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jtc · Mar 15, 2003, 12:52 PM

The hard drive on my iBook "beeps" a couple of times/week. It's about a second or two long and high pitched. It always makes a clunk sound after this, and other than that it seems fine. Is this normal? I've been backing up just in case.

ccsccs7 · Mar 18, 2003, 06:17 AM

To me, that kinda sounds like the optical drive (CD/DVD/Combo). Do you you have a disc in the drive? If not, have you noticed any similar sounds when a disc is in the drive.

The only beeps I've heard are from my Combo drive which makes a kinda beeping sound when a disc is inside and it first starts to read it. After a while, it will make a clunking sound (I'm guessing this is when it's parking/stopping something after it has finished reading.)

I might be wrong, but I thought I'd add my experience.

dannyillusion · Mar 18, 2003, 12:41 PM

I support the CD/DVD-player theory!
Doesn't bother me but it makes you wonder...
Why?

kybernaut · Mar 18, 2003, 02:03 PM

Depends on how you define "beep"... If it sounds like an alert beep it's definatly a bad sign. I head those beeps along with strange clicking before my IBM Travelstar 15GN died a few weeks later.

Try running Hardware Test CD.

kybernaut

jtc · Mar 18, 2003, 02:54 PM

It's definitely not the optical drive. It clearly comes from the left side. It's high-pitched (almost a screech) and happens when the speakers are muted (so it's not an alert sound). It long enough that I have time to put my ear close the keyboard so I can hear where exactly it's coming from. The iBook freezes up during the beep, then resumes after the clunk noise. I used to think it was to drive heads resetting - my desktop at work does something similar. Occasionally during reads/writes, one of the drives emits a very short "beep" which is, I think, the actuator hitting the voice coil. It has always done this, so I'm not worried about it.
The iBook however just started a couple of months ago, and has been getting worse. At first I thought it was the same thing, but the beep is much longer and it worries me that it's getting more frequent. As I said I've been backing up regularly. My one year warrantee is almost up, so if it's a problem I want to get it taken care of.

mqa · Mar 18, 2003, 04:23 PM

Mine just started doing this this morning, and now I am getting really paranoid. I dont have anyway to back up 30GB of data! Also thsi is definately not the combo drive beep which I have heard before.

kybernaut · Mar 19, 2003, 06:42 AM

Originally posted by jtc:
...and happens when the speakers are muted (so it's not an alert sound).

Mine didn't came from the speakers either but from the inside of the computer!

xtal · Mar 19, 2003, 10:39 AM

Originally posted by mqa:
Mine just started doing this this morning, and now I am getting really paranoid. I dont have anyway to back up 30GB of data!

How can I put this?

It is vital that everyone has a method to back up important data. Personally, I'm not so concerned about the OS, my prefs, or my music, but I have certain documents I would hate to lose. So, I back up to the network at work, as well as burn a CD periodically. Firewire hard drives are dropping in price. Heck, you could even get an enclosure and slap a notebook drive in there. It shouldn't run you more than $150 or so.

A bit of a tangent, but a necessary one.

Backup your data! Any way possible!