Clicking Hard Drive

[Ian]

For the first time yet I've got a non-IBM hard drive failing It is still working but makes some very nasty clicking sounds when accessing certain files.

Ironically, it is my backup drive I only found out after buying a new hard drive yesterday to replace it as it is almost full.

I'm guessing it is just worth chucking as it will fail completely fairly soon, or is it likely a full chkdsk may solve the problem (by marking the bad sectors). I'm almost set on chucking it as I don't want to lose any data, but if it is possible to patch it up I may keep it on as an unimportant drive.

 

[murdoch]

Get any data off it & then run chkdisk to see if any bad sectors on it.
But as you say it may be on it's way out, more so with the clicking noise.
Must admit i took one apart recently never realised how small the disk is compared to the rest of the casing!

 

[muckshifter]

The "clicking" is probably the armature failing and nothing to do with the platters being accessed for certain files.

However, after you have retrieved all your data, why not give a Linux "live CD" a look at it.

If it is physically damaged, there will be nothing you can do to "fix" it.

 

[Ian]

Just tried to format it and it won't get past 4% - too broken for my liking, think I'll be pulling it to pieces and getting my fingers caught by those powerful magnets

Glad I got that new drive when I did Got 99% of the data off it