This ST3120026A seems to be much quieter when seeking than that ST380011A was. Maybe the head assembly bearings in that ST380011A are worn out (the PC that ST380011A came from only had 256MiB of RAM). What's even stranger is that the access time on this ST3120026A is 0.2ms quicker than that of the ST380011A. Not the kind of inaudible seeks you get with the ST340014A, but definitely not bad.
By comparison, the ST380013AS makes a racket. The explanation I've read was that, in lieu of AAM, they locked the PATA models to quiet mode and the SATA models to performance mode, and comparisons of the access times between PATA and SATA 7200.7 - 7200.10 models back that up.
From the 2003 drives, I'd vote for the 7200.7 (I've seen too many reports of heavy vibration with Samsungs). From the 2005 drives, I prefer Western Digital.
By comparison, the ST380013AS makes a racket. The explanation I've read was that, in lieu of AAM, they locked the PATA models to quiet mode and the SATA models to performance mode, and comparisons of the access times between PATA and SATA 7200.7 - 7200.10 models back that up.
From the 2003 drives, I'd vote for the 7200.7 (I've seen too many reports of heavy vibration with Samsungs). From the 2005 drives, I prefer Western Digital.