Hi, I have purchased a second hand MAXTOR STM3320820AS 320 gig 5QF321NM SATA 300 8MB buffer...

The thing I am concerned about is the level of noise coming from the drive during reading and writing ops..

The drive sounds more like a typewriter than a HDD.

The drive is clearly audible outside the case over any noise emitted by the 9800 gt gpu fan, cpu fan and cooling fans.

the problem is this system is for sale and I do not want to sell anything which is sub-standard or not genuinely in good condition.

I have a fair amount of experience across most areas of PC building and repairs but I have never had a potential problem with an actual HDD before that relates to noise, so I need a stronger opinion from some one who has a more solid background in HDD mechanics.

My initial interpretation would be the heads are out of alignment or worn or etc etc etc but really I would only be guessing.

I always end up using Seagate drives, of which none make any significant noise and are pretty silent.

Maybe Maxtor drives are renowned for being exceptionally noisy??

the drive is loud enough to be disturbing and anyone who bought the system would unavoidably notice it immediately and query it with me.

If it's normal for a Maxtor drive, that's fine, I will tell them that is the case.

If it's a sign that the drive is excessively worn and poses any sort of question as to the reliability of the drive in the short/medium term then I will have to ask for a refund and return the drive...

These are the tests I have done so far...


The Maxtor has jumper settings to limit the speed to 1.5gps if you are using it on an older SATA mobo which can't automatically detect what speed it should operate at.

There are no jumpers present on the drive so it is operating at SATA 300 speed and is connected to the SATA 300 port on the H61M-S2PV board.

The Maxtor drive passes the SMART test and the quick test via SEAGATE TOOLS.

And crystal disk mark comes in with this...

-----------------------------------------------------------------------
CrystalDiskMark 3.0.2 x64 (C) 2007-2013 hiyohiyo
Crystal Dew World : http://crystalmark.info/
-----------------------------------------------------------------------
* MB/s = 1,000,000 byte/s [SATA/300 = 300,000,000 byte/s]

Sequential Read : 55.384 MB/s
Sequential Write : 72.365 MB/s
Random Read 512KB : 33.012 MB/s
Random Write 512KB : 28.376 MB/s
Random Read 4KB (QD=1) : 0.489 MB/s [ 119.5 IOPS]
Random Write 4KB (QD=1) : 0.779 MB/s [ 190.2 IOPS]
Random Read 4KB (QD=32) : 0.764 MB/s [ 186.6 IOPS]
Random Write 4KB (QD=32) : 0.815 MB/s [ 199.0 IOPS]

Test : 1000 MB [C: 44.4% (25.8/58.3 GB)] (x5)
Date : 2013/03/07 23:33:20
OS : Windows 8 [6.2 Build 9200] (x64)
maxtor 320g sata 300

This is in comparison to a SATA 300 Seagate 160G drive which comes in with this..


CrystalDiskMark 3.0.2 x64 (C) 2007-2013 hiyohiyo
Crystal Dew World : http://crystalmark.info/
-----------------------------------------------------------------------
* MB/s = 1,000,000 byte/s [SATA/300 = 300,000,000 byte/s]

Sequential Read : 76.718 MB/s
Sequential Write : 75.759 MB/s
Random Read 512KB : 36.566 MB/s
Random Write 512KB : 41.419 MB/s
Random Read 4KB (QD=1) : 0.556 MB/s [ 135.7 IOPS]
Random Write 4KB (QD=1) : 1.032 MB/s [ 252.0 IOPS]
Random Read 4KB (QD=32) : 1.072 MB/s [ 261.8 IOPS]
Random Write 4KB (QD=32) : 1.041 MB/s [ 254.1 IOPS]

Test : 1000 MB [E: 0.1% (0.1/149.0 GB)] (x5)
Date : 2013/03/07 22:50:29
OS : Windows 8 [6.2 Build 9200] (x64)
seagate 160g sata 300

So the Maxtor is a little slower and also sounds like a loud tiny typewriter..

I have been looking around the net also and there are quite a few questions about excessive noise from Maxtor drives and from what I can see it is deemed as normal to some degree??

