Mirror here (Score:3, Informative)
(The pictures couldn't be salvaged from the original story.)
RTA, he does suspend them. (Score:4, Informative)
He embeds them in gel and he suspends them with elastic.
Parent
Re:RTA, he does suspend them. (Score:5, Funny)
He embeds them in gel and he suspends them with elastic.
Kinky!
Parent
Re: (Score:3, Insightful)
Hard drives get pretty hot, and high temperatures will shorten their lifespan.
My seagate drives are quiet enough for me.
Only stuff that makes perceptible noise are the case fans, and the ones I have aren't that noisy either.
Re:RTA, he does suspend them. (Score:4, Funny)
Parent
Re:RTA, he does suspend them. (Score:4, Interesting)
Actually you can have a silent PC with silent fans. The standard is 20dB at one metre (3 ft). Those 3 feet are what enable a quiet PC to become a silent PC.
Turn just about any good fan down to 800rpm or less, and it becomes nearly inaudible in free air. Once you combine such a quiet fan with the PC's chassis resonance (on a good chassis), the chassis' acoustic properties will effectively shape the noise (like a bandpass speaker box). Some of that noise gets muffled internally, some of it gets dispersed at the vents, and ideally very little sound will reach your ears.
Making a quiet PC is easy, because off-the-shelf components have gotten very quiet over the years. Making a silent PC is more like building an awesome loudspeaker - there's a lot of planning, acoustic measurements and math involved to meet your sonic goal.
Parent
Re:Maybe it's just me... (Score:5, Insightful)
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Re:Maybe it's just me... (Score:4, Interesting)
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Re:I don't mind a little bit of noise from a HDD (Score:5, Funny)
It's a bit like a car engine - you know what your machine is supposed to sound like. When it doesn't, then you investigate.
Unfortunately, my Xbox is apparently supposed to sound like an overloaded 747 during takeoff... (I work near a UPS hub - I can take a fresh comparison every half-hour or so during the day).
Parent