Ticking HD noise.

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So I had this windows update a few days ago and since then my Harddisk gives a tick or click sound every few minutes. It's just one sound and like it's loading something, not a continueus click or tick...

I am not sure wether it is my SSD or my HDD, I have two drives installed on this PC. Everything seems to be operating fine, but I heard this could be a sign of disk failure?

Not to be paranoid, but someone could give some advice. I'm not into hardware. My PC is 7 months old now. Oh and it also keeps making that sound when my pc is doing nothing...

Thanks in advance.

[_I_]

check the smart table with aida or hdtune
if its shows any re-allocated or pending sectors its time to replace the drive

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Messaggio originale di _I_:

check the smart table with aida or hdtune
if its shows any re-allocated or pending sectors its time to replace the drive

Ok, I will give that a shot. In that case I want my money back from the store....

It's weird tho because I have no issues at all, no slow loading times. No corrupted files, nothing.

[_I_]

hdds do make some noise, but you should not be able to hear it from outside the case
clicking is the head moving, but excessive clicking noise can be a sign of a damaged drive

[DevaVictrix]

Yeah, check the SMART report. If I had a HDD that made a ticking noise I'd backup regardless of what SMART says.

If it get the all clear but doesn't stop ticking I'd see about RMAing it.

[Jaunitta 🌸]

Could be a case Fan, gpu fan, dust?
I'd take the tower lay on it side take the sidecase off and listen. Ears are sometimes more accurate than software :)

[Andrius227]

I had a similar problem a while ago. My hdd would start making noise, usually when i left my pc alone for a few minutes. Turned out windows was defraging it when pc was not in use. Apparently thats the default setting. Had to disable it, because i only leave my pc when i go to sleep, which is much harder with hard drives banging and clanking in the background.

Cant remember how to do it, as im not on my pc atm. You can probably find out on google.

[Bad 💀 Motha]

Disk Defrag in Windows Search bar, run as admin, go to the scheduler and disable.

Edit power options in control panel so that hdd sleep is set to 0 for never

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HDD sleep modes are turned off.

Disk defrag is on a weekly basis, and seems to be fine.

I opened up the case yesterday, and dusted it out. It's not a fan, it is definately the 1TB HDD that is making the noise. It's one click(or tick) every few minutes. When playing a game I don't notice it, only when the pc is doing nothing.

The weird thing is in SMART no errors show up. No defective sectors, no nothing. Maybe I'm just overreacting, but it started to happen right after a windows update.

[Bad 💀 Motha]

It's completely normal

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Messaggio originale di Bad 💀 Motha:

It's completely normal

I guess so I only had one Harddisk fail on me in over 30 years of pc gaming. And that one really made alot of strange noises. As long as no errors show up, I'll just live with the sound and turn the pc off at night.

[Bad 💀 Motha]

Is it installed metal to metal or is it within a tray? Most cases have been using tool less trays with rubber grommets on them for years now.

For me, a dead silent room is harder to sleep in, I prefer to have a room fan runninh while I sleep which would be enough to never hear anything from a pc

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Messaggio originale di Bad 💀 Motha:

Is it installed metal to metal or is it within a tray? Most cases have been using tool less trays with rubber grommets on them for years now

It's below in the case in a rubber kind of tray... As far as I can tell :) I didn't assemble this pc myself, I'm not into hardware that much :)

And as your second comment goes, my previous pc used to run 24/24. But this one makes just a bit too much noise so it takes a while getting used to not hearing the fans spin. I know what you mean with the sleeping :)

[Bad 💀 Motha]

Must be a really tiny room then if you sleep that close to the tower.

But yea if the noise bothers, turn off the pc. Only reason to keep it on maybe is if you make it work for u while u sleep, like a download queue or falling asleep to movie or music. Otherwise why keep it on when idle that long. It should boot from power on to Internet ready desktop in less than 30 secs anyways.

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Messaggio originale di Bad 💀 Motha:

Must be a really tiny room then if you sleep that close to the tower.

But yea if the noise bothers, turn off the pc. Only reason to keep it on maybe is if you make it work for u while u sleep, like a download queue or falling asleep to movie or music. Otherwise why keep it on when idle that long. It should boot from power on to Internet ready desktop in less than 30 secs anyways.

Nah I turn it off, I might get a small room fan tho. Just to get that little noise. :)

[Ad Hominem]

I started getting this too on a relatively new drive. It would click rapidly for a moment when starting to write a large chunk. I was just about to start the RMA process but decided to check the S.M.A.R.T. data and didn't see anything wrong with it. So far, so good.