I have installed four of the Seagate ST8000VN0002 in my RN716x and just finished the resync of all disks. Unfortunately I now have an annoying beeping/humming noise when the disks are idling. It's a pretty bothersome frequency and really nerve wrecking. As soon as there is some read or write access this humming disappears and the normal known sound of harddisks can be heard which is ok.
But the humming sound is so annoying that I can absolutely not recommend these disks at all. You should stay away from them.
I have installed four of the Seagate ST8000VN0002 in my RN716x and just finished the resync of all disks. Unfortunately I now have an annoying beeping/humming noise when the disks are idling.
Not sure about humming, but beeping is usually a sign that the disk is mechanically defective. Seagate will accept RMA'd beeping disks even if they pass Seatools.
Have you confirmed that this sound is coming from all four disks?
Hopefully other people who purchased these disks will chime in. Though I use Western Digital myself, having choices is always a good thing.
Havde you shared that video with Seagate Technical Support. I would really question if that is "normal" for any hard drive. Personally, I use the ST1000NV01 disks and do not have any noise from them.
All that said, it sounds like the noise may be getting magnified by the enclosure in some way. Have you tried removing and re-seating the disks in the ReadyNAS to make sure they are not rubbing against anoything in the case. I would also try putting a single disk in each of the four bays (one at a time) to see if a particular drive/bay is producing the sound.
I suspect that won't resolve the issue but it would be worth a try before going back to Seagate. My experience with Seagate Tech Support has been very good and I think if you do a reasonable amount of trouble shooting and can narrow this issue down to a single disk, they may be more willing to RMA it.
Havde you shared that video with Seagate Technical Support. I would really question if that is "normal" for any hard drive. Personally, I use the ST1000NV01 disks and do not have any noise from them.
That was my previous experience with these Seagate NAS drives as well. This was the main reason to also buy the 8TB from Seagate and not WD.
All that said, it sounds like the noise may be getting magnified by the enclosure in some way. Have you tried removing and re-seating the disks in the ReadyNAS to make sure they are not rubbing against anoything in the case. I would also try putting a single disk in each of the four bays (one at a time) to see if a particular drive/bay is producing the sound.
All drives produce this noise. It's a lot less noticeable in a normal drive bay as (like you wrote) it seems to be magnified by the ReadyNAS metal cage. Seagate also changed the drive mounting (in a very stupid way). It no longer has the holes in the middle. So I cannot use the the nice plastic tray of the ReadyNAS to fix the drive without screws and even worse I can only tighten the drive with two screws at the end of the metal tray near the SATA connectors. That might make things even worse.
I suspect that won't resolve the issue but it would be worth a try before going back to Seagate. My experience with Seagate Tech Support has been very good and I think if you do a reasonable amount of trouble shooting and can narrow this issue down to a single disk, they may be more willing to RMA it.
I contacted them and sent them a link to the video showing the problem and they wrote back that this is normal behavior and they don't offer any help in this issue. It's the worst customer user experience I had with a drive manufacturer so far. They don't even tried to help in any way.
Campus wrote:Seagate also changed the drive mounting (in a very stupid way). It no longer has the holes in the middle. So I cannot use the the nice plastic tray of the ReadyNAS to fix the drive without screws
Good to know. FWIW, the WD80EFZX equivalent does have the standard holes on the side, so the plastic insert can be used. They did shift the holes on the middle bottom though, which will be a problem if you use the old trays (ultra, pro, etc). I think that's probably a new industry standard.
Good to know. FWIW, the WD80EFZX equivalent does have the standard holes on the side, so the plastic insert can be used. They did shift the holes on the middle bottom though, which will be a problem if you use the old trays (ultra, pro, etc). I think that's probably a new industry standard.
Do you have hands-on experience with the WD80EFZX drives? Are they quiet or do they have similar problems?
My RN102 and my RN202 have identical WD60EFRZ+WD80EFZX configurations (jbod). I installed the 8 TB about a month ago.
The RN202 is my office - tucked away on the floor, not at ear-level. I don't hear any noise when it is idle. I can hear it while it is running, but I don't find it objectionable - but since it is a backup NAS, it is mostly idling when I'm working. The RN102 is in the basement, and there are 12 other disk drives nearby - so I can't really tell.
I've never heard anything like the video you posted in the RN202. I agree the quality of the noise is very irritating.
