I have a 98 S70 N.A. with 165K on it. I have noticed an increase in road noise while driving. It sounds like I have all terrain tires on my car. I have goodyear assurance tripletreds that have about 40K on them. I have rotated and the noise hasn't changed. I thought that the front bearings were going as it seems like they would at this mileage and so I changed them both. That wasn't it (ouch). I did the swaybar links at the same time. The only thing I noticed while doing the bearings is that one of my control arm balljoints (passenger side) was shot...I could make it rock back and forth just by hand. I was always under the impression that bad balljoints only caused creaking/nocking when going over bumps and turns...could they cause a grinding/harsh road noise too?

The sound doesn't change whether accelerating or coasting and it doesn't change when in neutral or when braking. Tire rotation didn't seem to do anything. Any ideas??