Llamma has got some images of the two DVD drives that live inside the Xbox 360. On the left is the newer, and quieter, Samsung drive (model #TS-H943), “easily identified by its unique drive-tray and ninja-like stealth“. And on the right is the Hitachi (model #GDR-3120L), “easily identified by the notches on its drive tray, and the ear-splitting noise it produces when it really gets going“. Are the drives being replaced across the whole production line or is it just some units? I think microsoft had realised that they made a ‘mistake’ when choosing drives for the 360 and later during manufacturing they found out that it packs some noise. So they decided to replace them with the sleeker and quieter Samsung model.
My 360 contains the Hitachi, and seriously does make a blast when it is on. If I play on the Xbox Live Arcade games or things running from the hard drive, the 360 is actually whisper quiet, but as soon as I press the button to play the game, the drive whirrs up. It spins really fast and makes a lot of noise; that’s how I realised that I accidentally left my 360 in the night (I could hear it through my iPod headphones!
my samsung is still pretty noisy
I had a samsung in the first box i got and it was nosiy as hell and when i took it bak i got a Hitachi now, and dam that thing is quiet it sounds like the Slim PS2
I have the “newer” and “quieter” samsung drive, and its crazy loud and very annoying.
Well you should hear my hitachi in action! It’s pretty loud, a beast!
Who cares just play the game
my cousin has a samsung one in his and for some reason it will read a dvd and a cd but has stopped reading games. it just says ‘please insert disc into an xbox 360′ or ‘this disc is unreadable’
anyone have any ideas?
lowie, I got the same message when I had the 360 crammed in a tv stand and it got a bit heated. With luck it might be running just a bit too hot. Can’t check which drive I got now (at work), but the noise started bothering me yesterday so I thought I’d look some things up. It’s prolly a Hitachi.
I had the older one (Hitachi) though then got dreaded 3 red lights, had a new one sent to me and its the new drive (Samsung) and its horrible! It shudders when it opens and squeaks when it reads data, god! why did they put it in????
I honestly think sometimes why they couldn’t find a drive which didn’t make too much noise, that worked fine. There are so many to choose from!
Samsung…loud, and scratches games.