WD Raptor 74GB Makes beeping noises when turned on

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Western Digital RMA service only takes a few days if you advance replace the drive. You must have a credit card for them to send you the drive in advance and then you package the old drive up in the box they sent you the new drive in and mail it to them. It is very easy. Oh if you do not sent in the old drive within 30 days then they charge your credit card for the drive. Other wise you all you have to pay for is shipping the drive back to them (usually ship ground only takes 3 days).
I do not think that freezing it will work for you. I tried and it did not help mine. Oh Western Digital does not offer to recover your data off the drive. So if you really need the data you will have to go to another company. But I do not know how much they can help if your system or your friends system do not reconize that the drive is installed. The drive I RMAd was not reconized either.
I was lucky because it was a replacement drive for one of my raid 6 drives so there was not any data on it yet.
 
Maybe you guys didnt understand what he wants. He wants to save his data, replacing the Raptor is easy, cuz 5 year warranty is still effective. So if you cannot help by putting some good input to save his drive, dont talk about warranty. Read the damn thread. Dont tell him to do crazy thing, open the hard drive is not that simple, of course it can be done. But if he never opened a hard drive, it will void the warranty and it may not do him any good since fixing a hard drive needs practice.
 
Thanks reaper for all the awesome replies, so let's start.

reaper: The drive does make a noise, I don't know it going on internally. Since Shuttle's power supplies, are already so low, it is 350W SilentX.

Since I said before I've tried this drive in another computer and it made the same noise, and that computer has a 450W Enermax Liberty PSU.

For the Shuttle, I've tried different SATA ports, but as you mentioned, I will try using the Molex instead of the SATA power.

I've just tried using the molex, and then on another computer, a molex, and then a SATA power.

Michaelahess: Hey man, I know about computers, but I have no experience with opening up drives. That will void my warranty, but I have a question, What If I took out most of the internal stuff from this drive, and put it into another drive?
 
Platter replacements only work if you have an identical drive (electronics are the key), got another raptor laying around? If so, very carefully take the platters out of both, swap the broken drives into the new raptor and close it up. I've had to do that with some scsi and ide drives in the past, takes a few hours to do it right, it's not hard, you just have to have the right tools and a lot of patience.

Some old 4 and 6 gig WD's had interchangable circuit boards so if the drive motor failed and you only had another capacity drive you could still swap since the board would pop off one and fit on the other. That was fun!
 
Platter replacements only work if you have an identical drive (electronics are the key), got another raptor laying around? If so, very carefully take the platters out of both, swap the broken drives into the new raptor and close it up. I've had to do that with some scsi and ide drives in the past, takes a few hours to do it right, it's not hard, you just have to have the right tools and a lot of patience.

Some old 4 and 6 gig WD's had interchangable circuit boards so if the drive motor failed and you only had another capacity drive you could still swap since the board would pop off one and fit on the other. That was fun!
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I don't have an identical drive, If I did I would RAID It, which I'm probably going to buy a same drive, but then If I swap platters, I would void that drive.

So my ony option is to get data recovery, or forget about it, RMA it, and then possibly buy a second drive so I can run RAID and not fuck it up in the future.
 
Well some HD's do beep when they're dead. Everyones saying 'its from the mb' its not hard to put your ear to a hard drive and listen to it beep. I have one in my shop right now that does it. There is a clearly a small piezo speaker inside the drive making it beep. I even named it beepy. It's not power cause I've tried it in different systems, its the drive beeping. I forget if it's a Maxtor or a WD. I'll have to check and see.
 
That's not beeping, it's a grinding noise, I'd say the spindle is out of wack or the heads aren't releasing properly.

Freezer does nothing for the electronics on hd's, it tightens the tolerances on the heads servo and actuators, perfect if they get out of alignment, but won't help here.

Best bet short of going for professional service (which voids warranty BTW), get the system in a really clean room, make sure there is no wind blowing around, take the top of the drive off and see if the platters spin, if not, give them a nudge (only touch the side!). If they spin but the heads don't start flickering, give them a gentle nudge towards the center of the drive, at the servo, not at the tips.

Of course if it's under warranty that will void it as well.

I have recovered numerous drives by doing this, as long as the room is clean and the drive isn't REALLY messed up, it works.
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On the first point I will agree w/ you. There is no speaker or anything like in any HD. The sound is from the heads hitting the platters at 10,000 RPMs. As far as opening the drive to make it work forget it. There is nothing you can do and more likely then not your data is gone. If you open that drive you can't return it. You need to return it though.
 
It is beeping noise, Getochkn said HD does beep. The grinding noise and beeping cannot be mistaken. Dont try to say something else, I saw hybrid clip, and it is beeping, hes not an idiot to not know the difference.
 