I am not personally that worried for my own sake, if I was keeping the drive for myself it would be no problem, but because the drive will be sold in a system build I need to make sure that it is in good working condition.

The SATA controller is set to AHCI for better performance and the drive is plugged into SATA 300 port 1 on the mobo, which is where it should be.

Most responses I have seen on the net in relation to complaints of excess noise from Maxtor owners are answered with insulation measures as opposed to "it's a faulty drive" scenario.

So doesn't seem so ominous..

Conversely I have run the short and extended HDD tests in PART MAGIC / DISK HEALTH and the RAW READ ERROR RATE is 202,000,000

The SEEK ERROR RATE is shown as 456,000,000

My understanding of this is that the heads are not hitting targeted sector accurately enough and are correcting slightly the whole time or the surface of the platter is degrading..(bit of a guess, but wouldn't that lead to a noisier drive due to constant mechanical correction??.)

I also am lead to believe that both these ERROR RATES should ideally be zero but do vary by manufacturer, unless your dealing with Seagate drives where a huge RAW RAED ERROR RATE apparently is normal..?? (just what I have read...)

I know Seagate owns Maxtor now, but does this therefore mean that the readings are acceptable?

I could return the drive to the Ebay seller, but to be honest I don't think it's fair on him to return it just because it's noisier than I expected, as long as it functions properly and is not in danger of failing due to a "louder" read/write action..??


Be nice if some HDD expert mechanic could come on and say.."yeah the noise is fairly normal for this type of drive, as long as it passes XYZ test then it's fine.."

Or "No it's dying, best off returning it.."

thanks for taking the time to read this and hopefully your advice.

My advice;
Spend $50 and buy a new 500GB drive and move on.

Regarding the noise of your drive, these are noisy in general but I believe it shouldn't be as noisy as you describe it to be.
Possibly a lot of bad sectors across the surface. Run a SMART test and post the raw values. It will most probably indicate that the drive has degraded media hence the noise. If that speculation is correct, the drive will deteriorate fast and soonly die.

You can also run the LONG test on SeaTools and see if it comes up with any error message.

But my opinion is, since you want to sell this machine, just buy a new drive. Then talk to ebay seller and tell him your concerns (along with the results of the forementioned tests).

Good luck.

_________________
http://www.northwind.gr
SandForce SSD Recovery
Ransomware Reverse Engineering - NoMoreRansom! partners

That STM Maxtor IS a bit louder than "usual" . I have a feeling someone played with AAM hence the noise level, in absence of other info. IF the drive is healthy why worry ? I would scan and check it with MHDD and see what's going on , including SMART.
Before assuming it is at fault I would check AAM and if the drive works normally (MHDD is sufficient in lack of professional diag tools).
Also, check power supply !

hi, I got the smart data and logscan.

the logscan came as a BIN file. I wasn't sure how to view it so I researched it.

When I tried to mount the BIN file the software I used - (which I have used many time before for mounting images) - crashed or was corrupted and literally took out the whole system, by disabling USB ports and leaving the central hub, MY Computer -I-explorer- inoperable.

Independent uninstaller's were prevented from removing the suspect virtual mounting software..

each attempt would bring the whole system down..

Even system restore to a point two days earlier couldn't remove the issue...

I have solved many problems in my time and this is the first time I was forced to reinstall the OS.

I wasted many hours trying many different things expecting it to be a fairly easy and trying to avoid the full re-install.

With Harry Hind Site I wish I had just reinstalled straight away and saved six hours or so.

I lost some data, through my own oversight, at the very last point I forgot to move the backed up data off the desktop to a different partition before I reinstalled...

That data included the smart data and the scan log, so I will need to do it again.

What a waste of a day.

Sorry to hear this one but at least you have your drive working again.

_________________
Iorana Haraharaini

Beside the point, but this Maxtor IS a Seagate.

If it seems troublesome no sense chancing it.

_________________
You don't have to backup all of your files, just the ones you want to keep.

ABC of HDDs : AAM ....

Hi, a bit of a positive update..

I erased the Maxtor drive with MHDD, cleared any HPA and ran the scan and erase function to clear any bad sectors.

