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motoyen · Jan 21, 2005, 03:08 AM

I have a 867G4 tower with 2 internal drives. Recently I've heard a skipping sound coming from my computer. I think it's being caused by the main drive. I ran disk utilities to repair the disk but the sound came back. Does this mean my drive is dying? If I were to take it to an Apple store is this something that can be fixed?

reader50 · Jan 21, 2005, 03:28 AM

Did the repair utility find anything to fix on the drive? Open Disk Utility or DiskWarrior 3.x and check the SMART status on the drives. Other than reducing seek times, drive utilities cannot fix anything that causes an HD to make noise. Noises are caused by mechanical problems, and drive repair utilities fix logical problems in the directory structure.

Are you sure the sound is coming from the hard drives? Plug a headphone into the audio-out jack to silence the speakers. Noises also frequently come from fans in the power supply or on the graphics card. The fans on ATi cards are famous for getting noisy when they get old.

One poor poster had a terrible time tracking down an infrequent beep from his system. The beep was ultimately tracked down to a nearby smoke alarm that needed a new battery.

motoyen · Jan 21, 2005, 04:19 AM

The disk repair utility said everything was fine. I know it's definitely coming from the computer. Here's a video clip taken with my camera of what is sounds like. If you can hear past the freaking loud G4 fan you can hear the skipping sound.

http://xitemedia.net/MVI_2673.AVI
http://xitemedia.net/MVI_2674.AVI

reader50 · Jan 21, 2005, 04:39 AM

That isn't fan noise. Assuming it isn't coming from the speakers...

Maybe your HD isn't dying, but it's doing an excellent impression of a dying hard drive. I'd get a new one and back up. Then maybe keep the old one in service for games duty, to see if it actually fails.

It would be annoying if it takes 3 years to finish dying. On the other hand, you've been looking for a reason to buy that 300GB hard drive.

f1000 · Jan 21, 2005, 04:59 AM

I agree with reader50: that sounds like a bad hard drive.

If you opened your case, you might be able to better hear just exactly where that sound is coming from.

Doc Juansinn · Jan 21, 2005, 06:48 AM

Another vote for a dying HD. I've heard drives do that and give up the ghost on the next cold boot.

That drive wouldn't happen to be an IBM Deskstar, would it? It sounds quite like it.

deboerjo · Jan 21, 2005, 11:05 AM

Dying hard drive, definitly. It doesn't so much sound like a Deskstar as it sounds like any dying hard drive (I've had a few Western Digitals that did that exact same noise before they died).

motoyen · Jan 21, 2005, 11:32 AM

I have 2 drives. One's an IBM and the other is a WD. How would I know which one is about to die?

bbales · Jan 21, 2005, 11:45 AM

I'd never heard a dying drive before. About 2 1/2 years ago, my internal drive started making a HORRIBLEW noise, the likes of which I hadn't heard before and haven't since. But it didn't sound like this, so it was quite useful to listen.

I was fairly good about backing up before that, but after that, I became pretty vigilant. I immediately bought an external HD and began a back-up regimen. I'm still tweaking -- need something off-site as well, I believe. But there's nothing like impending disaster to get you focuses.

Good luck with your drive. Personally, I'm looking at a Seagate for my next one, b/c of the great warranty and because people on the forums seem to recommend them (among other brands).

brucejy · Jan 21, 2005, 12:14 PM

Check with Staples.com They will have a sale on Maxtor 200 GB ATA133 drives starting on Sunday, according to the guy in my local store. The price will likely be ~99.95 "after rebates, etc."

Madrag · Jan 21, 2005, 02:08 PM

backup now!
and remove one of the drives to see which one is doing the noise.
then, replace it...

(I've had drives doing noises when reading some dodgy files.. dumped those files and the noise was gone.)