Automatic Acoustic Management

It would seem that Maxtor's Silent Store is merely a moniker for their implementation of an industry standard technology called Automatic Acoustic Management or AAM for short. According to an industry source, AAM is part of the official ATA specification as defined by the T13 committee.

The same source commented that Maxtor wasn't utilizing the AAM technology in the appropriate way, which is to ship AAM-enabled drives to OEMs who need ultra-quiet drives while leaving the drives for the retail market in the performance mode. Of course, there should also be a way to allow end-users and resellers to modify the AAM modes to suit their needs. I agree 100% with him.

His insightful comments reminded me of what Gregory Peng observed when he used AMSET to enable the Fast mode in his Maxtor drive. He discovered that the utility also changed the AAM mode for his IBM drive as well! However, he could discern no improvement in performance. Based on what I just learned about AAM, I think I wouldn't be too far off the mark to say that AMSET could be used to change the AAM modes for hard disks of other manufacturers as well. The lack of any performance improvement in Gregory's IBM hard disk can be attributed to the fact that IBM hard disks ship with AAM disabled or turned to the Fast mode; and not because AMSET cannot be used to change the AAM mode in IBM hard disks.

Now, I'm not recommending this but if you could possibly use AMSET to change the AAM mode of hard disks from other manufacturers. Since Maxtor appears to be the only hard disk manufacturer to enable AAM's Quiet mode by default, users of hard disks from other manufacturers should not need to worry about poor seek performance from their hard disks. But the ability to change the AAM mode for quieter operation might appeal to some. So, if you want to try using AMSET to change the AAM settings of your hard disk, be very careful. I will not be responsible for any loss of data that occurs if you use AMSET with non-Maxtor drives.