Haha same here "Quantum Bigfoot" all the way, love those noise makers. The neighbors know when im running my pc 🤣

Or you could use a western digital caviar 22000 2GB HDD, nice clean sound and these things still run like there new.

Maxtor 90320xx drives are excellent if you want a noisy drive. I have one in my P233MMX build. It's extra noisy between rotation whine, and head read / write operations. 😁 Unfortunately it's only 3.2GB.

If you want a drive with a unique seek pattern, the Maxtor 7120AT (130MB) is a good choice, if you want a low capacity secondary drive.
https://youtu.be/vDsXpb_vu5U?t=26s

Ampera wrote:

In the words of Drauga1

IT'S A QUANTUM BIGFOOT!

THE BIGFOOT AIN'T NO SLAVE

clueless1 wrote:

I've got a Quantum Fireball CR 6.4GB that still works perfectly and makes the most *lovely* sounds. 🤣. It's the loudest hdd I have, even louder than my 1GB Seagate Medalist.

I agree. I have one in my IBM Aptiva, and it is the original drive and is running great. I too think it is the loudest drive I have owned. From what I can tell, they were fairly reliable.

Tommaso

Yeah, for sure Quantum drives. I have Quantum Prodrive LPS, and when reading it sounds almost like if you walk with a stick along iron fence and just let the stick slip from rod to rod. Super nice sound!

Oh, god, I need to hear that right now! BRB 😁

Some 10GB WD100BB 7200rpm drives with wear-out ball bearings are very noisy too.

Maybe can be used as a garden anti mole device.

I'm going to do a short video of the Fireball CR booting up and shutting down (that jet engine spin down sound) and post a link here. Hopefully the sound comes out okay recorded from my phone. Stay tuned, hopefully I'll get it up tonight.

Go for SCSI drives... especially high rpm ones like 10k, 15k
The early 7200 rpm ATA drives also squeak a lot, if you wanna stick with ATA drives.
I don't think big feet are particularly noisy... at least they are not noisy in nerve-racking ways.

How my Fireball CR sounds:
https://youtu.be/GllW_CeoxPM

konc wrote:

You’re right, let me say a bit more about what I thought was old news by now. ...

Interesting, thanks for the info. It reminds me of what happened to Fujitsu's 3.5" drive division (faulty Cirrus Logic chips used in the MPF/MPG lines caused huge quantities of drives to brick; soon after, they left the 3.5" drive market).

My EX 6.4 doesn't have any Philips-brand chips on its PCB; I guess that's one reason why it still works fine today.

clueless1 wrote:

How my Fireball CR sounds:
https://youtu.be/GllW_CeoxPM

Sounds almost the same as my EX, except your CR's seek noise is maybe louder (?). The "donk" noise at spindown is identical 🤣

SW-SSG wrote:

Interesting, thanks for the info. It reminds me of what happened to Fujitsu's 3.5" drive division (faulty Cirrus Logic chips use […]
Show full quote

konc wrote:

You’re right, let me say a bit more about what I thought was old news by now. ...

Interesting, thanks for the info. It reminds me of what happened to Fujitsu's 3.5" drive division (faulty Cirrus Logic chips used in the MPF/MPG lines caused huge quantities of drives to brick; soon after, they left the 3.5" drive market).

My EX 6.4 doesn't have any Philips-brand chips on its PCB; I guess that's one reason why it still works fine today.

clueless1 wrote:

How my Fireball CR sounds:
https://youtu.be/GllW_CeoxPM

Sounds almost the same as my EX, except your CR's seek noise is maybe louder (?). The "donk" noise at spindown is identical 🤣

Since it's hanging out of the case and one end is on the table, that rumbling you occasionally hear is the seeks vibrating the drive against the table. 🤣

I have to say that especially old Maxtors (say, of around 4GB to maybe 20GB?) also tended to be loud. The loudest most annoying drive I ever used was (for some reason) some drive made by Fujitsu or Samsung (roughly 5GB, 3.5in drive). I can only assume its bearings were already worn out, the noise was literally unbearable 🤣

Usually slower ones tended to be a bit more bearable and it got a lot better when fluid bearing started getting used (I noticed this especially when comparing a WD U-Series X to a U-Series 5).
IBM drives sounded more silent to me (used a couple of those) but out of nowhere one of them did break one next day, bye bye data 🤣!

But the very old SCSI drives (especially the faster ones) were deafening as well.

And if you need even more noise, I could recommend either old Intel stock CPU HSFs or something like a Dragon Orb...that thing will blow you away! 🤣

Tetrium wrote:

I have to say that especially old Maxtors (say, of around 4GB to maybe 20GB?) also tended to be loud. The loudest most annoying drive I ever used was (for some reason) some drive made by Fujitsu or Samsung (roughly 5GB, 3.5in drive). I can only assume its bearings were already worn out, the noise was literally unbearable 🤣

I recently installed a 40GB IDE Samsung drive for a client with an older XP machine. You can definitely hear the drive whine a mile away. My 3.2GB Maxtor has a very audible rotation whine, and the read/write clicks are just as loud, almost borderline unbearable, but love the sound. 😁

I have the opposite problem - an old ST-412 which makes a horrible squealing sound. It works OK but the noise is appalling. How do I fix this? A drop of WD-40 on the axle?

I'm currently looking at a 10GB, 2.5AT EL25A881 Quantum Fireball.
Drive is said to be test, working, etc.

Is there any reason I shouldn't buy this particular model?

Neco wrote:

I'm currently looking at a 10GB, 2.5AT EL25A881 Quantum Fireball.
Drive is said to be test, working, etc.

Is there any reason I shouldn't buy this particular model?

Not really, it's far more modern that the "fireball" plague.

Are you sure that's a 10GB drive? "2.5AT EL25A881" refers to a 2.5GB unit.

Well now I feel stupid. I should have verified that myself....

I have contacted the seller, hopefully its not too late to halt shipment. I mean I purchased the drive for $16 so maybe that's a fair rate for an older 2.5GB drive, I don't know. Hopefully we can come to an arrangement

WD400

I just plugged mine in, and it sounds like an air raid siren.

Neco wrote:

I have contacted the seller, hopefully its not too late to halt shipment. I mean I purchased the drive for $16 so maybe that's a fair rate for an older 2.5GB drive, I don't know. Hopefully we can come to an arrangement

For a 2.5GB drive it's decent; it's one of the latest ones storing all 2.5GB on one platter, so it's faster than many drives of the same capacity. (It may also be quieter, too.) And if the seller truly tested it, then that can't hurt.