are HDDs supposed to make noises that sound like a geiger counter?

[Anubis]

is it normal?
or is sonething about to go seriously wrong

 

[quakefiend420]

several of my hdds make faint clicking noises when the heads are reading/writing

is it constant or is it only when it's seeking?

and how loud is it?

 

[SumYungGai]

I know that older drives would make that sound during HD activity, but I'm not sure if any newer drives are still as loud.

I have a 3 year old drive that clicks under heavy usage, especially when it's fragmented. Maybe you should try defragmenting, but not with the XP one, get something from http://execsoft.com or http://raxco.com

 

[Jiggz]

As long as it is not constant and only happens during access. Then I will presume it is normal since I do not know what hdd you have.

 

[Texun]

They can produce a light fluttering sound that is normal during access, or a series of solid clacks that indicates HD death has come to visit. There is no question about which one is which when you hear it.

 

[Anubis]

yea its only during access, it is an older drive its a 40 gig Quantum thats in another comp, its quite loud actually, happens most often when you load a program, ive had this drive in use for a while but i dont recall it being this loud in the past, however it coudl be because i now have it as the windows drive and not just a storage drive so it gets a lot of useage

i have a new 80 gig seagate 7200.7 SATA that you can heear also during read/write but its not as loud,

i never used to hear my HDDs making noise and im guessing they always did but the fans were just too loud and drowned it out, have a much quieter comp now

 

[Elcs]

I remember the day when HDD's got quieter the more you used them.