hard drive clicking - Wester Digital

[ViviTheMage]

How afraid should I be of this hard drive failing on me? i have run all the tests I can think of and it comes up with nothing wrong. It clicks sometimes during counter strike or Warcraft 3 TFT, it will lock up for 10-15 seconds then start working, then it will click a few minutes later, any ideas on how i can fix this?

 

[ciproxr]

how old is the drive ? clicking usually isnt a good sign......

 

[ViviTheMage]

Originally posted by: ciproxr
how old is the drive ? clicking usually isnt a good sign......

its almost as if its powering down, then powering back up on its own...not to old, maybe 9 months?

 

[DaveSimmons]

start a pool on when it will die.

$1 on 5-7 days

 

[ViviTheMage]

Originally posted by: DaveSimmons
start a pool on when it will die.

$1 on 5-7 days

its been going on for 3 months....just recently happening more..uh oh?

 

[DaveSimmons]

Yep. One day it's a click, next day you're looking up "freezer trick" using Avanced Search.

If you have anything on the drive you care about, including email and browser bookmarks, back it up today or else.

 

[F1shF4t]

if the hard drive start clicking thats a bad sign, back up all ur data, there is a good chance that it will die soon.

I just had my work mates hard drive die on him due to the clicking of death (deskstar or deathstar as they were refered to)

 

[Farmer]

Follow DaveSimmons and Cupcake's advice, and consider yourself lucky. Most of the time, the clicking starts after the drive is already inaccessibly dead.

 

[ViviTheMage]

Originally posted by: Farmer
Follow DaveSimmons and Cupcake's advice, and consider yourself lucky. Most of the time, the clicking starts after the drive is already inaccessibly dead.

its almost as if its not a clicking sound, more of the drive turning off, then back on..lack of psu power?

 

[DaveSimmons]

In Elizabeth Kubler-Ross' book, "On Death and Dying" she identified five stages that a dying patient experiences when informed of their terminal prognosis. The stages Kubler-Ross identified are:

• Denial (this isn't happening to me!) <-- you
  Anger (why is this happening to me?)
  Bargaining (I promise I'll be a better person if...)
  Depression (I don't care anymore)
  Acceptance (I'm ready for whatever comes)

 

[fire400]

sounds like a software issue. scan your system for viruses or spyware. if this ticks you off so much, restore your system or wipe it clean and then do a fresh install with minimum software installations.

it could be a software issue, it could be a hardware issue. look into reinforcing your software environment first.

 

[Jeff7]

One time something like this happened to me - got a replacement drive, and it did the exact same thing. I finally got a better-than-generic-POS power supply, and the problem went away.

What power supply you got?

Even so, it's still a good idea to get very very nervous when a hard drive acts up. Anything on that drive that you value even the slightest, put it in a safer place soon.
Then head to Western Digital's website and download their DataLifeGuard program. It can run some diagnostics on the hard drive to see what's going on.

Though you said that you downloaded some tests......well, my usual thing to suggest: SMART check.
Get yourself a copy of Everest and install it. Under the program's Storage section, select SMART. Find the drive in the listing and click on it. Is anything listed as failing? If not, right click on it, select Copy, and paste the results back here, I'll have a look. If I don't check back on this thread in a day or so, send me a Private Message or something to remind me.

 

[ViviTheMage]

Originally posted by: Jeff7
One time something like this happened to me - got a replacement drive, and it did the exact same thing. I finally got a better-than-generic-POS power supply, and the problem went away.

What power supply you got?

Even so, it's still a good idea to get very very nervous when a hard drive acts up. Anything on that drive that you value even the slightest, put it in a safer place soon.
Then head to Western Digital's website and download their DataLifeGuard program. It can run some diagnostics on the hard drive to see what's going on.

Though you said that you downloaded some tests......well, my usual thing to suggest: SMART check.
Get yourself a copy of Everest and install it. Under the program's Storage section, select SMART. Find the drive in the listing and click on it. Is anything listed as failing? If not, right click on it, select Copy, and paste the results back here, I'll have a look. If I don't check back on this thread in a day or so, send me a Private Message or something to remind me.

thats actually what I am thinking too, because I have a POS generic PSU. I will look into Everest and see if that cures me. I didnt think you had to pay for everest either...last time I got it I downloaded a full version free if I recall.

results :

