Hitachi HDD Clicking Like Mad But Still Going Strong!?!?

[Joshontech]

I bought a refurbished Hitachi HDD about 2 years ago now. About 6 months ago when accessing it, it will make a horrible clicking noise, but only when accessing certain files. I can use Macrium Reflect to make a image backup of the Hitachi drive but no sound is made, totally silent. On the other hand If I try to import skyrim mods that are in .zip format it will click like mad. The clicking happens when either writing or reading from the drive but as stated before only with certain files.

Hope Someone Can Help! Thanks!

[Metallus97]

1. BACK IT UP

2. This sound could be connected to the drive or those files youre talking about being heavily fragmented. Try defraggin it AFTER you made a PROPPER backup.

3. It’s very dependent on wich sound it makes to distinguish failing drive form hard working one

4. Do a SMART readout and see if the self reported health is okay. However this cant detect every defect

 

oh and one other thing: Dont buy refurbed drives

 

My guess is that it is simply fragmented hardcore

[Joshontech]

3 minutes ago, Metallus97 said:

1. BACK IT UP

2. This sound could be connected to the drive or those files youre talking about being heavily defragmented. Try defraggin it AFTER you made a PROPPER backup.

3. It’s very dependent on wich sound it makes to distinguish failing drive form hard working one

4. Do a SMART readout and see if the self reported health is okay. However this cant detect every defect

 

oh and one other thing: Dont buy refurbed drives

 

My guess is that it is simply fragmented hardcore

I have done every test I can think of with the drive and everything says it is fine. I wish it was just fragmented but I have tried defragging the drive wiping and copying all the contents back. I am at a loss. I am not worried about data loss because the drive is part of a 3 drive backup system I have so no worries in that department.

 

I just wanted to get some possible definitive proof if it was dieing or just being itself lol.

 

I know I shouldnt buy referb drives I really do but the deal on it was so so good lol. plus its my 3rd drive so im not all that worried about it dieing.

[Joshontech]

11 minutes ago, Metallus97 said:

1. BACK IT UP

2. This sound could be connected to the drive or those files youre talking about being heavily defragmented. Try defraggin it AFTER you made a PROPPER backup.

3. It’s very dependent on wich sound it makes to distinguish failing drive form hard working one

4. Do a SMART readout and see if the self reported health is okay. However this cant detect every defect

 

oh and one other thing: Dont buy refurbed drives

 

My guess is that it is simply fragmented hardcore

This is what the drives access is like with my imagining software running and 0 noise.

[Metallus97]

26 minutes ago, Joshontech said:

This is what the drives access is like with my imagining software running and 0 noise.

 

looks fine. But did you do a full defrag? wiping and copying forth and back only sometimes helps in that regard 

[Joshontech]

15 minutes ago, Metallus97 said:

looks fine. But did you do a full defrag? wiping and copying forth and back only sometimes helps in that regard 

yea i did a defrag and than when that didn't work i did a 0 on the disk.

[Metallus97]

31 minutes ago, Joshontech said:

yea i did a defrag and than when that didn't work i did a 0 on the disk.

hm okay. Then i guess the files are just hard to read and the drive is okay

[Joshontech]

22 minutes ago, Metallus97 said:

hm okay. Then i guess the files are just hard to read and the drive is okay

Yea that's all I could think of as well. I was on Linux for about a year and a half with this system and the reason why I was confused about the drive initially was it just deleted stuff off of it without me doing anything. I had all my backups and stuff on this drive and than poof one day they were gone. I tried to put the files back on thinking it was a fluke but than days later again the drive said  nothing was on it. I went back to windows and so far everything has been really good now surprisingly.

[Metallus97]

5 hours ago, Joshontech said:

Yea that's all I could think of as well. I was on Linux for about a year and a half with this system and the reason why I was confused about the drive initially was it just deleted stuff off of it without me doing anything. I had all my backups and stuff on this drive and than poof one day they were gone. I tried to put the files back on thinking it was a fluke but than days later again the drive said  nothing was on it. I went back to windows and so far everything has been really good now surprisingly.

This to me sounds like a software/user error happened/made on Linux.

a HDD to “format itself” is pretty unlikely. When something geoes wrong the data is partially corrupted or the drive doesn’t work anymore 

for the most part 

[Metallus97]

To conclude: don’t trust this drive with anything mission  critical but continue using it:)

[Joshontech]

11 hours ago, Metallus97 said:

To conclude: don’t trust this drive with anything mission  critical but continue using it:)

Yea that's what I thought as well. As far as user error goes I know it was not me that did anything cause I only ever touch the drive to do backup and such. Possibly a program I was using had an issue I could see that. 

 

Thanks for all the advice and help

[ToastyBear]

On 12/11/2019 at 5:47 PM, Joshontech said:

I bought a refurbished Hitachi HDD about 2 years ago now. About 6 months ago when accessing it, it will make a horrible clicking noise, but only when accessing certain files.

Not sure how loud those clicks are but I have a set of Hitachi Deskstars and they are noisy. They might be working as intended.

 

I had Seagate Barracudas a long time ago and when those click, it was known as the click of death. Seagate kept replacing it under warranty and my new refurbished replacements will work for a few months and click as well, then die.