QUIET vs. FAST HARD DRIVES, share your experiences

BusyBoxSt7 · Post by **BusyBoxSt7** » Sun Oct 04, 2009 2:04 am

I've currently got in my mac pro:
230GB system/personal
500GB project stuff...

i'm looking to add a 1TB and use it like this
230 system + desktop stuff only
500 personal only
1TB projects only

THE QUESTION
Should I go for a quieter hard drive like a WD Caviar Green or go for the high performance one like a Caviar Black (or raptor)? I'm not looking for a ton of back and forth about which hard drive company's the best (that's a waste of time, it's all over the internet). I'm asking for GENERAL advice on this unless you've owned the specific drives in question and can say "oh it was too loud (or wasn't), or, "it was too slow (or wasn't)" MAKE SENSE?

MY SYSTEM
Mac Pro Quad 2.66 OSX 10.4.8 (delaying Leopard due to PT8 upgrade fees)
3 GB ram
drives (see above)
PT HD 7.3.1
HD1 accel pcie (rarely use TDM plugs)
Lynx Aurora16 ADDA
UAD2 Quad almost omni (runs as RTAS of course)
hopefully some outboard and a console soon..

jetam · Post by **jetam** » Sun Oct 04, 2009 5:55 am

Probaly every modern disk is fast enough for recording/playing back 48 tracks or even more. I have WD disk, I think that it's Green and it isn't loud or slow.

BusyBoxSt7 · Post by **BusyBoxSt7** » Sun Oct 04, 2009 7:46 am

THANKS! ...

Other thoughts? Even if it's just a quick +1, add to my survey

.

woodhenge · Post by **woodhenge** » Sun Oct 04, 2009 8:13 am

I've added 4 new drives to my Mac Pro, and have found that NONE of the new ones were nearly as noisy as the WD 250GB one that shipped stock in my machine!

I have 2 Maxtor 500GB drives and 2 Barracuda 1.5TB drives (all 7200 rpm) and have not had any issues with disk speed or excessive noise. One 500GB drive is dedicated as a Leopard OS and applications disk, and the other 500GB is all audio projects. One of the 1.5TB disks is used as a redundant backup of my project drive and also for video projects, and the last 1.5TB drive is a Time Machine backup drive containing all the data from the other 3. (you can never have too many backups!)

I have noticed that the 1.5TB drives tend to run hotter according to the s.m.a.r.t. status in Tech Tool, but they're both showing identical stats so I don't think there's really a problem there.

Just about any 3gbps SATA drive should kill for audio, really.

BusyBoxSt7 · Post by **BusyBoxSt7** » Sun Oct 04, 2009 1:16 pm

Sweet feedback, thanks woodhenge... it's looking like I should probably go w/ the Green....

I like your backup scheme. I've got more personal files I think (iTunes, photos, research/text files) so it's slightly different. I'm currently using a WD external mirrored drive in one enclosure (2TB mirrored = 1TB) for backup since I don't have all this stuff on a UPS yet (seems like a UPS strong enough for a stocked mac pro is quite pricy? just need something to hold it for 5 seconds to avoid power flicker drive damage). anyway, good stuff...

woodhenge · Post by **woodhenge** » Sun Oct 04, 2009 1:39 pm

I found one of the APC 1500VA UPS's at Best Buy on special for about $250 and have been very happy. It works really well with the Mac Pro. With my whole system up and running on the UPS, it gives me about 8 minutes of battery. Not too bad... Power here can be pretty spotty, so it's been a lifesaver more than once. I tried some smaller units, and the Mac booting would freak them all out. But this one seems to hang pretty well. I think it's the LCD or R series. So hard to tell on those things...

Unfortunately, my backup scheme came as a result of catastrophic failure and data loss. Now, I even keep a clone of my time machine drive! These days, it's much less hassle to back things up, so I think I'm even better about it. The irony is that since I got so obsessive about backups, I haven't had any reason to use them! Someday...

