I have a Western Digital 120G HD that has an operating whine much louder than any of my other harddisks.

It sounds quite normal, and the drive works fine, so I was thinking of applying some oil to a small round metal part which could be the bottom part of the spindle.

Has anybody tried this? Is there any other advice? I don't fancy opening it up, cos I imagine I would destroy it.

Then again, destroying it is probably its only future at this stage, cos the whirr is just too high pitched and annoying to have anywhere.

Cheers!

Good luck!

Backup first.

Do you know enough about hard-drive design to know where that oil might go and what it might do? (I don't).

The only way I would attempt this is in a clean-room (I would guess they use at least class-100), taking apart the drive to make sure I knew where the oil was going. Considering the cost of building (or renting) a clean room, plus the cost of my time, I think I would save money by buying a new drive.

Also note that, if a bearing is making noise, there may be some other parts nearing end of life.

Believe it or not, WD-40 works too!

I stopped using this HD ages ago. It's empty except for a basic slackware distro.

Pixellany, I expect this is what Western Digital might propose if I complained to them. It's rhetorical, because HD's are so cheap nowadays.

In any case, I *have* other harddisks I can use. I don't need this one at all. But .. it's lying around, taking up space, and I'd need to find somewhere special to get rid of it.

I suppose I'm just testing the waters by asking here, before doing something to it, which I have little doubt will destroy it.

http://www.bbspot.com/News/2004/05/b...ard_drive.html

I've never tried applying and type of lubricant to a hard drive nor would I would suggest using WD-40. However, if it worked then good for you. I agree with pixellany you do not know where the oil will end up.

Reminds me of a friend who oiled his front brakes to eliminate a squeal, results will probably be the same. My suggestion is get a new hard drive. Good luck

Cart

adding oil to a hard drive is most like to just kill the drive. if that's your ultimate goal, I think your plan is a good one

Hard drives are not meant to be oiled.. if it's loud I would replace it with a quieter drive.

Marvelous!!!! Looks a bit like my old motorcycle repair shop....

The hammer reminds my of my only real experience "repairing" a hard drive. I had a company laptop which would sometimes refuse to start. Simply turning off and on again cured it---until one day it didn't. After it would not start, I listened closely and noted the drive was not spinning.
Power off
Smack case with fist at assumed location of drive
Power on--works perfectly

The next day, it went to the repair folks for a new drive.

I've disassembled a few dead drives in the past, just to see how they work. The location stabu is referring to is the end of the spindle, but if you apply oil (or any kind of lubricant) in a way that seeps into the spindle shaft there's a high risk that it'll reach the disk platters. The part that makes the noise is more likely the head actuator which can't be reached without opening the unit.

Thanks for the link. It cracked me up, especially when coating the platters.

I have found that those heavy greases are not so good for hard drives. If nothing else, you never manage to get a uniform coat on and when the drive platter spins up it is out of balance for at least awhile. Also, forcing the heads to plow through all that grease results in longer seek times and sometimes an increase in I/O errors.

I have had my best results using a spray-on lithium grease. It is heavy enough to quiet things down, but you can get a far more uniform (and thinner) coat on the platters in particular by using it.

Greasing up a hard drive is a really good way to quiet it down. I guarantee that it will be a LOT quieter after you do this than it was before you did.

P.S.

does anyone think I should put a smiley or other subtle disclaimer on that previous post?

I'm surprised you didnt' try graphite. Supposed to be a good lubricant. Sure a little conductive but what the heck.