Platter replacements only work if you have an identical drive (electronics are the key), got another raptor laying around? If so, very carefully take the platters out of both, swap the broken drives into the new raptor and close it up. I've had to do that with some scsi and ide drives in the past, takes a few hours to do it right, it's not hard, you just have to have the right tools and a lot of patience.

Some old 4 and 6 gig WD's had interchangable circuit boards so if the drive motor failed and you only had another capacity drive you could still swap since the board would pop off one and fit on the other. That was fun!
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Here we go again. The drive is crashed and instead of telling him to return it you give him the idea that he can buy another and swap everything but the platters and case and salvage his data. LOL That beeping sound is actually the sound of the heads scraping against the platters. There are going to be fragments of the edge of the platters. I am under the impression that Raptors are mega$$$$$ so now you want to get him to waste the RMA of drive 1 then buy a new drive and open it thusly voiding it out too then if you did manage to get that plan to work you still have to get another drive.....
 
I think your over lookign the most impotant piec eof info here guys.....he just said he went to a friends house to lan....that means he had to "TRANSPORT" his case.....I'm not being sarcastic here but I think he might have overlooked the most obvios problem here....and that is that he might have bumped, shoved dropped,,.....whatever....the case in transit.
Call me a noob but last I remember, hard drives do NOT LIKE to be manhandled (bumped, dropped, shoved). Because if you do, well, this might be the problem.
You might not even realize it but picture this;
Your case is in the back seat.....your driving along....and you hit a bad pothole.... 🙁
And there in lies your problem. Just a thought but isn't that the sticker that they display BOLDLY on the antistatic bag when you buy a hdd?... "DO NOT DROP OR MISHANDLE THIS DEVICE"
Like I said before guys I'm not trying to be a smartass, but consider it.
 
It is beeping noise, Getochkn said HD does beep. The grinding noise and beeping cannot be mistaken. Dont try to say something else, I saw hybrid clip, and it is beeping, hes not an idiot to not know the difference.
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I listened to the clip and even watched it! So STFU that drive is crashed out! The actuator moves the heads from the ZL into the platters. One or more of the heads are scraping against the rotating platters. It happens regularly since the drive controller does not get a signal back from the heads reaching ZERO track. There are no speakers in those drives. More then that ass wipe those drives are not user serviceable in any way. Now for the big thing I have a WD drive here that does the exact same thing. It came from a customers array but the drive is past warranty. Raptors spin @ 10,000 RPMs so when there is a head crash what should it sound like (that is not a question). Any way STFU!!
 
My god man, stop trying to say everything is impossible. I had a couple scsi drives that were dropped by a client, I opened them up and sure as shit there were gouges on the platters, I transplanted them into another drive and got ALL their data off. The scratches weren't in a data bearing location.

I've done data recovery for years, and those are a few tricks that WORK.

I'd say buying another raptor to save data is a LOT cheaper than proffesional data recovery services, and even they can't always get data off so the risk is there either way (some services don't charge if data can't be recovered, but the warranty will void either way.)
 
I think your over lookign the most impotant piec eof info here guys.....he just said he went to a friends house to lan....that means he had to "TRANSPORT" his case.....I'm not being sarcastic here but I think he might have overlooked the most obvios problem here....and that is that he might have bumped, shoved dropped,,.....whatever....the case in transit.
Call me a noob but last I remember, hard drives do NOT LIKE to be manhandled (bumped, dropped, shoved). Because if you do, well, this might be the problem.
You might not even realize it but picture this;
Your case is in the back seat.....your driving along....and you hit a bad pothole.... 🙁
And there in lies your problem. Just a thought but isn't that the sticker that they display BOLDLY on the antistatic bag when you buy a hdd?... "DO NOT DROP OR MISHANDLE THIS DEVICE"
Like I said before guys I'm not trying to be a smartass, but consider it.
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Yeah, that's one thing I strongly considered, but hey . I had the Shuttle on the back floor of the car where there is no space for it to move, the house was pretty much a 1 minute drive. It could have been possibly due to moving the Shuttle, because I took it off my desk, put it downstairs, and hour later I take it, put it into the car, take it out, put it on the ground, put it in the house, then put it onto the carpet and boom it doesn't work.

I've moved this before, and I've moved other PC's before, but this just seems odd.

I first said this beeped because I listened to it, there were no beeps from the motherboard, but in the video, you can see as I put my phone closer to the HD, it is louder, there is a noise coming from the hard-drive, but I don't know whether it's a beep, or something scraping together.

The antistatic bag doesn't mean you can't move the HD, but it just means don't toss it around. Also, my system wasn't on while I was moving it, so there is no way that it got damaged while it was on, thats the weird part.

I didn't throw this system downstairs, but picked it off my table and took caution on how I was handling it, this rig cost me a lot of money, so I always baby it.

