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    hard drive click, beep

    Discussion in 'Alienware' started by Mithorium, Jul 23, 2010.

  1. Mithorium

    Mithorium Notebook Enthusiast

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    I have a m17x and since I got it the seagate ST9320421ASG hard drive has been making this click, beep sound accompanied with full system microfreezing. It does this completely randomly, I may not even be using the hard drive at the time. However, it is very infrequent and I've been ignoring it up till now, but I found a clip of the exact same noise

    YouTube - Clicking noise on new Seagate ST9320421ASG 320GB HDD

    I've tried installing new drivers for it, and all diagnostics come out clean, all SMART readings are extremely healthy, and when its not making the sound the drive works flawlessly. But it can be annoying when it comes up and I'm trying to use it. Is there some firmware update or something that fixes this?
     
    Mithorium, Jul 23, 2010
    #1
  2. BatBoy

    BatBoy Notebook Nobel Laureate

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    Call Dell Support - have them send you a replacement drive. You should not be hearing that click/beep. Seagates have had a clicking issue in the past but not like that.

    There is a F/W update for the older drives, not sure on the current ones. I would just be done with it and call support.
     
    BatBoy, Jul 23, 2010
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  3. dave-p

    dave-p Notebook Deity

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    And of course back up your files ASAP
     
    dave-p, Jul 23, 2010
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  4. xeroxide

    xeroxide Notebook Deity

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    yeh your hdd is defective, replace asap. backup any files u need.
     
    xeroxide, Jul 23, 2010
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  5. Mithorium

    Mithorium Notebook Enthusiast

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    the hard drive works fine, I've had it for a year. I got backups already
    >90% of the time the drive works perfectly fine without the noise. I could probably still have it RMA'd but I don't want to go through all the trouble of copying everything onto a new drive. Plus I read on another forum where someone had the same problem and the replacement drive still made the noise.
    I saw a link to a dell firmware upgrade for that exact drive but its not there anymore, so I was wondering if anyone knew where I could find it (its supposed to fix the noise)
     
    Mithorium, Jul 24, 2010
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  6. dave-p

    dave-p Notebook Deity

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    it is never a good thing when the drive does things like this,

    Why wait for the BSOD get the drive replaced from Dell,
     
    dave-p, Jul 24, 2010
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  7. EleJota

    EleJota Notebook Guru

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    EleJota, Jul 24, 2010
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  8. BatBoy

    BatBoy Notebook Nobel Laureate

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    That firmware may not be compatible with the HDD model he has. He can launch the updater to verify.
     
    BatBoy, Jul 24, 2010
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  9. xeroxide

    xeroxide Notebook Deity

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    seagate has a tool on the website where you type in your serial and it tells you if you have the "defective" firmware. I had 2 desktop models both 1tb which had a defective firmware where it would corrupt and die within the first few days of use.
     
    xeroxide, Jul 24, 2010
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  10. time_older

    time_older Newbie

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    call dell technician to check your computer.
     
    time_older, Jul 25, 2010
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  11. Psychotic deformity

    Psychotic deformity Notebook Consultant

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    I had one of those Seagates too, all is fine since the firmware update.

    What you can do is download and instal crystal disk info. Launch it, select your hdd and look up the firmware version. If it is above the update provided by Dell, then it is a no go and you have to call tech support. If it is an older version, try the new firmware.
     
    Psychotic deformity, Jul 25, 2010
    #11