Apologies if this isn't the right community to ask in, I figured folks who use them would know, but if there is a better place to ask, please let me know!

So - I need to buy some external storage, and looking at prices and with the long run in mind, I was leaning towards a 18TB WD Elements or 16TB SEAGATE Expansion, but after looking at the reviews I am concerned about the noise levels, since I have sensory processing disorder, making me really sensitive to noise and this is going right by my bed and will hopefully function as an active backup, so will be always on.

Apparently there's a thing called Preventative Wear Levelling which will cause the drive to rev up every few seconds, and all drives (HDD anyway) do it, but it's the size of the drive that affects how much sound it makes, is that right?

If that's the case, is there a size drive where the noise becomes noticeable that I should stay under, or is it a case of trial and error and "my mileage may vary", and actually any drive could end up being noisy?

Alternatively, is there a quiet but affordable (in terms of ££ per TB, I wouldn't buy a significantly smaller SSD for the same price as those I mentioned, for example) alternative?

TIA