Failing Hardrive

Hi everyone
I am 100% sure that my hard-drive on my M17x is failing because A) it makes a weird screechy noise and B) laptop tends to freeze every hours or so.

So what are my options at this point ???

When I removed the "lid" from the bottom I realized I have a second drive. So could I technically remove the damaged one loosing all the date but still function
off the second drive ??
Or do I need both of them for laptop to function properly ???

 

Hello, Craven, which M17x model is it?
If it's still under warranty contact Dell support.

Back up your data ASAP especially if the HDDs are setup as RAID 0.

 

I am not sure but I believe its the very first model so that would be r0 or r1 ?
Unfortunately its not under warranty any more !

Data backup is unnecessary since I re installed Windows only 2 weeks ago I dont really have anything of great importance on the drive.

So is it possible to remove one drive and just run of the second one ???

Also I get this weird issue with my charger (brand new)
The laptop will be charging and then will stop for like a second and start again
cause major performance spikes.

Also I noticed that the screechy sound from the laptop is only present when
it is charging!

P.S.
Laptop Performance is not really compromised I can still play like ... Battlefield 3
no problems but when a performance spike from the charger occurs or everything freezes for 5 mins for no reason - it confuses the hell out of me !

 

Dell likes to do Raid 0... so if you're a factory config and haven't put in any settings yourself, it is Raid 0.

The problem is...if one harddrive dies in a raid 0 array, you lose all your data. You can't remove one harddrive while in raid 0.

backup all your important stuff now...like to an external harddrive or flashdrive.

You can always run your computer off one of your harddrives, but this will require a reinstall of windows and you'll lose all your Raid 0 data. Plus running one harddrive alone will obviously cut your storage space in half

 

ok thx I well aware that I will loose pretty much everything and I really dont care because I am used to re installing windows and I keep all my games as digital downloads so that can be easily required.

So ill try removing the damn thing. Placing new windows and ill see if it helps.

Also does having a lot of ... dirt in the fan cause major problems ???
cause my computer has not seen any ''inside'' cleaning since day 1

 

dirt and dust are the major reason why computers overheat. Clogged CPU/GPU fans and heatsinks need to be cleaned to keep your computer running at optimal temps

 

Ok so this story just got a whole lot more complicated. I performed disk check for damaged sectors as well as used 3rd party software to evaluate condition of my hard drives and it appears that everything is fine.

After removing the bottom casing again while computer was on I realized that the weird screechy sound is not coming from the hard drive but rather somewhere beyond the cpu fan.

So could this be an issue of idk motherboard or cpu which are stationed deeper below the cpu fan.

Ill try to provide a more accurate description of all symptoms for better understanding!

Symptom 1: In windows everyone knows that programs tend to go unresponsive from time to time and then they recover immediately or u are forced to close them. For me when something goes unresponsive the alien eyes start to glow non stop and everything kinda idles but not freezes meaning that I can open a new tab in browser while this is happening or alt tab to a different program however nothing is really functioning cause new browser tab wont load a page, and other programs wont perform any functions. If its a game it will freeze. If I let it be, in about 3 min everything will magically unfreeze and start working again like nothing happened.

Symptom 2: While laptop is charging there is a screechy sound present from withing the laptop. Sound tends intensify a little based on what is going on the laptop screen. Low screen brightness results in almost no sound. Unplugging the charger results in No sound. (a screen problem ??? )

Symptom 3: the laptop will stop charging itself for no reason for a period of no more then 3 seconds and then will start charging once again. This causes performance spike when it happens. Sometimes it happens once a day. Sometimes every minute.

Any advice on what to do ????
Could a fresh bios flash help out ????
(Re-instalation of the system will have no effect cause I already tried)

P.S. I started overclocking a little recently however problem existed even before.

 

Sounds like you have a power issue, could be a bad shorted battery or the mother board. With out warranty I would start looking on ebay for prices on replacement parts. May be time for a big Xmass present to yourself.

 

craven, if you run strictly on battery, do you hear this sound?