The result was

<3ms 2,236,346
<10ms 214,634
<50ms 560

No sectors erased.

the SMART data for the drive is below and I have included the SMART data from 160GIG Seagate SATA II drive for comparison.

[PRE]HDD: ST3160812AS; FW: 3.ADJ; SN: 3.ADJ (Seagate)--------------------------------------------------------
Name Val Worst Raw
Att # 1 : Read error rate : 118 86 167920918
Att # 3 : Spin up time : 94 94 0
Att # 4 : Number of spin-up times : 98 98 2366
Att # 5 : Reallocated sectors count : 100 100 0
Att # 7 : Seek error rate : 54 54 360327995
Att # 9 : Power-on time : 96 96 4304
Att # 10 : Spin-up retries : 100 100 0
Att # 12 : Start/stop count : 97 97 3125
Att # 187 : Unknown : 100 100 0
Att # 189 : Unknown : 100 100 0
Att # 190 : Unknown : 81 50 320012307
Att # 194 : HDA Temperature : 19 50 19
Att # 195 : Hardware ECC recovered : 98 47 194767039
Att # 197 : Current pending sectors : 100 100 0
Att # 198 : Offline scan UNC sectors : 100 100 0
Att # 199 : Ultra ATA CRC Error Rate : 200 200 2
Att # 200 : Write error rate : 100 253 0
Att # 202 : Unknown : 100 253 0


[/PRE][PRE]HDD: MAXTOR STM3320820AS; FW: 3.AAE; SN: 3.AAE (Maxtor)
--------------------------------------------------------
Name Val Worst Raw
Att # 1 : Read error rate : 117 88 145184028
Att # 3 : Spin up time : 96 95 0
Att # 4 : Number of spin-up times : 97 97 3155
Att # 5 : Reallocated sectors count : 100 100 0
Att # 7 : Seek error rate : 86 60 457503027
Att # 9 : Power-on time : 84 84 14313
Att # 10 : Spin-up retries : 100 100 0
Att # 12 : Start/stop count : 97 97 3128
Att # 187 : Unknown : 100 100 0
Att # 189 : Unknown : 100 100 0
Att # 190 : Unknown : 86 51 235798542
Att # 194 : HDA Temperature : 14 49 14
Att # 195 : Hardware ECC recovered : 72 56 325404
Att # 197 : Current pending sectors : 100 100 0
Att # 198 : Offline scan UNC sectors : 100 100 0
Att # 199 : Ultra ATA CRC Error Rate : 200 200 6
Att # 200 : Write error rate : 100 253 0
Att # 202 : Unknown : 100 253 0

the overall data doesn't look that different between the two drives...

I set the Maxtor drive up for another crystal Mark benchmark and in doing so I didn't actually mount the drive in any bay, just left it sitting on the desk.

I can say with certainty that the excessive noise caused by the drive is down to a factor of amplification by the case frame. With the drive free standing, I struggled to hear the heads working at all...

the other thing is, if you look at the data of the Crystal Mark benchmark re-run, the figures are now very good.

I re-ran the benchmark on two independent systems to validate and the data is comparable.

I also ran the benchmark on a Seagate SATA II 160gig and a Seagate SATA III 500gig drive for comparison.

the data is shown below..


CrystalDiskMark 3.0.2 x64 (C) 2007-2013 hiyohiyo
Crystal Dew World : http://crystalmark.info/
-----------------------------------------------------------------------
* MB/s = 1,000,000 byte/s [SATA/300 = 300,000,000 byte/s]

Sequential Read : 73.615 MB/s
Sequential Write : 70.683 MB/s
Random Read 512KB : 33.431 MB/s
Random Write 512KB : 35.963 MB/s
Random Read 4KB (QD=1) : 0.481 MB/s [ 117.5 IOPS]
Random Write 4KB (QD=1) : 0.872 MB/s [ 212.9 IOPS]
Random Read 4KB (QD=32) : 0.886 MB/s [ 216.2 IOPS]
Random Write 4KB (QD=32) : 0.903 MB/s [ 220.5 IOPS]

Test : 1000 MB [C: 46.3% (18.1/39.1 GB)] (x5)
Date : 2013/03/12 22:37:45
OS : Windows 8 [6.2 Build 9200] (x64)
Seagate sata II 160gig h61m - 2spv g860 12.3.13------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