ID Attribute Description Threshold Value Worst Data Status
01 Raw Read Error Rate 51 200 200 0 OK: Value is normal
03 Spin Up Time 21 169 145 2091 OK: Value is normal
04 Start/Stop Count 40 100 100 851 OK: Value is normal
05 Reallocated Sector Count 140 200 200 0 OK: Value is normal
07 Seek Error Rate 51 200 200 0 OK: Value is normal
09 Power-On Time Count 0 85 85 11039 OK: Always passing
0A Spin Retry Count 51 100 100 0 OK: Value is normal
0B Calibration Retry Count 51 100 100 0 OK: Value is normal
0C Power Cycle Count 0 100 100 838 OK: Always passing
C2 Temperature 0 125 253 25 OK: Always passing
C4 Reallocation Event Count 0 200 200 0 OK: Always passing
C5 Current Pending Sector Count 0 200 200 0 OK: Always passing
C6 Off-Line Uncorrectable Sector Count 0 200 200 0 OK: Always passing
C7 Ultra ATA CRC Error Rate 0 200 253 190 OK: Always passing
C8 Write Error Rate 51 200 155 0 OK: Value is normal

 

[Jeff7]

Yeah, Everest is now pay-for software. Fortunately, Oldversion.com exists.

Alright, let's see....
Raw Read Errors: 0
Reallocated Sector Count: 0
Reallocation Even Count: 0
Current Pending Sector Count: 0
Off-Line Uncorrectable Sector Count: 0
Write Error Rate: 0
Temperature: 25 (hardly higher than ambient I imagine, impressive)

Only thing that seems odd is Ultra ATA CRC Error Rate at 190. I've only ever seen that in the single or double digits.

I say that you should still be wary, but do try a better power supply. Quality power is a good idea - you don't eat unrefined junk (well, you might, but you shouldn't), so you shouldn't feed your PC poorly filtered power.
Internal difference between PSUs. Scroll down to the second row of images, and check out the one in the middle. On the left, a generic thing I bought for $5 on the forums. It's labeled as a 400W PSU. Yeah right. On the right, an Antec Smartpower 350W. Note that it has bigger heatsinks, bigger capacitors, and a lot more filtering circuitry.
Also, the fact that this only seems to happen during games points to the power supply - with the videocard sucking up power, a cheap power supply might not be able to keep up with demand, and the voltages will start fluctuating.

Nowadays, I only use generic PSUs when I need a quick source of 3.3, 5, or 12V that need not be especially clean. My current preference is Seasonic, but I believe I've seen Fortron recommended too. Just search the forums for "Recommend PSU" or something to that effect. Plenty of threads out there.

 

[ViviTheMage]

Originally posted by: Jeff7
Yeah, Everest is now pay-for software. Fortunately, Oldversion.com exists.

Alright, let's see....
Raw Read Errors: 0
Reallocated Sector Count: 0
Reallocation Even Count: 0
Current Pending Sector Count: 0
Off-Line Uncorrectable Sector Count: 0
Write Error Rate: 0
Temperature: 25 (hardly higher than ambient I imagine, impressive)

Only thing that seems odd is Ultra ATA CRC Error Rate at 190. I've only ever seen that in the single or double digits.

I say that you should still be wary, but do try a better power supply. Quality power is a good idea - you don't eat unrefined junk (well, you might, but you shouldn't), so you shouldn't feed your PC poorly filtered power.
Internal difference between PSUs. Scroll down to the second row of images, and check out the one in the middle. On the left, a generic thing I bought for $5 on the forums. It's labeled as a 400W PSU. Yeah right. On the right, an Antec Smartpower 350W. Note that it has bigger heatsinks, bigger capacitors, and a lot more filtering circuitry.
Also, the fact that this only seems to happen during games points to the power supply - with the videocard sucking up power, a cheap power supply might not be able to keep up with demand, and the voltages will start fluctuating.

Nowadays, I only use generic PSUs when I need a quick source of 3.3, 5, or 12V that need not be especially clean. My current preference is Seasonic, but I believe I've seen Fortron recommended too. Just search the forums for "Recommend PSU" or something to that effect. Plenty of threads out there.

and its only happened after i installed my 6600GT

doingers, must have found the solution!

any pointers on a PSU I should grab for about 30-40$~~

 

[Googer]

Originally posted by: ViviTheMage

Originally posted by: ciproxr
how old is the drive ? clicking usually isnt a good sign......

its almost as if its powering down, then powering back up on its own...not to old, maybe 9 months?

I had that problem with a differant brand of drive. It turned out to that the molex connector was loose, one of the wires was coming out of the plug. The solution, I used a differant plug and all is ok.

I have since put electrical tape over the molex so I do not use it in the future.

 

[Jeff7]

Originally posted by: ViviTheMage
and its only happened after i installed my 6600GT

doingers, must have found the solution!

any pointers on a PSU I should grab for about 30-40$~~

Yup, sounds like power supply's the issue.

