Digidrive is LOUD!

[uno1234]

I just received my Digidrive (after weeks of backorder), and to my dismay, it is loud. Besides the usual clicks and gurgles from hard drives, the Digidrive also has a high pitched squeal at at 16 kHz or so. You can even hear it faintly over a mix.

Is anyone else experiencing this problem?

I'm planning to send it back-- but should I get a replacement or another brand of HD?

So disappointed...

[This message has been edited by uno1234 (edited 10-04-99).]

[Somebody]

I think that different drives are loud, some are soft. The digi drive is supposed to be the quietest. I have a Glyph, and it is loud as hell, but I know someone else who has the same Glyph drive, and it isn't so loud. I just got a long monitor cable and put my drive in the closet.

[AMG]

I was just using two Digidrives on an Avid system and was also surprised by the high pitched whine and the noise. There is little I think Digi can do about this.

[Marc Edwards]

I have a noisey external AV drive aswell (Seagate). Well, actuly it's more the drive fan than the drive itself.

Given the nature of the noise it should be easy to stick in a cupboard or something and maybe do a little sound-absobtion work. I've been to studios where the entire computer and drives are locked out of view under the desk. Anyway, I don't know of any 'quiet' external drives :^)

[Paul Schwotzer]

I returned my "QuietDrive" for a Glyph.
I didn't like the chatter the QD made, which is even more distracting that steady whirrr.
That extra $300 for advertised quietness was not worth it.

Great idea, if it had worked I would have paid for it.

-pws

[Ray Lyon]

The quietest drives I know of are the older Atlas II Quantum series...

[uno1234]

Digi told me that a 10,000 rpm drive cannot help but be noisy. I was comparing it to my other drive, which is 7200 rpm.

[Zep Dude]

Just to throw this alternative out there. I installed a Barracuda 9gig 7200rpm in the extra drive bay of my 7600 (with G3/300 cpu). There is no problem with noise other than the inherent computer fan noise. With high track counts (20+) you do hear a little drive chatter. With this setup I can take advantage of the Fast internal SCSI (10mb/sec) which yeilds about 31 tracks of 24bit audio from this one drive. For an additional 8-12 tracks I can add an external drive.

This is a good solution for smaller setups because you now use all three PCI slots for PT cards (Mix, Farm, Farm) instead of giving one up for a Ultra SCSI card. It's amazing to find that for all the hype about needing Ultra SCSI and 10,000rpm drives, I have never needed that level of bandwith or speed and have a system capable of 40 tracks of 24 bit audio. I've even added video (low resolution) for doing jingles and the system performs very well. Of course for serious hi res video, forget it!

One other thing. If anyone goes this route, I highly recommend adding a little fan that attaches to the top of the Barracuda to draw the heat off (http://www.pcpowercooling.com/). Also, don't try adding a 10,000rpm drive internally, they run too hot.

[Keith Lynch]

re: drive noise, many studio designers have fought this battle for years,and not just with computer CPUs and periphrial equipment. It really does drive (no pun intended) you nuts after a while...

I find that a nice solution which eliminates both drive and fan noise is remote location of the entire CPU/drive stack, in a properly cooled and filtered cabinet assembly. Extending the monitor and mouse cables is better than long SCSI chains any day!

Remote cabinetry really isn't as expensive as it sounds, and with reasonable care can provide excellent results. If you need the heat load for Macintosh CPU's, go to their website. There is a specification section which gives various Mac CPU heat loads in BTU, and the acceptable operational temperature limits.

Incidentally, I have found that remote location also tends to make everyone a bit more serious about avoiding stupid glitches, since crashes are more annoying when one has to walk a few feet to reset the box.

Finally, there are low-noise fans available in standard sizes. Pan and Muffin list them in their literature. They use both lower CFM and alternative blade-edge designs to reduce their SPL.

k.