Also, data recovery is pretty pricey, even for like the 50GB of info I have on this hard-drive, I may not consider it, beacuse it's not like I was developing some long awaited file or something. It's just like my work's documents, invoices, family photos, not to mention like 20GB of music, but luckily it's on my iPod, but I don't know if that helps, and thank god I took some files onto my 1GB thumbdrive.

Also, does anyone know, if purchased music on iTunes can be somehow transfered?

My god man, stop trying to say everything is impossible. I had a couple scsi drives that were dropped by a client, I opened them up and sure as **** there were gouges on the platters, I transplanted them into another drive and got ALL their data off. The scratches weren't in a data bearing location.

I've done data recovery for years, and those are a few tricks that WORK.

I'd say buying another raptor to save data is a LOT cheaper than proffesional data recovery services, and even they can't always get data off so the risk is there either way (some services don't charge if data can't be recovered, but the warranty will void either way.)
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There is a service called OnTrack, and they have authorization from hard-drive makers that they can restore data, but not void your warranty, but my friend's clients have recieved quotes from anywhere from $500-$1000

I don't really want to pay $1000 to recover some small, but not too important data.

I was just wondering, If in all cases I'm screwed, how would I transplant my platters from this drive, and into where?
 
Yes, you get one shot a year to do it if you can't demote the first computer it was on, though I believe they allow 3 computers at once so you may not need to.
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Thanks, because I had a iTunes gift certificate and I bought a lot of songs.

Also I was wondering, so what do you have to do to get it back? Like login and press something, and then re-download all your songs?
 
Didn't know on-track wouldn't void warranty, good info.

To transplant you need the same model hd, revisions of the pcb aren't as critical all the time, not sure on raptors though, try to get one that is EXACTLY identical.

You need a T5 and T7 driver I believe (can't remember the exact sizes) or a really small flathead, to take them appart, the spindle bolts are very small. When you take the lid off, the easy part, you have to make sure the heads are out of the way, sometimes this means taking them out which is fun since the spindle has to come apart at the same time :) Obviosly put the platters back in the same order you took them out, never touch the surface of the platters, just the sides, and I'd use rubber medical gloves. This isn't for the faint of heart by any means.
 
Didn't know on-track wouldn't void warranty, good info.

To transplant you need the same model hd, revisions of the pcb aren't as critical all the time, not sure on raptors though, try to get one that is EXACTLY identical.

You need a T5 and T7 driver I believe (can't remember the exact sizes) or a really small flathead, to take them appart, the spindle bolts are very small. When you take the lid off, the easy part, you have to make sure the heads are out of the way, sometimes this means taking them out which is fun since the spindle has to come apart at the same time :) Obviosly put the platters back in the same order you took them out, never touch the surface of the platters, just the sides, and I'd use rubber medical gloves. This isn't for the faint of heart by any means.
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Well I don't really feel like spending another ~ $150, so I guess I'll try to remember what I lost, and check my external drive and thumbdrive to see what info I have left of it.

Login to the itunes site and request it, not sure where, I refuse to pay for copy protected songs :)
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Yeah, but like I said, I won a $500 iTunes Gift Certificate 😀
 
My god man, stop trying to say everything is impossible. I had a couple scsi drives that were dropped by a client, I opened them up and sure as **** there were gouges on the platters, I transplanted them into another drive and got ALL their data off. The scratches weren't in a data bearing location.

I've done data recovery for years, and those are a few tricks that WORK.

I'd say buying another raptor to save data is a LOT cheaper than proffesional data recovery services, and even they can't always get data off so the risk is there either way (some services don't charge if data can't be recovered, but the warranty will void either way.)
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Michaelahess,
The other day you and I talked here regarding SCSI & Raptors. I would never entertain advice from you! Frankly you should be slapped around for about an hour. You do know that you need a special tool to get the platters out of a drive case dont you? You do know that you must have gloves on to go near a platter since your skin has oil? Now your asking someone that thought the drive was beeping to play hard drive forensic person on a drive that is too expensive to f**k with. You must be on crack!

hybrid09 the drive is too expensive not to RMA to WD!! Yes the data will be gone but naturally you backed most of it up regularly so it is not a problem. If you have no backups well then you can forget about it and start over. This way you will at least have another drive. In the future make backups to your DVDs or CDs.
 
Special tool huh? Like a torx bit? Darn special tool there.

I only gave him options, it's up to him to decide if he wants to mess with it or not.

I'm guessing you've never swapped platters before.
 
Special tool huh? Like a torx bit? Darn special tool there.

I only gave him options, it's up to him to decide if he wants to mess with it or not.

I'm guessing you've never swapped platters before.
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STFU Liar!! You are a BSing LIAR! And there is a special tool! It's called a platter lock. It is inserted through the side of the case. There is whal looks like a silver decal that gets removed and the tool inserted! The platters must be kept clean and that is impossible in your house or garage...

STFU
 
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