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From: Dave Martindale on 9 Apr 2008 21:54
"Ouch" <Ouch(a)ygothere.org> writes:

>The drive doesn't click when it's idle. The noise happens when it's writing
>a large file to it. To clarify the situation, I have made a temporary video
>of the noise the drive makes while it is writing a 1.4GB file. You can view
>this video here:

>http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZxZ89UJQvmU

That sounds like normal head seek noise to me.

There are two sharper "click" sounds within the first 2 seconds of the
video that I can't identify; perhaps they are from something else in
the room? But all the other noises sound like normal seeks.

Now, most drives don't do that much seeking when writing one large file on
an empty disk; you'll hear this only when the disk is randomly accessing
files, or writing onto a badly fragmented disk. But someone else
suggested that some Seagate drives avoid leaving the head in one place,
and this noise is consistent with occasional random seeks.

Dave
From: Ouch on 9 Apr 2008 23:46

"Dave Martindale" <davem(a)cs.ubc.ca> wrote in message
news:ftjs0g$gdp$1(a)swain.cs.ubc.ca...
> "Ouch" <Ouch(a)ygothere.org> writes:
>
>>The drive doesn't click when it's idle. The noise happens when it's
>>writing
>>a large file to it. To clarify the situation, I have made a temporary
>>video
>>of the noise the drive makes while it is writing a 1.4GB file. You can
>>view
>>this video here:
>
>>http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZxZ89UJQvmU
>
> That sounds like normal head seek noise to me.
>
> There are two sharper "click" sounds within the first 2 seconds of the
> video that I can't identify; perhaps they are from something else in
> the room? But all the other noises sound like normal seeks.
>
> Now, most drives don't do that much seeking when writing one large file on
> an empty disk; you'll hear this only when the disk is randomly accessing
> files, or writing onto a badly fragmented disk. But someone else
> suggested that some Seagate drives avoid leaving the head in one place,
> and this noise is consistent with occasional random seeks.
>
> Dave


Thanks a lot Dave, the video on Youtube here:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZxZ89UJQvmU

has been studied by Seagate Support (? in China) and they also say that the
noise is normal for a Seagate FreeAgent Drive. I downloaded Seatools for
Windows from Seagate's web site (diagnostic software) and this confirmed
that the drive has no problems, so I will keep it and see how it goes over
the next few months. The drive is a bit noisier than expected, I certainly
don't hear noises like that from my laptop's hard drive, but perhaps this is
because it is completely enclosed, while the 750 gig Seagate drive is an
external drive?



From: Dave Martindale on 10 Apr 2008 02:55
"Ouch" <Ouch(a)ygothere.org> writes:

>The drive is a bit noisier than expected, I certainly
>don't hear noises like that from my laptop's hard drive, but perhaps this is
>because it is completely enclosed, while the 750 gig Seagate drive is an
>external drive?

The external case may well provide a more direct route for sound from
the drive to your ear. In addition, the amount of noise produced by
head movement depends on how fast the positioner moves, how heavy it is,
the clearances in the bearings that carry it, and the algorithms of the
code that drive it. Drives with faster seek times tend to be noisier,
for example, because they have to start and stop the positioner faster.
Some drives even let you program their "acoustic profile", trading off
faster access at one end of the range with quieter operation at the
other end.

Dave
From: BillW50 on 12 Apr 2008 14:15
In news:igkmv3pise372473fg9971omufpfrhg6j0(a)4ax.com,
Brian Mathews typed on Tue, 08 Apr 2008 23:10:19 +1200:
> They don't work on USB Drives..
>
> Also if you had read my Post you would also see why Plus Modern
> drives to track recalibrating to allow for heating on the Disk..

Some of them actually do work on external USB drives.

--
Bill
From: BillW50 on 12 Apr 2008 14:23
In news:47f9e5ba$1(a)clear.net.nz,
Ouch typed on Mon, 7 Apr 2008 21:13:21 +1200:
> The other day, I bought an external 500 gig Seagate Free Agent drive.
> It made a few clicking noises when writing data, so after some
> research on internet, I decided I would return it. So I purchased
> from another store a 750 gig Seagate FreeAgent drive. Now this drive
> does exactly the same thing, so I'm most reluctant to return this one
> because I know that Seagate is a very good brand and that all hard
> drives have to make some operating noises. A year ago, a friend
> bought a 500 gig Seagate Free Agent drive, and it makes no clicking
> noises at all when you write to it, so that's why I thought something
> might be wrong with mine.
> The Seagate drives come with a 5-year limited warranty, so you can't
> do much better than that. I am using the drive mainly for backing up
> home movie holiday captures, so it won't be in continuous daily use
> like some drives are. Has anyone else experienced clicking noises on
> external hard drives? Do such noises really indicate that something
> is wrong, or is the hard drive likely to operate satisfactorily for
> many years even with these intermittent clicking noises? Is there any
> software that I can run that will check out whether there is anything
> wrong with the drive? I have the feeling that there's not much point
> in swapping the drive again as all of them are likely to do the same!
> Thanks for your help.

Maybe this will give you a better idea on what is happening in a hard
drive.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9eMWG3fwiEU

--
Bill

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