My Dell 1520 makes an "odd" sound when booting

I've uploaded a video of the sound here (it's about 8/9 seconds in):

Boot Sound

I've owned the laptop for just over 2 years now and i've had this problem pretty much for as long as I can remember, I "think" it's the optical drive but I can't be sure, I also thought the problem might be because the drive was ahead of the hard drive in the boot options but that isnt the case

Does anyone else have this problem or has ever had it? Can it be fixed?
Any help would be really appreciated because well, to be frank, it's annoying haha

 

It does just sound like a disk being read in the CD driver,Or a floppy drive

Other that that,Not 100% sure really..have you disconnected the drive and tried booting?You might just need to pick up a replacement on ebay.

 

I never thought to remove the drive and then boot, duh haha. Give me 2 or 3 minutes and i'll get back to you

 

Removing the DVD Writer makes the sound completely disappear
Hooray
But does that mean my writer has a problem?
What are some good Alternate brands to upgrade to? (I have a TSST Corp TS-L632H drive at the moment)

 

Ah that's good,At least the problem has been pinpointed and it's nothing major!

As for a new drive,I'm not 100% sure and really you can't go wrong with a new one as long as you get the same specs,I'm sure someone can give you some opinions on what to get but just a quick search on ebay brings up plenty of replacements

 

It does that on my Vostro as well. It's really annoying when starting it in the middle of the night. I don't think it has to do with the specific DVD drive you have, it has to do with what the computer does before booting the OS. I don't know how you could change it.

 

Thanks for your help! Without you I don't think I would of thought to try removing the drive ha

Damn, really? So even a change of DVD drive won't make a difference? If it isn't specific to the type of optical drive I have, how come the noise goes once it's removed?
That would be seriously rubbish if it was to do with the computer rather than one of it's components...I spose' contacting Dell wouldn't be much help either? What with it being out of warranty and all that jazz

EDIT: Also i've just found that the TS-L632H is a PATA drive, does that mean I can only use other PATA drives or will SATA also work?

 

Glad to of helped!I'd assume maybe the bios does a system check to make sure that the disk drive is present and to see if a CD is in the drive,My studio 1555 does this too but only a very quiet and quick sound...I'm not 100% sure of my boot order though so mine could be set to check the DVD drive first..

As for your SATA and PATA issue,I have no Idea and wouldn't like to answer it just in case I'm wrong

 

I'm trying to say that it's a BIOS thing. The sound IS coming from the drive, but the drive isn't the source of the problem. The computer is checking for a disc as the boot order normally goes HDD/Disc/USB. You can't really do anything about it that I can think of. If you do try to find another disc drive for your laptop, you'll probably find that drive to do the same thing as the first.

 

That makes a lot of sense (about the BIOS being the problem)
As I said earlier I guess it's not worth going to Dell and asking them for any kind of "fix" is it? Especially as im well out of warranty by now

I guess i'll have to add this to the "things I don't like about the 1520" list, granted it's not a big list but it's all just small things that after a while start to bug you(me)

 

I make the same sound when I have Chili or Mexican food

 

Well you could just uncheck the optical drive from the boot order in the BIOS. You can always override it by pushing F12 at bootup if you actually want to boot from optical drive.

 

it's a normal thing.. my old dell used to make that sound

 

How would I go about doing that? I know how to rearrange the boot order but i've not seen anything in the BIOS setup that allows me disable certain drives etc

It's a bit rubbish, I was using a friends 1720 the other day and noticed that his doesn't do it, also checking some 1520 boot videos on youtube shows that it's not a problem with "every" 1520 as some are silent

Bad times
Haha

 

Normally in the BIOS if you can drop something from the boot sequence then it will be an option in the same screen as where you change the boot sequence. If it's not there then I guess it's not something that was available with your machine. Check the Dell website for the latest BIOS updates incase you have an old one. Otherwise, it might simply be something you just have to live with. Optical drives are mechanical devices and are often quite noisy.

 

Hi,

My Inspiron 1520 DVD drive produces the same sound.
I knew it was the DVD the first time I heard it. The sound was not there when the system was new but when I played a badly scratched DVD , then the DVD started making this sound on startup.
I dont think its an issue though as the drive works fine. The BIOS checks for a disk on startup and thats when the drive makes the sound.

Maybe some oil/grease on the head movement mechanism might fix that but I dont wanna try incase I mess up the drive.