is my hard drive about to fail

[iHate]

https://dl.dropbox.com/u/3331450/hdd noise.mp3

It makes this noise on startup and shutdown, or when it wakes up from sleep. I think it's always made this noise (about a year) but it bothers me more the every time I hear it. (you can hear it on the shutdown, and between the disc drive booting. its the crrrshhhhhhh sound.)

Is this a normal sound or is it a sign of failure to come? It's a WD caviar black laptop drive, I remember paying a good amount for it.

 

[Mutant]

Hmm only on shuttown and when booting ?
When shutting down a HDD will usually move its reading/writing head to a safe place outside of the data filled area to prevent the head hitting the platter and corrupting the data when moving the PC or just the HDD.
Maybe the head hits something or is stuck a little bit when it is in that position.
[edit]
Oh and btw... WD drives SUCK !
Go for Seagate.

 

[Wolfeman]

Whatever it is, if you are even the slightest bit concerned, backup now lol

That's not a normal sound, but it's not a failing hard drive sound either. Someone posted a sweet website a while back that had all the different sounds of hard drives about to go, can't find it though:-(

 

[JayB]

I've had 3 Seagate drives fail in two years. All hard drives fail no matter the brand. I back everything up to no less than 5 drives , no exaggeration

 

[[UEAK]Clowd]

I've never had a harddrive fail since my first 386 when I was like 4 years old

(not that that helps you, lol)

 

[Mutant]

I've had 3 Seagate drives fail in two years. All hard drives fail no matter the brand. I back everything up to no less than 5 drives , no exaggeration

Out of 9 HDDs i ever had and didn't sell or give away: 1 WD and it failed, 1 Maxtor and it still works, 6 Seagate and they all still work, 1 I don't remember its brand and it doesn't work because i was curious and took it apart (it was very very very old and 113 MB lol)...

 

[iHate]

I've had 3 Seagate drives fail in two years. All hard drives fail no matter the brand. I back everything up to no less than 5 drives , no exaggeration

I'd never buy a Seagate drive. Had an external drive from them that could literally burn skin. Immediately returned lol. Plus, designated "external drives" usually aren't as high of quality in my experience. I've bought a couple before and they were just shit; loud, hot, slow, shorter warranty. So i stick to internal drives in my own case.

And yes all hdds fail some time but I've never heard a sound like this. I was expecting the noise to get worse over time but it just hasnt; its quite annoying. Ive had 2 drives fail before but they were Toshiba and over 5 years old and came in refurbished computers.

I have an extra drive for backup but it hasnt been opened yet haha.

 

[Mutant]

http://www.tomshardware.co.uk/forum/245312-14-seagate-western-digital-reliability

 

[>>>GENZ<<<]

I've been using quite a few Quantum and then Maxtor HDDs over the years,never had any problem,
sadly there's no other option but Seagate right now,I'm hoping they will keep Quantum/Maxtor quality.
I got Seagate HDD about 6 month ago,I'm happy with it so far

 

[Notuern]

I'd never buy a Seagate drive. Had an external drive from them that could literally burn skin. Immediately returned lol. Plus, designated "external drives" usually aren't as high of quality in my experience. I've bought a couple before and they were just shit; loud, hot, slow, shorter warranty. So i stick to internal drives in my own case.

And yes all hdds fail some time but I've never heard a sound like this. I was expecting the noise to get worse over time but it just hasnt; its quite annoying. Ive had 2 drives fail before but they were Toshiba and over 5 years old and came in refurbished computers.

I have an extra drive for backup but it hasnt been opened yet haha.

Seagates are known to run slightly warmer then Western Digital, but only a couple of degrees(Which makes no difference in lifespan.).
I would suggest that you reconsider your opinion about Seagate, because their Barracuda drives are generally considered some of the best drives in the world.

I've had 3 Seagate drives fail in two years. All hard drives fail no matter the brand. I back everything up to no less than 5 drives , no exaggeration

I've had about 10-15 Seagate Barracuda's over the last 15 years or so, only one broke down and that was due to lightning.. and in fact, it still works(My friend has it now.), the only thing is that it will only work slaved.

Im actually going to be a bitch and tell you that you probably misused your drives in one way or another, causing them to break down.

I've been using quite a few Quantum and then Maxtor HDDs over the years,never had any problem,
sadly there's no other option but Seagate right now,I'm hoping they will keep Quantum/Maxtor quality.
I got Seagate HDD about 6 month ago,I'm happy with it so far

I bought a Maxtor once, broke down after a couple of months.
I used to have a really old Maxtor(~1995) that worked fine for a couple of years before it broke down.

My brother bought like 2tb of Maxtors a few years back(When a 500gb drive still was considered _HUGE_.), only two out of like 8 drives survived the first year.
I remember that people used to buy Maxtors because they couldnt afford anything else.. i've actually never heard of anyone using the word quality in the same sentence as Maxtor,.

The only drives that has broke down on me are Maxtors, so yeah, personally i would NEVER EVER buy a Maxtor.

 

[Notuern]

Shit.. just talked to my dad about the reliability, it seems that Seagate actually bought Maxtor a while ago!
So the cheap Seagate's are pretty much equal to the old Maxtors.. so no wonder people have had bad Seagate's now days.

I still suggest you buy a Seagate though, but just make sure its not one of the old Maxtor models.