WD Caviar Blue and Black

[damstas]

I would like to buy the Black version, because it's faster, and the warranty is better, but the noise issue is not nice.
Are all Black's noisy? Can you hear them through Define R3 case, which should be silenced?
Any recommendations ?

 

[Hawkeye22]

That's odd. I always get WD blacks and I barely hear them, even the ones in external enclosures. Either you got an exceptionally loud drive or my hearing is going bad, lol!

 

[damstas]

Thanks for the reply. I haven't bought any hard drive, but im planning to. What case have you got?

 

[tomatthe]

I've got 3 WD blacks in a bottom of the line Tuniq case sitting about 1ft from me, and the video card is really the only thing I can hear at idle. If you copy some large files around you will hear the drives, but nothing that seems overly loud to me. I will never buy WD drives again though, after they essentially disabled the ability to use them in anything other then stand alone, and Raid 0/1 sets.

I didn't notice the Sata 2/3 thing earlier, the drives I am using are Sata 2.

 

[ebola28]

I beleive the newer sata 3 6gbs are louder than the past sate 2 3gbs, but thats just from reading, not from personal experience

 

[Hawkeye22]

Thanks for the reply. I haven't bought any hard drive, but im planning to. What case have you got?

It's an older antec sonata2 case.

 

[damstas]

But how can it be quiet? Many people say, that it's very loud?

 

[Hawkeye22]

You didn't specify which model you are looking at. Mine are a few years old and they are quiet. Even the 1Tb WD1001FALS I have is quiet. Perhaps quiet to me is loud to you. Personally, I think seagate drives tend to be louder than WD drives, or at least the ones I have had.

 

[jitpublisher]

I have a 1TB black, the WD1001FALS and I cannot hear it. The fans are louder that it is, and my fans don't make much noise at all.

 

[tlmck]

I have both black and blue WD's and the blacks are noisier. Especially when something like indexing or defrag is going on. Obviously they will be noisier in a gaming type rig as opposed to a basic desktop due to the amount of usage. You will especially notice it in larger tower style gaming cases that have a lot of mesh for air flow.

This is one of the main reasons I switched to the Samsung F3 which is also faster by a slight bit according to most benchmarks I ran. It is also whisper quiet. I wound up putting the WD black in my HTPC. Even then I can hear it on occasion from 10 feet away. The blue drive is in an aluminum DIY external box. Don't really hear it at all either.

 

[Hawkeye22]

I wonder if it's a QA issue or firmware that makes a difference. My 1Tb WD1001FALS is in an ESata dock and it's still quiet even when I'm backing up my system drive to it.

 

[abekl]

Hmm, I have neve noticed a noise issue with my WD blacks. They are not totally silent, but they are not intrusive either, and I am using them in a quiet environment.

 

[tlmck]

I wonder if it's a QA issue or firmware that makes a difference. My 1Tb WD1001FALS is in an ESata dock and it's still quiet even when I'm backing up my system drive to it.

All I know is there is no shortage of refurb WD's around. I just think WD ain't what they used to be and I have used them exclusively for many years. Not that they are any worse than Seagate or Hitachi these days, but they used to be so much better. I know I am loving my Samsung.

 

[damstas]

Many people have had noise issues with WD Caviar Black and Samsung Spinpoint F3. hmm.