OKAY! Thank you to everyone who took the time to audition the comparison and vote! I really appreciate the participation.
Here is the big reveal (servo #'s match the video test #s) along with cost as of 3/31/2024 (Amazon cost if available)
#1 - FunOSR - AI-H200 - $41.78 + $29.16 shipping
#2 - Generic - DS3230 - $17.00
#3 - Flash Hobby - M45CHW - $41.59
#4 - Hitech - D954SW - $99.99
This was just the “sound” portion of my testing, so the comments below will be restricted to sound/noise, and I will discuss smoothness and speed in my other tests.
First Place:
The Flash Hobby M45CHW is one that I’ve been recommending for some time now. It is extremely quiet and (somewhat) affordable. I have tested some other Flash Hobby servos around the same price point, and some +$20, and they are all similar in noise. Some of you with good ears can hear a high pitch undertone - your ears are not tricking you. These are very quiet, but sound very strange. Thankfully, high pitch sound is very bad at transmitting through any sort of boundary, so headphones or earbuds totally mask the high pitch squeal, so it’s not an issue in real world use - just a minor annoyance for those of us who can still hear above 12khz.
Second Place:
FunOSR shipped me 3 samples of their AI-H200 for testing and really was the push for me to conduct this series of tests/comparisons. The community definitely owes them a thank you for helping kick this off. Unit to unit consistency was very good, and all 3 units performed identically to my ear. These are extremely quiet servos. The quality of motor noise was average, with some inconsistency of pitch depending on direction of movement. This could potentially be annoying to some, as the sound of the toy will vary more based on the use/movement. At a similar price to the Flash Hobby, I would be 50/50 in terms of recommending this servo. However, the shipping cost to the US, as well as the inability to easily return/replace servos makes it a tough recommendation to those located in the US like me. If FunOSR can get a local distributor to help eliminate shipping costs, and build a US based support network to handle warranty and RMAs, then they could have a strong contender on their hands for a highly recommended quiet servo.
Third Place:
The Hitech D954SW was one of the most highly recommended servos when I started diving deeply into the OSR2 world. Their reputation as a servo manufacturer is stellar and they have been in business for more than 50 years! It’s amazing how current quiet servos have surpassed this previous recommendation in just a few years. Even though they are not anywhere near as quiet as some of the recent quiet servos, I still love mine and use it in my personal machine. Some may have noticed (I see a few 2nd place votes for the Hitech) that the quality of noise is very good. It’s super consistent and sounds… precise. So while it may not be the quietest servo in the group, the quality of noise communicates a sense of high build quality overall. Unfortunately, it is priced at more than 2x the cost of the Flash Hobby and the FunOSR (without shipping), so making a recommendation of this servo based on noise is extremely hard to do. It could still be a good option for those that are annoyed by the high pitch sound of the Flash Hobby servos or want to purchase from a highly established company with a strong North America presence.
Fourth Place:
The DS3230 was included ONLY to provide a baseline for comparison. This is a variant of the standard generic China servos - they all sound pretty much the same. These aren’t “bad” servos for those on a budget and/or mostly watch PMV/HMV with loud music and headphones. While its easy to hate on how loud they sound - I do appreciate them for getting so many people into the hobby at a lower price point. It’s very hard to mentally make the jump to spend $300 on servos vs $45 in a DIY 3D printed toy without ever trying one. I still recommend these to folks on a budget who don’t have major concern with noise. IMHO, an OSR2+ with these cheap servos will outperforms the Handy in every way other than noise.