Clicking harddrive == bad?

[Vasant56]

I recently bought an external HD off ebay (Maxtor Diamondmax 200gig in an external case). I've been leaving it running pretty much 24/7 for my azureus downloads. It's making a sporatic clicking noise, is this just data being written to the harddrive, or is this a bad sign? It doesn't make the clicking noise when data isn't being written.

Thanks

 

[UsandThem]

Yes, that is a very bad sign for a hard drive.

Back everything up now to CD's/DVD's and dig a hole to bury that hard drive in soon.

 

[Vasant56]

Is there any way to get it fixed? I bought it off ebay, and I doubt I can get it returned.

 

[UsandThem]

Originally posted by: Vasant56
Is there any way to get it fixed? I bought it off ebay, and I doubt I can get it returned.

Nope, what you have is terminal and is called "the click of death".

My condolences

 

[Vasant56]

Sorry if I'm desperate, but I spend a load of money on this..

Will maxtor cover it in any way?

 

[DaTT]

I hope the ceremony is beautiful.

 

[UsandThem]

Originally posted by: Vasant56
Sorry if I'm desperate, but I spend a load of money on this..

Will maxtor cover it in any way?

You can enter the serial number off of the drive at their website, and it will tell you if there is any warranty left.

 

[P0ldy]

If it's still under warranty, yes. Don't tell them you bought it on ebay, you'll get the runaround.

 

[Vasant56]

It expires 2/21/2008, which I suppose is a good thing. I'll throw it into a pc tommorow and run the maxtor scan.

Thanks guys,

btw, will they make me ship this back to them first? There's no way I'll be able to back this stuff easily.

 

[DaTT]

Don't bother with the scan, just back up your stuff and send it out. They will not send you a new one until they receive and test yours. It will be gone for several weeks.

 

[Dragonbate]

Well I agree with backing your stuff up and checking the hd but... I've heard some strange sounds from computers and hds many of which could be described as "clicks". Some were indicative of imminant failure, some are just regular sounds. The hd on the computer I'm writing this on now clicks from time to time. It has done this for as long as I remember. Run the maxtor diagnostics and go from there.

 

[SrGuapo]

Many drives will make clicking sounds as they seek. My seagate SATA drive makes a pretty noticeable click whenever I am accessing data. Is this a regular clicking sound, or only when you acces data?

 

[imported_bum]

He says only when data is being written. I would have to agree that it is a sign of death, especially since it was bought from ebay. However, in the unlikely case that it is less severe than you make it sound, it could be a normal noise like the last two mentioned.

 

[pwyll]

Hi. I just had a hard drive question and it sort of ties in with this post so I thought it would be best to post it here instead of starting a new thread . Anyway I was just wondering what the average hard drive life was? I'm still running off of my 6 or 7 year old Dell hard drive. Also you guys were mentioning the "click of death". Well when my hard drive seeks it makes a constant clicking sound. My friend actually describes it as farting, but its basically a clicking sound. I'm not too worried about it because it has been doing this for as long as I have had the computer. Just wondering what you guys thought of this.

 

[mjkim]

what kind of clicking sound is it? is it... metal to metal kind of clicking sound... or a click followed by drive spinning up?

because if its the latter... i had the same problem... and its not the hard drive....

 

[Dragonbate]

As hard drives age the bearings begin to make noise; some more some less. I had a 1.9 gb drive from an old toshiba infinia (circa 1997) that was loud as hell but still working perfect when I gave away that computer about two years ago.

 

[HardcoreRobot]

IIRC maxtor will ship the replacement first if you give them a CC number (in case you never send back the broken one)

 

[Vasant56]

Hi,

I Ran the powermax tests, and it passed all of them. I will try contacting maxtor tommorow. I think the HD was new, as it's warranty expires on 2/21/2005 (which is really weird, as it's a 3 year warranty, and yesterday was 2/21)

Hopefully they'll send out the new HD first, and I'll send the old one back after

 

[montag451]

They should be ok with the odd day if you are nice to them

 

[DoC91383]

Hahah my hard drive sounds like a lawn mower running over a car and has sounded this way for the last 4 years. I'm using it until it dies just to see how long it will last.

 

[VirtualLarry]

I wonder how much of this "problem" might be the normal Maxtor seek noises while reading/writing? They would likely be magnified if it was housed in an external case. Here's what I would do, before contacting Maxtor to set up an RMA - download HDTach 2.61, and run it several times. See if there is a downward spike in the read-test graph, that corresponds with the occurance of the "clicking" noise. Also, check the System Event Log for any error messages that might occur. If either of those occurs, then your drive is likely having issues and you should RMA. However, if the graph, through several runs of HDTach read testing, shows a fairly-smooth graph (no spikes), then the drive is probably alright, especially if it still "clicks" while doing the read testing. (That would indicate that the "clicks" that you are hearing, are the normal seek noises of the drive, which are comparatively loud on the DM+9. It's the only drive in my case that I can hear seeking, over the noise of my 4 case fans and CPU fan.)