Does anyone have the noise (dB) measurements for the new fan on the 5N?
This has ALWAYS been a MAJOR complaint across all drobo products (I have the original Drobo, 2nd gen, and the 800fs) … hoping this one fixes it 
I personally wouldn’t rely on the dB measurements that much but the guys here reported it’s much quieter than in the previous devices. There’s no standard way of measuring this and the dB noise value alone doesn’t tell anything about the characteristics of the noise itself and its subjective “annoyingness level”. Furthermore, its very likely they won’t stick with one particular fan vendor for the whole duration of the production.
I don’t have dB measurements, but I can say the 5N is near-silent compared to the old FS. Not quite as good as the replacement fan I’d put in my FS, but quiet enough that I don’t think I’ll ever need to replace it (and I spend all day in a dead-silent office).
decisions decisions … continue with Drobo (and go with the 5N), or try a Synology DS412+ :X :X :X
Near-silent? Mine is annoyingly loud. Did you tweak anything to make it silent? Thanks.
After having it for a month now (256GB mSATA and all 3TB red drives) … I can say it’s truly is near silent!!! And I’m a HUGE stickler on sound! color me shocked! 
FINALLY!!!
256 mSATA and all 3tb red drives for me to and its silent as .
I did some noise measurements!
I used the Decibel 10th iOS App calibrated against my brother’s industrial standard noise meter that he uses to make sure his power station isn’t too noisy. Not, perfect, but not bad either.
The prevailing ambient noise in the ‘play room’ where the Drobos live is 35dB. The only thing turned on in the house was the fridge-freezer several rooms awa.
I measured the 5N and the FS at distances of 12" (30cm), 3’ (1m) and 6’ (2m). I performed measurements with each Drobo individually, idling (though drives not spun down) and under a heavy write load of multiple 1, 5, 50, 500 and 1000MB files. The laptop performing the writes was also two rooms away so as not to interfere.
Results:
Drobo FS (idle)
12" - 52dB
3’ - 49dB
6’ - 42dB
Drobo FS (under load)
12" - 58dB
3’ - 52dB
6’ - 44dB
Drobo 5N (idle)
12" - 39dB
3’ - 38dB
6’ - 35/36dB
Drobo 5N (under load)
12" - 42dB
3’ - 40dB
6’ - 36dB
Now, I know this isn’t a perfect laboratory style test, but you can see that under normal use conditions, from 6’ away, the 5N is no louder than ambient background noise which is pretty damn good in my opinion. The FS on the other hand, desperately needs a replacement fan!
Caveat - the FS has much older drives in it, which explains to some extent the greater noise under a write load.