Bearings (VAG)

[tihol tiholov]

This one to susp gurus:
Do bad wheel bearings get more quiet when unloaded or under more load?
Background: Patient is '99 NBeetle, 237K km, wife's car, little driven by me.  Got humming  noise after putting new winter tires (Hankook, pretty high tech) in April, then got worse with summer tires (Falken ZIEX 512) in May.  Sounds like off-road mud tires on tarmac.  First appeared at 90/100 km/h, then over few weeks gradually came down the speedometer and now at about 50 km/h  there's a harmonic vibration shaking stuff in car.  Used to be on a straight line only and disappearing in corners, both left and right.  Now it disappears when going left only.  Finally, 2 day ago got tired of it and went to have the tires looked at.  All 4 were rebalanced, test drive and same noise.  Reliable tech tells me "must be wheel bearing".  Up on the hoist it goes - both front wheels feel a little tight when turning, no play.  Driving with front axle up in the air brings a slight noise from the left wheel, less to no noise from the right wheel.
Ordered front wheel bearing but the lack of play in the hub is a little disconcerting.  Hypothesis is dried out bearing that's still (maybe too) tight.  Has anyone seen such a bearing failure?  Hope it's not worse like the transmission.  Any ideas, BTDT's very much appreciated.

TIA,
Tihol   

TT