Is my trusty 320GB WD HDD dying?

[ManIkWeet]

Hi there,

 

Lately I am having issues with my 320GB HDD that I use as temp/scratch disk: sometimes the BIOS hangs and when it finally decides to continue the drive (usually) doesn't show up in Windows...

All SMART tools say that the drive is "OK" so it might be something else?

 

SMART is below, any tips?

[MellowCream]

*dying

 

If SMART says it's okay, it's okay.

[DigitalHermit]

*dying

 

If SMART says it's okay, it's okay.

What this guy said..

 

Or...

 

Can you hear some clicking or other noises from the drive?

 

or...

 

Is loading/startup slow?

In this case, a simple defrag might speed things up significantly (especially if the fragmentation reaches 20+ percent)...

 

EDIT:

Reseat the SATA Data cables and see if that fixes the problem... If that doesn't get new SATA Data cables.. If it still doesn't work, stuff might've happened on the drive's PCB...

[ManIkWeet]

What this guy said..

 

Or...

 

Can you hear some clicking or other noises from the drive?

 

or...

 

Is loading/startup slow?

In this case, a simple defrag might speed things up significantly (especially if the fragmentation reaches 20+ percent)...

 

EDIT:

Reseat the SATA Data cables and see if that fixes the problem... If that doesn't get new SATA Data cables.. If it still doesn't work, stuff might've happened on the drive's PCB...

I'll try reseating the SATA cables...

Can't hear clicking, but that might be because of Fractal R4 being a huge beast...

 

Who knew it was dying and not dieing? I sure didn't  :unsure:

[ManIkWeet]

I swapped the SATA cables with my Optical Drive, it didn't change a thing...

Still a hang on POST and no drive in Windows...

 

A reboot CAN fix it, but it's not guaranteed...

That's without power getting cycled...

 

Any other tips?

 

(Changing the SATA was not without swearing, my GPU is in the way and those stupid rubber CPU fan mounts came off...)

[DigitalHermit]

I swapped the SATA cables with my Optical Drive, it didn't change a thing...

Still a hang on POST and no drive in Windows...

 

A reboot CAN fix it, but it's not guaranteed...

That's without power getting cycled...

 

Any other tips?

 

(Changing the SATA was not without swearing, my GPU is in the way and those stupid rubber CPU fan mounts came off...)

 

Try the drive in another PC (or tear down a non USB 3 external HDD to use the SATA-to-USB bridge) and see if it still has the same problems... If it does it might be the motherboard's SATA controller...