The Seagate has decent idle noise specs - 25 dba at idle. But the WD80EFZX is exceptionally quiet at idle - only 20 dba. It's actually the quietest drive in the WDC Red lineup. But during seeking, their specs are quite similar (28 dba for the seagate, 29 for the WDC).
Just wondering - did you try elevating the RN516 briefly? The amplification you are hearing might be through the shelf or floor (I can't see what it is sitting on). You might be able to control it somewhat by putting the RN516 on a soft mat of some kind.
The RN202 is my office - tucked away on the floor, not at ear-level. I don't hear any noise when it is idle. I can hear it while it is running, but I don't find it objectionable - but since it is a backup NAS, it is mostly idling when I'm working. The RN102 is in the basement, and there are 12 other disk drives nearby - so I can't really tell.
That sounds good.
I've never heard anything like the video you posted in the RN202. I agree the quality of the noise is very irritating.
I found another test of the Seagate drives where they mentioned the exact same problem. They measured the idle noise at 47dB which sounds reasonable for me.
Just wondering - did you try elevating the RN516 briefly? The amplification you are hearing might be through the shelf or floor (I can't see what it is sitting on). You might be able to control it somewhat by putting the RN516 on a soft mat of some kind.
Even lifting the entire NAS box does not change the sound. It actually stays on rubber absorbers used for subwoofers to isolate the ReadyNAS from the floor. The sound is always the same. Also I don't think it's a vibration issue but some head-movement/-parking/-whatever when idling that creates it because it completely disappears when the disk has to read or write something and a vibration would usually be noticeable all the time I guess.
I could not find a solution for this annoying issue. I simply replaced the drives with the previous ones. I tried several things to check whether its a vibrational thing but AFAIK the sound is coming from within the drive and it's not some vibration enhanced by the case. Even with a completely opened case and some isolation rubbers the sound is still there.
This is a bit late for you Campus but I have been talking with someone from Seagate and shown them your video and explain the noise and when it happens.
I've given him the serial numbers for my hard drives ST8000ne0001 and a Seagate engineer will discuss this with someone at Netgear/ReadyNAS.
Since for me the noise only occurs at idle - If you perform a defrag/scrub or copy/read a large amount of data it is normal operation noise.
So hopefully between Seagate and Netgear one or the other can work out a firmware update or a fix/patch to resolve the issue. I would assume that the fix for one model would be the same or similar for both.
I'll update this thread once I hear back the outcome (and hopefully solution) from Seagate.
Mine do. I've tested 3 of the 6 drives and all make the same noise even in my desktop PC. Much quieter one by one but the noise is still there.
I work in IT and the supplier I purchased them from have a strong relationship with Seagate so they have put me in contact with someone there to help rectify the issue.
Well. It was on sale. Besides the negative review the Seagate 8TB NAS HDD SATA 6Gb/s NCQ 256 MB Cache Bare Drive ST8000VN0002 I bought does not fit in the control tray! It is missing the holes in the middle! I think I'm going to drill some homemade holes. Mabey that is why there is noise coming from the HD for some people. I definately am not going to snap off the small pegs on the control tray and ruin it. I'll buy the WD HD that was reccomended to me. Thanks you all for your input!
Update: After drilling two shallow holes on either side of the HD so it could fit in the control tray I slid it in and thank God there is no noise. No complaints here! Thank you everyone for your info on this topic!
Out of interest I would like to know if you have time to see if the you remove the plastic caddy thing and screw the drive to the metal tray does that make the drive noisy?
Ooops! I didn't know about that! The holes I drilled were a few centimeters in. Just enough for the tray's plastic peg to fit in. Thanks to you I know what to do with my second Seagate 8TB NAS HDD SATA 6Gb/s NCQ 256 MB Cache Bare Drive ST8000VN0002
I use 6 WD80EZZX 8TB drives that don't have any noise issues (they are very quiet and performance is great, plus they have normal mounting holes so you can use the tray!)
The only downside is that you have to remove the drives from an external enclosure (it's super easy to do) and then keep the external enclosure/screws/random pieces in the event that you need to use the warranty. You can buy the drives for under $250 on Amazon or eBay.
So far I have 4,000 power on hours on them and haven't had any issues. My RN516 (has 16GB's of Memory and a 716 processor in it) gets used very heavily and I have had no issues whatsoever.
I'll buy the WD HD that was reccomended to me. Thanks you all for your input! 