Power Supply Poll Thread
PC Power and Cooling obviously won, but then they're not going to be found anywhere for $30-40.
What are your full system specs?
Seriously though, just search for "power supply" on the forums here (titles only). Plenty of treads recommending power supplies.
But from that poll thread, Seasonic, Antec, Enermax, and Fortron (FSP, Fortron Source, all the same thing) all made good showings. I like Seasonic because of their higher effciency ratings, though something in the back of my mind is telling me that some recent Fortron PSU's are also pretty efficient.

 

[Googer]

Originally posted by: Jeff7

Originally posted by: ViviTheMage
and its only happened after i installed my 6600GT

doingers, must have found the solution!

any pointers on a PSU I should grab for about 30-40$~~

Yup, sounds like power supply's the issue.

He may be having a power issue, but it does not mean that the PSU is bad. If that one drive is acting funny then it probably is the power connectoin to the drive is bad. Try a differant one. If that is not the case then it could be the drive.

Lately it seems that anytime something goes wrong in a pc (ie mozilla wont install or IE crashed), the first thing all the noobs shout out these days is your PSU sucks, get a new one! People on this fourm make PSU's sound like they are more fragile than eggs and that they burn out like cigarettes or are about as reliable as a Yugo.

 

[F1shF4t]

HMM interesting.... i had the same thing happen to me when i had my 6800ultra on a generic POS psu, it used to lock up for a few sec then was fine.

either that or ur drive is dying, also some HDDs are just loud, like my raptor is pretty loud when its doing a lot of writing reading.

 

[ViviTheMage]

I have a mediocre computer..

AMD Athlon XP 2500 barton (copper heatsink)
512dual ddr kingston ram
two optical drivers, dvd reader, cd burner
that one WD 120gig hd
floppy
fan controller
6600GT


PSU generic ATX switchin supply, 430WATTS??:
12v rail : 17A
+3.3V rail : 28A
+5V rail : 40A

 

[Jeff7]

Another possible option to narrow it down for sure, assuming that this is a safe option at all:
Do you have another power supply handy? Maybe hook up your motherboard (and videocard if it needs it) to one power supply, and the drives and peripherals to another power supply. The peripheral one can be turned on by temporarily shorting the green wire on the ATX connector to any of the black wires.

I don't know if it matters that there are two separate grounds then among the components, or if it'll even matter, since they're all tied to the same Earth ground. It worked for me when I had my hard drive problem way back when, but maybe I was just fortunate. I don't think it should cause any problems though.

 

[LW07]

I would get that Hard drive replaced ASAP. And this time, get a Seagate rather than a Western Digital. My brother hates Western Digital and told me he'd never buy 1 of their drives again, because he bought one before that died on him in 3 weeks, he got it replaced, the replacement WD lasted 2-3 months, it too died, and then he had the store replace it with another brand. So, my advice is to get that WD replaced with a Seagate ASAP and back up that data and do what ever you want with the WD drive. Clicking is NOT a good sign.

 

[ViviTheMage]

Originally posted by: LW07
I would get that Hard drive replaced ASAP. And this time, get a Seagate rather than a Western Digital. My brother hates Western Digital and told me he'd never buy 1 of their drives again, because he bought one before that died on him in 3 weeks, he got it replaced, the replacement WD lasted 2-3 months, it too died, and then he had the store replace it with another brand. So, my advice is to get that WD replaced with a Seagate ASAP and back up that data and do what ever you want with the WD drive. Clicking is NOT a good sign.

everyone has their own opinion on hard drives, I have gotten many towards Maxter, WD, Seagate. I prefer Seagate because I have a friend who works at Seagate, right here in Eden Prairie.

 

[Googer]

Originally posted by: ViviTheMage

Originally posted by: LW07
I would get that Hard drive replaced ASAP. And this time, get a Seagate rather than a Western Digital. My brother hates Western Digital and told me he'd never buy 1 of their drives again, because he bought one before that died on him in 3 weeks, he got it replaced, the replacement WD lasted 2-3 months, it too died, and then he had the store replace it with another brand. So, my advice is to get that WD replaced with a Seagate ASAP and back up that data and do what ever you want with the WD drive. Clicking is NOT a good sign.

everyone has their own opinion on hard drives, I have gotten many towards Maxter, WD, Seagate. I prefer Seagate because I have a friend who works at Seagate, right here in Eden Prairie.

The same with PSU's and CPU's, that is why they make both Sempron and Athlon FX; theres a little some thing for everyone.

 

[Jiggz]

Might as well grab some bargain PSU in the FS/FT section. They got some brand new Antec with 380W, 400W and even 450W for almost half the price.