Vibrating HDD (What is/isn't normal?)

[Pocket Fox]

So I have two external HDD's. I have had them for 2 years and they work perfectly fine. They are both the exact same model/make.

But I became a little worried last night, I notice one is constantly vibrating, like a low hum/rumble while the other seem almost completely motionless - although there is a tiny amount of whirring.

 

I transfered a few gigs of data back and forth between the two, to see if this would affect them. Make the loud one quiet after a transfer or make the quiet one louder etc

 

Fearing, oh god, the one that is louder must be dying I bought another external HDD today and it to is vibrating at about the same level as the loudest one I have.

 

So, my question is.  What is normal/abnormal here? I'd think then that the louder vibrations are normal, but then is the more quiet drive possibly the one that might be dying or is it just quieter?

As both HDD's are the exact same model and make, but one is clearly louder than the other. No programs etc to my knowledge are accessing these drives.

[yoječ]

All HDDs vibrate to some degree, some of them are more noticeable than others. If the SMART report comes up fine, I wouldn't worry about it.

[Pocket Fox]

And the drive that is eerily super quiet? They're like...shy or something?

Can HDD's get social anxiety disorder?

[Jason]

Different types/models of HDD's will produce different levels of noise.

 

If you start hearing a mechanical crunch noise or a grinding noise, or if the drive starts dropping out while being used that's a sign something is up.

[SilverRST]

My HDD's were making vibrating, not sure but they started it recently. So when I upgraded my GPU, I cleaned my PC and they stopped vibrating.

[Fozzy Fozborne]

Depending on the type, size, manufacturing batch, and a lot of other variables you can get two dramatically different drives in the same packaging.

For example Western Digital has basically a 'drive lottery' where you can get a:
Red (NAS drive), Green (slowest, most power-friendly, least RAID friendly, usually not in 8TB versions) or white-label drive (basically not good or bad enough to fit into any previous category, missing certain voltage circuitry for internal use).

By extension the drives can be 5400, 5900, or 7200RPM models. Somewhat obviously the 7200RPM models will make more noise and vibration etc. 

And they're all sold in identical packaging, and SKUs, right next to each other on the shelf. The model number usually gives it away if you know what to look for.

Here is everything you need to know about the 8TB version. There are similar posts for 6 and 5TB drives and I remember the practice cropping up when 3 and 4TB drives first came out.

 

Seagate has a similar setup where you might get an SMR drive (archival drive, slow writes, decent reads, shortest average life) or a regular PMR drive.

Generally they're labelled 'backup' and 'expansion', respectively. But if they run out they mix and match.

 

You don't know until you open it. May the odds be ever in your favor.

[Pocket Fox]

On 10/17/2018 at 10:45 AM, Fozzy Fozborne said:

Depending on the type, size, manufacturing batch, and a lot of other variables you can get two dramatically different drives in the same packaging.

For example Western Digital has basically a 'drive lottery' where you can get a:
Red (NAS drive), Green (slowest, most power-friendly, least RAID friendly, usually not in 8TB versions) or white-label drive (basically not good or bad enough to fit into any previous category, missing certain voltage circuitry for internal use).

By extension the drives can be 5400, 5900, or 7200RPM models. Somewhat obviously the 7200RPM models will make more noise and vibration etc. 

And they're all sold in identical packaging, and SKUs, right next to each other on the shelf. The model number usually gives it away if you know what to look for.

Here is everything you need to know about the 8TB version. There are similar posts for 6 and 5TB drives and I remember the practice cropping up when 3 and 4TB drives first came out.

 

Seagate has a similar setup where you might get an SMR drive (archival drive, slow writes, decent reads, shortest average life) or a regular PMR drive.

Generally they're labelled 'backup' and 'expansion', respectively. But if they run out they mix and match.

 

You don't know until you open it. May the odds be ever in your favor.

 

That answers a lot, thank you.

 

Well the old HDD's are still working so I just panicked when I needn't.

 

BUT! Getting that extra HDD for back up and actually backing up 2-3 years of data was good. So, no complaints.

[Evil empire]

Did you make a SMART?

 

You will probably find unseful infos if you make a search with -> "hard drive" "sounds "about to die"