27" iMac hard drive noise

Mine makes a very small click right before it goes to sleep as well, so I'd say that's normal. :-/

As far as hard drive noises, It's probably not actually coming from the hard drive if it is making it even when idle. That is possibly a fan rubbing against something it shouldn't, like some others have suggested. IF you believe it to be that, I'd have it checked out at the apple store right away.

Message was edited by: Cory Senecal

I'd like to hear a recording of this if possible as I'm a mac newbie. Coming from a very loud PC I'm not sure what I should be hearing

Mine was silent at first, but is make a little noise now after a month or so.

Here's an interesting bit of info I found on another site. Hope it's ok to post it here, because I thought it was very informative. The conversation is about external hard drives, but I would think it applies to internal one's too.

" There are two kinds of noise mostly, the spinning noise that the drive makes when it's running and the "seek" noise as the heads move about. Seek noise is usually in the form of rapid clicks.

Motor noise has come down a LOT in the last few years. Some drives make very little motor noise, some make more. Those with fewer platters inside often make less motor noise as do those that turn more slowly.

Seek noise is often adjustable! Many drives have a feature called "AAM" or "Automatic Acoustic Management". This is nearly always "OFF" by default. Most drives made by Samsung, Hitachi and Western Digital have this feature. It can be turned "ON" and adjusted to various levels in many cases by using Hitachi's Feature Tool, Samsungs Hutil (Samsung drives only) or windows-based tools like HDDScan or HDparm. Turning AAM ON vastly reduces the Seek noise but will slow down access time a little.

For example, a Caviar Black 1TB makes moderately loud Seek noise with AAM OFF but almost none with AAM ON.

Here's my favorites for low noise operation:

WD Green Power. Very little motor noise. These are pretty quiet even with the AAM OFF. Also, they run very cool which is important in an external enclosure.

Samsung. Little Motor noise, AAM is fully adjustable with Hutil. Usually a great silence choice.

WD Caviar Blue Single Platter drives- (160, 320, etc) Little Motor noise, virtually silent with AAM ON. Run cool.

WD Caviar Black with AAM ON. Little Motor noise, slight Seek noise. (Lots of Seek noise with AAM OFF)

Hitachi - Some Motor noise, especially when spinning up. Virtually no Seek noise with AAM ON. Hitachi Feature Tool allows AAM to be fully adjusted.


Drives that make a TON of noise:

Seagate 7200.10, 7200.11. Noticeable Motor noise, plenty of Seek noise, AAM not supported. Also, they run hot.
I'm sure the 10,000rpm Raptors do too!

WD models not supporting AAM or having AAM OFF tend to make plenty of Seek noise. WD doesn't appear to have a AAM tool. HDDScan works OK, sometimes Hitachi Feature Tool will work on WDs too. WD usually only offers AAM "ON" or "OFF" with no fine-tuning like Hitachi and Samsung."

More info for anyone who's interested......following comments made by a Seagate Tech obtained from another site. My opinion is that Apple must be totally aware that no current seagate supports AAM, therefore they must have know the hard drives are louder than they should be and that some ( many ) people would be upset. Why would they do such a thing ?

" Seagate doesn't manufacture drives with this mode anymore. Seagate has decided that it will no longer support AAM (Automatic Acoustic Management). Seagate is in the process of removing all product information pertaining to the support of AAM.

Our drives are extremely quiet while operating at the highest performance
levels, so we believe the ability to switch between modes is unnecessary.

We are also involved in patent litigation with Convolve and MIT. Although
we believe the lawsuit is without merit, Convolve alleges
that one of its patents, US Patent No. 6,314,473, covers AAM technology.

We understand that Convolve told the T-13 standards committee that it
would license its patents on a reasonable, non-discriminatory basis.

Seagate Technical Support

I also found this.....

http://www.seagate.com/staticfiles/support/disc/manuals/desktop/Barracuda%207200 .11/100452348d.pdf

Message was edited by: Suba

So, question: Could the HD firmware be updated to allow AAM? Theoretically apple could issue an update to fix this? Or not? I'm now on my third imac and I don't want to bother with exchanging it any more..

Can anyone try this tool in their windows partition?

http://sites.google.com/site/quiethdd/

Seems to be made for a seagate (the example). Of course, I'm not sure if modifying APM is such a good idea..

As per the thread above, dell was able to fix the problem with a firmware update. So should apple!

"Not sure if this will help any one else out there with this problem, but I just noticed that Dell released some updates for other Seagate 7200 rpm drives ... might be of use, so check the model number you have. My drive was the ST9250421ASG so no fix, but this update is supposed to fix ST980412ASG, ST9160412ASG, ST9250410ASG, ST9320423ASG, ST9500420ASG. There was also another release for ST9160418ASG and ST9250464ASG."

