Noise, rattling from desktop tower

[tinpanalley]

Every now and then, my tower that is in a Coolermaster HAF 912 rattles. There are two distinct noises that occur often, and I'll try to describe them...
- One is a high-pitched metallic rattle that cycles in slow waves. A gentle tap on one of the two fans in the system (front panel and back panel) stops it.
- Sometimes that high pitched rattle becomes a more rumbly sound. Not like a HDD grinding or defragging but rather like a low-pitched metallic rattle. Again, a gentle tap of the case stops it.
But annoyingly, one usually turns into the other. It's infuriating because it will begin all on its own and then it just keeps mounting like water torture and you just want to let out a frustrated CRT TV smack to it but I know that's not conducive to helping. If you ever had a CRT that would begin to lose its signal every now and then, you know what I'm talking about. It's the same stupid logic as smacking the remote when it won't respond.

I've tried looking for this when the HDDs are spinning and when they're not and it doesn't seem affected by either of them. Does anyone know of anything I can do as it seems that a little bit of something vibrating starts up and just seems to ripple throughout the case getting louder and louder. Is there something I can buy or install in the case to dampen this?? It's driving me completely bonkers.

 

[DSF]

Are you sure it's not a fan? Does tapping one fan work better than the other in terms of stopping the noise? It's also possible it's the PSU fan.

In my opinion it's almost definitely not the hard drive unless it only happens when the hard drive is in use.

Could be a bearing wearing out in one of the fans. As long as you're not running some ridiculously overclocked system that's on the verge of overheating, I would try disconnecting one of the case fans for a while. If that doesn't help, try disconnecting the other.

You could also try just opening up the case and seeing if you can tell where the noise is most intense. Sometimes a rolled up piece of paper held to your ear helps isolate it.

 

[tinpanalley]

As long as you're not running some ridiculously overclocked system that's on the verge of overheating, I would try disconnecting one of the case fans for a while.

What would be the easiest way of creating some kind of text file with the PCs internals? Just so I can post what's running on here.

While we're on the subject of HDDs though, what does it sound like when the HDDs are making noise? Is it like what I described? There's nothing really muffling the harddrives, it's just metal on metal. Could that do it?

 

[mfenn]

The harmonics are either coming from an HDD or a fan. Like DSF mentioned, the fan is fairly easy to rule out by just disconnecting each one in turn. Your computer shouldn't be running so close to the edge that it'll overheat from being down one fan at at time.

 

[tinpanalley]

The harmonics are either coming from an HDD or a fan. Like DSF mentioned, the fan is fairly easy to rule out by just disconnecting each one in turn. Your computer shouldn't be running so close to the edge that it'll overheat from being down one fan at at time.

Ok, cool. I'll try that. And I assume that if I isolate the sound as coming from the HDD, it would be best to replace it ASAP, right?

 

[corkyg]

I had a similar thing a year ago. Turned out to be a wire that would occasionally bump up against a fan. It was hard to find, but redressing wires solved it.

 

[mfenn]

Ok, cool. I'll try that. And I assume that if I isolate the sound as coming from the HDD, it would be best to replace it ASAP, right?

An HDD vibrating at a resonant frequency isn't necessarily an urgent problem. Yeah, it'll probably shorten the drives lifetime, but it could still work fine for years. Regardless, you should have a good backup system in place so that you don't care when a drive dies.

 

[tinpanalley]

I've actually decided to take this opportunity to buy another HDD and to upgrade my system drive to a SSD. I'll keep these current two running on enclosures but I did a CrystalDiskInfo and HWinfo64 test on those two 1TB HDDs...
C: System drive showed a Current Pending Sector Count of 100 (data=5)
D :Storage drive showed a Current Pending Sector Count of 100 and an Uncorrectable Sector Count of 100 as well (data=3)

 

[frozentundra123456]

I had a similar noise from the psu fan, and have also had rattling noises from something as simple as a loose side panel.

 

[tinpanalley]

I'll try to record it with my audio recording device sometime soon. Just to share.

 

[mfenn]

I've actually decided to take this opportunity to buy another HDD and to upgrade my system drive to a SSD. I'll keep these current two running on enclosures but I did a CrystalDiskInfo and HWinfo64 test on those two 1TB HDDs...
C: System drive showed a Current Pending Sector Count of 100 (data=5)
D :Storage drive showed a Current Pending Sector Count of 100 and an Uncorrectable Sector Count of 100 as well (data=3)

Good call running CrystalDiskInfo!

The true number to look at is the raw data field instead of the normalized indicator (that's the data=5 etc.). Both of your drives are relatively unhealthy, they're starting to show unreadable (pending remap). The D drive has run out of sectors that it can remap, needless to say you shouldn't put any valuable data on it.

 

[tinpanalley]

Good call running CrystalDiskInfo!
The true number to look at is the raw data field instead of the normalized indicator (that's the data=5 etc.)...needless to say you shouldn't put any valuable data on it.

What are the numbers referring to exactly? (Maybe there's some link that explains all this in detail?) Also, the SSD and HDD I purchased to replace them won't be here until Wednesday. So, yes, it's a bit paranoid but from a purely theoretical standpoint, what can I do to minimize the likelihood of either drive dying between now and then? I know it's unlikely, just humour me. Is there something I can do?

 

[mfenn]

What are the numbers referring to exactly? (Maybe there's some link that explains all this in detail?) Also, the SSD and HDD I purchased to replace them won't be here until Wednesday. So, yes, it's a bit paranoid but from a purely theoretical standpoint, what can I do to minimize the likelihood of either drive dying between now and then? I know it's unlikely, just humour me. Is there something I can do?

Wikipedia has a good explanation of what the various SMART attributes mean. It's no more likely for the drive to fail between now and Wednesday that it was to fail in any other 3 day period hence, so I personally wouldn't change anything.

The best thing you can do to protect your data is to immediately start copying the important stuff somewhere else. Failing that, you should discontinue use of the suspect drives until their replacements arrive, and then immediately copy the data off. Like I said though, they're not more likely to die just because you know about the issue.

 

[tinpanalley]

Well, it's been a week with the new drives, and clearly it WAS the previous HDDs that were causing the vibration/buzzing/harmonics and not a loose cable or anything else. The new 2TB Seagate is silent and the SSD obviously is as well. I wish there was something I could do to fix those warnings that were coming up in CrystalDisk.
Anyway, thanks for everyone's help. I don't want to get lazy now though. I think I'll have to find another backup solution to add to what I already have. So I'm not scrambling again next time.

 

[mfenn]

Glad it worked out in the end!