Clicking hard drive

[rootbeer]

My brand-new 300Gb hard drive is clicking like a clock when I turn it on. It just now started doing this and My Computer does not recognize it. It worked fine yesterday. The air is very dry here and static electricity builds up when I walk on the carpet. I touched the drive enclosure when I switched it on, there was small spark no bigger than usual and then I heard the clicking. I have rebooted several times, saw a blue screen with squarish text telling me that Windows had to be shut down for its own safety, saw another dialog box telling me that Windows has recovered from a serious error, et cetera. What has happened to my three month-old hard drive? It has an absolute wealth of data on it-- things for which I have paid and other stuff that took a great deal of my precious time to download. To lose it would pretty much put me into the insane asylum.

When I put my ear up against the case and turn the drive on, I hear it spool up, then the clicking starts, then it spools down and goes silent. I'm fearing the worst...

I've now tried unplugging the USB from the enclosure and rebooting, then plugging the USB back in. Nothing works. I'm sick beyond words...

[EirePlane]

computer innards are extremely sensetive to static electricity and it is recommended you discharge yourself whenever working with the inside of your computer.

I read something beofre about an old trick used in PC repairing circles that says you should put the dead drive into a freezer bag and leave it in your freezer overnight. Afterwards, make sure there is no moisture on it and install it back into your PC.
It should work for long enough for you to at least recover your data.

I tried this on a hard drive before and it didn't work so I would recommend looking into it a bit more before trying it.
I also read that giving it a sharp whack with the palm of your hand or dropping it from about 4-5 ft flat onto it's side works too but again that didn't work for me

[rootbeer]

The way I feel about it right now, I'd say it's on the fast track for a .45 bullet right through it!

[ctjoyce]

Its dieing. I can tell you that much. But the new 16MB cached SATA drives are out, so its a good time to buy.

Cheers
Cameron

[rootbeer]

I think it's already dead. There will be no doubt once that big bullet blasts through it.

I'm sick about all the stuff on it that is now gone forever. I had almost three dozen airplanes downloaded and unzipped and lots of downloaded videos. They're gone, gone gone. I'm numb...

[ctjoyce]

Its called backup disks, or backup drive You should think about getting one.


Cheers
Cameron

[rootbeer]

This drive was purchased to do just that because I need to reformat the original drive.  Who would guess that a new drive would take a dump in less than two months? I had a computer than ran for ten years and never gave me any problems...

[ctjoyce]

Make sure to get a Western Digital.

Cheers
Cameron

[rootbeer]

Not on your life!! The one that destroyed my whole reason to live today IS a Western Digital. Never again!!!

[PisTon]

I agree, get Western Digital.

Speed isn't what I like about it, it's quiet. Very quiet. You CANNOT hear them AT ALL.

My 160gb WD is faster and quieter than my friends Maxtor 160gig. The Maxtor sounds like a jackhammer, making screeching noises.

Also, my WD drive has diferant modes: Unchanged, Quiet, Standard, and Performance. It loses barely any speed when in Quiet mode, and even in performance you can't hear it.

[ctjoyce]

Not on your life!! The one that destroyed my whole reason to live today IS a Western Digital. Never again!!!

WHAT?! I have never ever had a problem with a WD drive. Not even my 7 year old 2GB.

Cheers
Cameron

[rootbeer]

I agree, Cameron. I bought WD because I knew they were a very good drive. I feel like I've been knocked over the head and had $275 taken out of my wallet. I had stuff on it that was on the original drive. Once I had transferred the original stuff, I deleted it. Now it's gone forever and I feel like all the effort that went into filling the failed drive was in vain, somewhat like you'd feel if someone crashed their rusted-out 1967 VW Bug into your beautifully-restored 1967 427 Corvette convertible. How would you feel if that happened? You wouldn't be angry; you wouldn't even be sad. You'd feel empty and numb...

[ctjoyce]

Not at all. I would have killed myself already

Cheers
Camreon

[kipman725]

right from what your saying the drive is mechanicly fine but the electronics have been fried by static.  If the data is very important you can buy an identical drive and take the circuit board from the identical drive and put it on the faulty drive and see if you can get your data back.  If it's very very important (Ie above

[rootbeer]

I've turned it on a multitude of times since that fateful time the clicking was first heard yesterday. I guess it's toast and the data is gone forever. I can only get another one and start over...