is it possible for a dying hard drive to cause pauses and shut computer down?

[damac]

im just wondering cause my computer that I made last december is jacking up bad. I haven't changed any parts and my cdr ain't working right but another cd rom drive did fine, and my hard drive was all good until about a month ago when it wouldn't be recognized at bootup sometimes. couldn't do a defrag at first cause it said it had damaged sectors and their were hundreds when i finally defragged. problems still persisted and even now again after a format and fresh win98se install

anyways its playing tricks on my head but can a dying hard drive cause these symptoms?
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clicking of the hard drive

pausing during windows like with the mouse cursor, surfing, games whatever where screen freezes the the hard drive winds up again.

computer has shut down like in a deep sleep with no lights, fans still run but I have to reboot

settings not taking affect. for example making control panel change, reboot and things aren't like in last state.
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It sure sounds like with what my hard drive is doing it is causing havoc but can the symptoms be so widespread like that?

If so I guess I should just rma the ibm ide drive and see what happens with a new one?

 

[olds]

Is it an IBM? If so (and maybe even if it isn't) it sounds like it is about to fail. I just had this happen to me but without the cdr problems.

 

[damac]

hahah yep its the 75gxp ide 30gb hard drive. ibms site looks very easy when it comes to requesting an rma so im just gonna use the backup computer and send this sucker in. clicking all the time can't be normal ugh. Well thats my first dead hard drive.

 

[ronmon]

Yeah, I had to RMA an IBM drive a few months ago. If you run their diagnostic utility, it will give you an error code to enter on the RMA web form. They sent one back very quickly, no questions asked. Getting that error code is the key to making it a smooth deal.