Clicking sound from HDD, can detect why

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jayadratha

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Sep 17, 2009
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I bought new 2TB HDD and i was using a 500GB before. I tried "long test" for both the HDD. and they passed very nicely. But dont know why a slight click sound coming from cpu. I suspect it is from the 500GB. I changed the smps, it is a normal SMPS but last 3year I was using this type of SMPS with 2 500GB HDD and now I just replaced one 500GB with a 2TB.
SMPS has 12volt 19A power rating.
 
Solution
Ok, well this makes it all new. Normally CDI can mess with almost any drive. I wonder if WDC wanted to put a stop to it.

They have this(I have not tested it), but it has to be set rather aggressive. like 6-7 seconds.
http://softjock.com/mdis.htm

Other then that would be to try WDIDLE3(Its a dos program and may or may not void the warranty(it should not do anything if it does not support the drive). recommend setting 300s and not /d for disable as some have reported issues.)

EDIt. The Seagate is older and most likely is not making the noise.
I agree with you, but Seagate started to do it to, but seemed to have changed it with a later firmware. It only effected the Seagate 1TB per platter drives(very new ones).

My old 60gigabyte Hitachi(notebook drive) seemed to do something similar. On laptop drives I can see how keeping the head off the platters is a good thing since it means a sudden move at this time will NOT hurt the drive(they even have sensors that park the head if the drive is moved to much).
 
But one thing is correct. This head parking in idle state will save power and it will give rest to the head. But in S.M.A.R.T why Load/Unload Head count has its threshold value?? If Load/Unload of head is bad for the drive then why they designed like this??
 
Most drives are rated from 300000 to 600000 LLC's many will pass 1000000 and still be fine.

People do like to worry.

I just do not like the delay it causes(due to the spin down).

Also for mine it sometimes clicks when listening to music almost like it just was half spun down then have to spin up right away.

The normal parking on a notebook drive is much more quiet then its desktop counterparts(and is a place that most drives have been doing this for YEARS).

I have never heard my WD blue 320(good old IDE drive) and it has tons of LLC and I have no plans to change its settings.

My notebook drive(1TB blue 2.5 inch. Boxing day sale made it hard to say no) takes much less power then the desktop drive it replaced(1TB Blue 3.5 inch) anyway.
 


This program (http://softjock.com/mdis.htm) cannot go below one minute, do you know other one that can do this every 6-7seconds?
 


Four years later and this solution still works, lol. Why is this still a problem for some hard drives? You'd think it'd be fixed by now... Once SSD's are mainstream it won't be an issue I guess so whatev.