L-ROX · Post by **L-ROX** » Sun Oct 04, 2009 4:45 pm

I've had nothing but good luck with Seagate Barracuda drives for years. Recently a Glyph drive that I own stopped mounting (Firewire) so I just popped it open and installed the HD in my system (it's a Seagate Barracuda IDE drive) and works just fine (lesson learned: will not be buying a Glyph ever, as you're adding a case that can stop working into the mix). They are very quiet too, although I don't know how they compare to WD Green drives. My other drives in my system are also Seagates (SATA).

BusyBoxSt7 · Post by **BusyBoxSt7** » Sun Oct 04, 2009 4:58 pm

woodhenge,
thanks for the UPS model info, cool stuff. 8 min is plenty for me. i just need it long enough to avoid power flickers. my PT is set to save the session once a minute anyway.

_______________________________________
L-rox,

thanks for the info. i totally agree about buying glyph drives being a waste of $$ and they boot slow anyway (most drives are silent now anyway)... everyone seems to favor either WD or seagate. i've bought some of both in the past. My general method for choosing a drive is checking user reviews (newegg/tigerdirect) and seeing which ones rate highest (w/ a decent # of feedback of course). thing is, every company tends to make some good models and some often faulty models. so i try not to get attached to any brand. I'm checking out the caviar greens cause they're rating well. also, year to year production changes affect it too.

google did a massive study on the drives in their data centers and found a few things:
-no brand could entirely be recommended, varied by model
-drives that super cold didn't last as long as warm ones (not crazy hot maybe).. the only reason I'm leary of the green models
-after 5 years, everything regardless of model/brand, gets way more likely to die (so, label the dates you start using your drives)

Brian Brock · Post by **Brian Brock** » Sun Oct 04, 2009 9:31 pm

on speed vs noise, the single platter, large capacity drives are both faster and quieter than multi-platter drives with equal capacity. So there is a way in which you eat and have cake.

silentpcreview.com is a great (though occasionally wrong) source for info on such matters.

Brian Brock · Post by **Brian Brock** » Sun Oct 04, 2009 9:34 pm

i agree that a quiet drive is usually quite capable for audio, although a fast drive can really make a difference as your OS drive (at least on windows XP)

BusyBoxSt7 · Post by **BusyBoxSt7** » Mon Oct 19, 2009 2:55 pm

brian,

how does one go about figuring out which drives are single and which are multi-platter?

Brian Brock · Post by **Brian Brock** » Mon Oct 19, 2009 11:17 pm

silentpcreview is a good place to start. the number of platters is just one factor contributing to noise, though.

BusyBoxSt7 · Post by **BusyBoxSt7** » Mon Oct 19, 2009 11:58 pm

CAVIAR GREENS ARE 5400 RPM DRIVES!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Just FYI.. they don't advert that because they figured out some other ways to speed it up. It does great on some tests, average/lagging on others.

BusyBoxSt7 · Post by **BusyBoxSt7** » Tue Oct 20, 2009 1:20 am

looked at SPCR earlier, quite a confusing site... finally figured out how it's organized (or lack thereof sorta, like most techy sites)... while picking up some great ideas like decoupling drives from the chassis, most of the info seems to be out of date as far as specific drive models (nothing beyond summer '08 pretty much). hmm...

well, some of it's up to date, just hard to figure out the conjunction between these two pages:
http://www.silentpcreview.com/section13.html (up to date, but not organized into any ranked list or anything)
http://www.silentpcreview.com/article29-page2.html (out of date?)

too much info, too little time

Brian Brock · Post by **Brian Brock** » Thu Oct 22, 2009 2:53 pm

yeah they're pretty messy over there. Maybe check the hard disk forum:
http://www.silentpcreview.com/forums/viewforum.php?f=7

Message Board

QUIET vs. FAST HARD DRIVES, share your experiences

QUIET vs. FAST HARD DRIVES, share your experiences

Who is online