-----------------------------------------------------------------------
CrystalDiskMark 3.0.2 x64 (C) 2007-2013 hiyohiyo
Crystal Dew World : http://crystalmark.info/
-----------------------------------------------------------------------
* MB/s = 1,000,000 byte/s [SATA/300 = 300,000,000 byte/s]

Sequential Read : 81.589 MB/s
Sequential Write : 80.486 MB/s
Random Read 512KB : 38.048 MB/s
Random Write 512KB : 31.851 MB/s
Random Read 4KB (QD=1) : 0.590 MB/s [ 144.1 IOPS]
Random Write 4KB (QD=1) : 1.079 MB/s [ 263.5 IOPS]
Random Read 4KB (QD=32) : 0.984 MB/s [ 240.1 IOPS]
Random Write 4KB (QD=32) : 1.087 MB/s [ 265.4 IOPS]

Test : 1000 MB [E: 0.0% (0.1/298.1 GB)] (x5)
Date : 2013/03/12 22:51:04
OS : Windows 8 [6.2 Build 9200] (x64)
maxtor 320gig h61m-s2pv g860 12.3.13
---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

-----------------------------------------------------------------------
CrystalDiskMark 3.0.2 x64 (C) 2007-2013 hiyohiyo
Crystal Dew World : http://crystalmark.info/
-----------------------------------------------------------------------
* MB/s = 1,000,000 byte/s [SATA/300 = 300,000,000 byte/s]

Sequential Read : 117.068 MB/s
Sequential Write : 110.726 MB/s
Random Read 512KB : 39.375 MB/s
Random Write 512KB : 55.137 MB/s
Random Read 4KB (QD=1) : 0.478 MB/s [ 116.6 IOPS]
Random Write 4KB (QD=1) : 0.575 MB/s [ 140.4 IOPS]
Random Read 4KB (QD=32) : 1.166 MB/s [ 284.8 IOPS]
Random Write 4KB (QD=32) : 0.576 MB/s [ 140.5 IOPS]

Test : 1000 MB [C: 54.8% (31.1/56.9 GB)] (x5)
Date : 2013/03/12 22:45:31
OS : Windows 8 Professional [6.2 Build 9200] (x64)
SATA III 500G Z68X-UD5 12.3.13
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

-----------------------------------------------------------------------
CrystalDiskMark 3.0.2 x64 (C) 2007-2013 hiyohiyo
Crystal Dew World : http://crystalmark.info/
-----------------------------------------------------------------------
* MB/s = 1,000,000 byte/s [SATA/300 = 300,000,000 byte/s]

Sequential Read : 81.589 MB/s
Sequential Write : 80.283 MB/s
Random Read 512KB : 38.930 MB/s
Random Write 512KB : 32.160 MB/s
Random Read 4KB (QD=1) : 0.591 MB/s [ 144.3 IOPS]
Random Write 4KB (QD=1) : 1.050 MB/s [ 256.2 IOPS]
Random Read 4KB (QD=32) : 1.006 MB/s [ 245.6 IOPS]
Random Write 4KB (QD=32) : 1.093 MB/s [ 266.9 IOPS]

Test : 1000 MB [K: 0.1% (0.2/298.1 GB)] (x5)
Date : 2013/03/12 23:17:01
OS : Windows 8 Professional [6.2 Build 9200] (x64)
sataII-320g maxtor-i3 2120-z68x-ud5-12.3.13

You can see the Maxtor is now sequentially reading and writing at approx. 80 MB/s which is actually faster than the Seagate SATA II.

I really don't know why the Maxtor performed so badly in the initial benchmark..??

Sequential Read : 55.384 MB/s
Sequential Write : 72.365 MB/s

I must admit I thought the SATA 600 drive would comparably be a quicker than it turned out to be..

Wondered if anyone else had a SATA 600 crystal mark test to compare it to, just out of interest..

But all is good on the home front now. I am happy the drive is operating normally and there is no excessive noise when the drive is removed from the case frame. Rubber mountings would work well here but unfortunately the case doesn't support these..