Responses?

"Works great!
No more marble sounds "

"Worked great for me as well."

etc etc.

I'm guessing this also has something to do with apple's aggressive power management features:

"Unlike a lot of Windows-based PC systems, iMac uses energy-efficient hardware components that work hand in hand with the operating system to conserve power. Mac OS X spins down hard drives and activates sleep mode on already energy-efficient LED-backlit displays. And it balances tasks across both central processors and graphics processors. Mac OS X never misses a power-saving opportunity, no matter how small. It even regulates the processor between keystrokes, reducing power between the letters you type. That’s just one of many ways Apple manages small amounts of power that add up to big savings."

So

Against all odds and logical explanations, the 2TB drives are more quite than the 1TB ones?
Am I correct that many of you are buying the 2TH ones just to avoid noise? And not because they need the space?

At first, I really felt like I was going to miss the Mac. But to be honest, it hasn't been on for 1 whole day..which is extra ordinary in my world. UPS is going to pick it up tomorrow or the day after, I'm going to wait a couple of months to sit out all these 27 inch problems.

Is the HD noise something on which Apple will work? Or is it something that they won't bother to fix or reduce?

For anyone suspecting the fans (noise from the right side, the black thing under the optical drive is indeed a fan), download SMCFanControl. With SMCFanControl you can rev up the fan speed and it should make the noise more prominent if it's actually coming from the fan.

I also have the 27" Seagate hard drive chugging sound. Saw genius at Apple Store in Reston. Tested several other iMACs--two 27", one with Seagate, other with Western digital--both made the noise (my ear was right up to the back of the case where the hard drive is). I also heard the noise in one 21.5" with Seagate drive.
However, I tried two more 21.5" models, one with Seagate, and one with Hitachi hard drive, and BOTH WERE TOTALLY SILENT!!!

Asked the genius why some new iMACs were silent (which he confirmed) and some were noisy (like mine and the two other 27" models in the store). He said he really didn't have an answer, but that the noise we heard in my 27" and the others is considered "Normal," and thus not fixable or replaceable.

On another issue, he did confirm that my iSight camera had dead pixels, which he tried to fix by opening the case and cleaning the camera. It didn't work, and Apple will replace the iSight camera under warranty.

Overall, not a great success as far as getting things fixed...the hard drive noise is my main issue, and that was not corrected. A bit disappointing considering my 24" iMAC is silent, as is my new 13" MacBook Pro.

Basically it seems like luck of the draw whether your hard drive is quiet or not, and not necessarily based on the brand of the hard drive (although the one Hitachi I was able to test in the 21.5" model was completely silent).

Hope this information is helpful to everybody...hopefully there will be some sort of fix from Apple down the road.

My advice would be to cancel the order till the number and interval of the complaints decrease significantly. It's not going to be easy getting help where you are. Of course there are a lot more computers without problems but the current situation is minor.

wesleyh84 wrote:
Can anyone try this tool in their windows partition?

http://sites.google.com/site/quiethdd/

Seems to be made for a seagate (the example). Of course, I'm not sure if modifying APM is such a good idea..

Yep, all looks a bit risky. I did just try it and modifying AAM has quite an effect - it gets worse! I don't think my drive (WDC 1TB 'black') can be improved. It took a while to figure out how to reset - really, use at your own risk.

Hello

I guess this problem is worldwide, My Imac was quiet at first but after a couple of days it started doing his grumbling thing. I heard some people say it is just a mechanical thing, it makes noises but comeee on, i did not pay soo much money for no reason guys.

I'm backing mine up and getting it picked up by an authorised repairer tomorrow under Applecare. I've had my machine since early December and have wiped the HD twice. It is noisier now than ever.

Whilst I appreciate that an HD is mechanical there is no way it should grumble like this for normal web browsing. It's a 2TB Hitachi HD.

In every other respect, my iMac is wonderful - such a shame about this,m though. I do lots of quiet work and it is very annoying.

Mine makes a rumbling noise as well. The Beachball also very frequently appears, especially when I do a Spotlight search while having a Safari window open. Extremely annoying. I have a 1TB Seagate ST31000528ASQ like others who are reporting this issue.

I think I'll take mine into an Apple Store, and probably ask for a replacement. (Never done that before, hopefully Apple will be co-operative and just replace it rather than replace the Hard Disk or something). Just typing this now with only Safari running I can hear a rumble.

Could anyone tell me the process of replacing a configured-to-order computer from Apple, I don't think they stock i7's at my local store.

I own other Mac's, including one old iMac, that run perfectly quiet.

I need to look on the bright side though - I'm fortunate enough to own a 27" iMac! 😉

Many thanks in advance for any advice.