You guys remember the clicking grinding noise old computers made? The drive head seeking while writing/reading, I think. I'm thinking of building several small machines with old drives and running them headless as freenet nodes just to hear that soothing noise from my childhood.

How do I get a drive that sounds right? I think modern HDDs have some kind of mechanism to prevent this noise?
Do I just need to track down specific old models, or is there a way to get any old HDD to do it? (Something to do with power management? Head parking? I've seen the term "acoustic management a few times...)

My immediate thought was a few Seagate DM series drive would sound like that before long.

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Sabo Computer Repairs & Data Recovery

Old drives used stepper motors for positioning the headstack whereas modern drives use voice coils.

If you want some real nostalgia, I have an AC blower motor from an 80s era Control Data 250kg storage module drive. It makes about as much noise as a jet engine. The drives used to walk across the floor during heavy seeking (if you left them on their wheels).

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A backup a day keeps DR away.