Something thrashing my hard drives?

  • Thread starter Thread starter Roy N.
  • Start date Start date
R

Roy N.

I have a five year old dell with a 40GB drive that was making the worst
sounds, typical stuff for a failing hard drive. So I copied all my data to a
new 120GB drive before the original drive totally crapped out.

Now I've got the new drive installed, all the data replicated to it, and
I've left the cover off so I can go in and make a couple of peripheral
changes in a few days. Now this new drive is making sounds that I'm not
totally comfortable with; no clicking or thumping sounds, but it's like a
muffled circular saw sort of sound.

Could be that I'm just hearing things I normally wouldn't hear with the
cover on, but I don't think I noticed these sounds eminating from the
computer until today. Could there be another problem lurking under the hood
of my computer that is causing hard drive failures?
 
Roy N. said:
I have a five year old dell with a 40GB drive that was making the worst
sounds, typical stuff for a failing hard drive. So I copied all my data to a
new 120GB drive before the original drive totally crapped out.

Now I've got the new drive installed, all the data replicated to it, and
I've left the cover off so I can go in and make a couple of peripheral
changes in a few days. Now this new drive is making sounds that I'm not
totally comfortable with; no clicking or thumping sounds, but it's like a
muffled circular saw sort of sound.
Click to expand...

The sound described sounds like bad bearings or otherwise faulty relative to the
spindle/spinning part of the hard drive. I've got an IDE drive that's been
doing that for years -- since pretty shortly after I bought it actually, which
was around '95. Most of the time is quiet, but it does occasionally does that
bandsaw thing -- usually after the machine has been turned off for even a short
time. It then quiets back down after an hour or so.

My point is that it does not neccessarily indicate an urgent problem, but if
you're under warrenty, you might want to RMA it.

Bryan
 
The first check your computer to confirm the noise was not come from
the CPU fans,if not ,so you must crap out your PS(power supply), The
bast idea is buy a new comfortable computer to yourself
 
Roy said:
I have a five year old dell with a 40GB drive that was making the worst
sounds, typical stuff for a failing hard drive. So I copied all my data to
a new 120GB drive before the original drive totally crapped out.

Now I've got the new drive installed, all the data replicated to it, and
I've left the cover off so I can go in and make a couple of peripheral
changes in a few days. Now this new drive is making sounds that I'm not
totally comfortable with; no clicking or thumping sounds, but it's like a
muffled circular saw sort of sound.

Could be that I'm just hearing things I normally wouldn't hear with the
cover on, but I don't think I noticed these sounds eminating from the
computer until today. Could there be another problem lurking under the
hood of my computer that is causing hard drive failures?
Click to expand...

Could be that you have power or cooling problems, but the sound you describe
suggests a fan rather than the disk. First thing, shut the machine down,
let it cool, and then blow out as much dust as you can (use one of the
dust-blower cans that you get at any decent office-supply or electronics
store). Then turn it on and briefly stop each fan--for the ones that are
exposed inside the machine just press a finger against the hub, for the
ones that are guarded push the eraser end of a pencil in slowly until you
stop the fan--the rubber should keep it from getting marred. If the noise
is coming from a fan then you'll know which one.

As for your other problem, check the power supply with a meter if you can
afford one (Sears and Home Depot both carry Fluke, which is a _very_ good
brand) and make sure the voltages are all within tolerance, and then set up
one of the various SMART programs to measure the drive temperature and make
sure it's not approaching the upper bound specified by the manufacturer.
 
As others have written, you have other things spinning inside besides
the HD. I had a noisy Dell desktop for a while. Strange noise, as you
report yours to be.

In my case, it turned out not to be what I suspected. It was neither
the HD nor the main cooling fans. It was a teeny tiny fan I didn't know
about mounted on my video board heat sink!

My true problem became evident only when that noisy, failing fan finally
got quiet - and my video card started to really cook....

Dell replaced it for free, of course, but still....

Doug
 
Roger said:
The first check your computer to confirm the noise was not come from
the CPU fans,if not ,so you must crap out your PS(power supply), The
bast idea is buy a new comfortable computer to yourself
Click to expand...

Could someone translate this into English for me?
 
Doug -

You are the man!

After some of the posts here I was pretty convinced that it wasn't the hard
drive. So I ripped the cover off the machine, fired it up and stuck my ear
inside the box trying to find the source of the sound. It's hard to see and
identify, but I kept searching my sound card (without removing it) for a
fan. Not only did I find it, I was able to determine that to be the source
of the sound!

If it wasn't for you I never would have thought to search my video card for
a fan. Now hopefully Dell will replace the card, my warranty either JUST
expired or I've got a few days left.

Thanks again!
 
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