Going bad with HDDs

Mar 19, 2017
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Hello! Since I built my PC, I experienced issues with my Internal HDD which is 'WD CAVIAR BLUE 1TB' having bad sectors and so, I replaced it with RMA and received a refurbished drive from WD. After a few days of usage, I heard some sort of clicking noise from my CPU. I though it was the fans but it was my HDD! I hear them when I power on my PC (about 6 seconds and stops), I didn't care it first, but worked fine. But now suddenly, my PC can't detect my Hard Drive even in BIOS and makes clicking sounds continuously. By the way, I don't have an SSD. I am worried everytime anything is going bad with my PC. I may plan to purchase an SSD later which I hope the SSD's Architecture doesn't give me these physical type of issues anymore like clicking sounds and anything. What do you guys suggest me to do? Thanks in advance.

My PC:
Intel Core i5-6500
ASUS MAXIMUS VIII RANGER
16GB DDR4 RAM 2133 MHz
ASUS STRIX GTX 1060
WD Caviar Blue 1TB HDD
 
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BonzaiDuck

Lifer
Jun 30, 2004
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Hello! Since I built my PC, I experienced issues with my Internal HDD which is 'WD CAVIAR BLUE 1TB' having bad sectors and so, I replaced it with RMA and received a refurbished drive from WD. After a few days of usage, I heard some sort of clicking noise from my CPU. I though it was the fans but it was my HDD! I hear them when I power on my PC (about 6 seconds and stops), I didn't care it first, but worked fine. But now suddenly, my PC can't detect my Hard Drive even in BIOS and makes clicking sounds continuously. By the way, I don't have an SSD. I am worried everytime anything is going bad with my PC. I may plan to purchase an SSD later which I hope the SSD's Architecture doesn't give me these physical type of issues anymore like clicking sounds and anything. What do you guys suggest me to do? Thanks in advance.

My PC:
Intel Core i5-6500
ASUS MAXIMUS VIII RANGER
16GB DDR4 RAM 2133 MHz
ASUS STRIX GTX 1060
WD Caviar Blue 1TB HDD

So far, I think I've had one or two Blue WD drives go south. Those still running are -- well -- still running.

The WD Blues are not terrible drives. I've used them for DVR and media storage, and I"ve used them for image backups. But if I were building a system with an ASUS Maximus VIII Ranger and even the second-tier of the second-tier i5-6500 and so forth, I'd choose my long-term boot-system physical disk more carefully. You should've invested the likely less-than-$100 in a 128GB or 250GB SSD. The SSDs I've purchased lately (excluding for good reasons my 960 Pro 1TB NVMe_M.2), were inexpensive ADATA SP-550 units that cost me ~$135 each after shipping and tax. Those were 480GB units. Why, even a Samsung 960 EVO 250GB should run around $135. Or at least I can say that's what I paid, like all of these mentions -- without coupons or sales promotions.
 

Azuma Hazuki

Golden Member
Jun 18, 2012
1,532
866
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I don't trust WD Blue drives any longer, nor the Greens. SSD is the way to go, and if you have a lot of stuff, just get a small SSD for your OS and programs and spend the rest on an Enterprise-grade 1TB or so.
 

Valantar

Golden Member
Aug 26, 2014
1,792
508
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HDDs fail. That's life. You've just had some bad luck, as they don't tend to do so that much.

Still, though, looking at your PC, I'm struck with... remorse?.. for how you've paid for a premium overclocking motherboard to use with a locked CPU and 2133 RAM... Going for a more suitable motherboard could have paid for a 240GB SSD easily. Oh well.
 
Mar 19, 2017
32
2
11
So far, I think I've had one or two Blue WD drives go south. Those still running are -- well -- still running.

The WD Blues are not terrible drives. I've used them for DVR and media storage, and I"ve used them for image backups. But if I were building a system with an ASUS Maximus VIII Ranger and even the second-tier of the second-tier i5-6500 and so forth, I'd choose my long-term boot-system physical disk more carefully. You should've invested the likely less-than-$100 in a 128GB or 250GB SSD. The SSDs I've purchased lately (excluding for good reasons my 960 Pro 1TB NVMe_M.2), were inexpensive ADATA SP-550 units that cost me ~$135 each after shipping and tax. Those were 480GB units. Why, even a Samsung 960 EVO 250GB should run around $135. Or at least I can say that's what I paid, like all of these mentions -- without coupons or sales promotions.

I am bit less cared and unaware about picking up good storage drives while building my PC. I won't use a HDD as my boot drive anymore.
 
Mar 19, 2017
32
2
11
HDDs fail. That's life. You've just had some bad luck, as they don't tend to do so that much.

Still, though, looking at your PC, I'm struck with... remorse?.. for how you've paid for a premium overclocking motherboard to use with a locked CPU and 2133 RAM... Going for a more suitable motherboard could have paid for a 240GB SSD easily. Oh well.

I built my PC keeping future upgrades in mind but gone wrong in choosing a right storage device.
 
Mar 19, 2017
32
2
11
Yep I've started the policy of having one or two spares on-hand at all times in case of the troubles.

Will copy that. I have created a backup of system image of my PC using 'Windows System Image' but I think it can't be restored to a low capacity SSD though.
 

Valantar

Golden Member
Aug 26, 2014
1,792
508
136
I built my PC keeping future upgrades in mind but gone wrong in choosing a right storage device.
Yeah, but you would have been just as well off with a much cheaper Z170 board (you could have gotten one for close to half the price) with every feature you would want/need, and added a 240GB SSD alongside it. The price increase would have been marginal. When it comes to motherboards, the premium models are generally for a very limited demographic, and you pay a lot extra for features that 99% of users never need. Did you ask on the forum before deciding on components?
 
Mar 19, 2017
32
2
11
Yeah, but you would have been just as well off with a much cheaper Z170 board (you could have gotten one for close to half the price) with every feature you would want/need, and added a 240GB SSD alongside it. The price increase would have been marginal. When it comes to motherboards, the premium models are generally for a very limited demographic, and you pay a lot extra for features that 99% of users never need. Did you ask on the forum before deciding on components?
Yeah I agree. And no, I didn't asked in the forums and decided to choose the components for myself. :p
 

Shmee

Memory & Storage, Graphics Cards Mod Elite Member
Super Moderator
Sep 13, 2008
8,139
3,075
146
I would RMA the WD again, and use it for extra storage, but get an SSD for the boot drive. Note that his motherboard supports BLCK OC on Skylake CPUs, according to ASUS.
 
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Yakk

Golden Member
May 28, 2016
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SSDs can fail just as much as mechanical drives, I've had a couple fail without warning. Quite annoying that, mechanical drives at least usually give you warnings in the form of bad sectors. Just have a backup, replace them and go on. Blues are usually ok, a notch above anything Seagate, but they'll still be faulty drives anywhere.