Can anyone suggest a silent hard drive with auto spin down (for NSLU2)?

[pmk]

I have bought a Linksys NSLU2 network attached storage device and need to kit it out with a silent hard drive with persistent auto spin down capabilities.

My current choices are Samsung SP2514N (250GB) or Maxtor 6L250R0/6L300R0 (250GB/300GB) but can find no definiate answer on whether these are silent drives and they support spin down after idling for N minutes?

Performance is not the key factor as it is restricted by the NSLU2 it is the noise level (in a silient room it should not be heard) and reliability. For reference I am also considering an Icy Box 351U Black enclosure.

Can anyone confirm which hard drives support spin down after idle and the application used to set this parameter?

Thanks

[herulach]

AS far as im aware all drives will spin down, but only if theyre explicitly told to, so you want to be lokoing at the specs of the box, not the drive. Out of those too the samsung will be the quitest by a long stretch. My Diamond Max 10 is pretty quiet, but has quite loud read noise (i can hear it, it isnt loud, but since the rest of my system doesnt even register above background on a db meter its audible.

[pmk]

As the NSLU2 uses USB to connect the drives it is not possible to set the spin down time. To avoid this the Wiki recommends getting a drive that you can connect to a PC/Linux and set the spin down time and the drive remembers the setting.

This is the problem I am having I can't find any specifics on new drives where this is persistent feature.

As I currently have a Samsung (5400) drive and I know they are quiet I thought I would go with the Samsung 250GB although its 7200 because 5400 in the larger capacities do not seem available?

It appears I would be lucky with the Samsung to get spin down to work? More chance with Maxtor / Hitachi etc but they seem to be noisy in comparision.

Best case scenario would be quiet Samsung with spin down, probably quiet Samsung without spin down will be better than a Maxtor/Hitachi with spin down?

http://www.nslu2-linux.org/wiki/FAQ/...wnUSBHarddisks
http://www.nslu2-linux.org/wiki/HowT...MaxtorOneTouch

[herulach]

I mean the Icybox/whatever youre using as opposed to the router itself

[peterb]

There is some thought that the drive on the NSLU2 with Unslung won't spin down because of the journalling file system - it makes frequent accesses anyway. One option for a silent system is to use a large flash drive, but you are really limited to low sizes, and they are expensive! 4GB Corsair pen drive from Scan about £150.