How to make sure it's my hard drive that's broken

Hi!

I'm new to these forums so I hope I posted this at the right place! Last summer I bought my Dell XPS 15. Today, right after pressing the power button I heard this ticking noise and the BIOS told me there was no Operating System found. I restarted the laptop and got the same message. I checked the BIOS and nothing was wrong so I figured it probably had to do with the hard drive. I opened the laptop following the online manual's instructions and removed the Hard Drive. I started up the laptop again and no ticking noise this time. Is there a way to be absolutely certain it's my hard drive that's broken or isn't there. Or would you guys say this already enough to say my Hard Drive is dead. My parents told me they would buy me a new Hard Drive, but only if I was really certain. It would be quite useful to know because else they might send my laptop to some guy who asks a lot of money for just replacing a hard drive!

Thanks!

 

It does sound like the hard drive is indeed on it's way, the symptoms you describe fit that scenario pretty well. The only way to know for sure would be to put the drive in another computer or use either a drive enclosure or an adapter.

If you have a desktop, you could put the drive in it provided you have the right cables and try to access it from your OS. Otherwise, if you have either a hard drive enclosure or a SATA to USB adapter, you can check the drive using another computer that way.

 

There are a couple things you should probably do before declaring it dead, though that does sound like it might be dying.

Like tijo said, if you have a way to hook it up to another laptop or desktop you can run a check on it for errors as well as use a tool like crystaldiskinfo to see if there are any warnings in the SMART info.

Not sure if you can run a chkdsk when its hooked up as an external, anyone know?

Another thing to try is to refomat it (after you take your data off of it). Something just may have gone wrong with your bootloader or windows in general. Though, if that was the case your hard drive should still at least show you the windows is loading screen before failing.

 

One more thing, you could use a bootable HDD checking tool. Most HDD manufacturers offer one on their website. For example, if you have a seagate drive, you can get seatools for DOS and create a bootable flash drive or cd and check the drive with that.

 

Thanks guys! I found a HDD checking tool from the HDD's manufacturer (Toshiba) and I'll try it out soon.

 

I couldn't get Toshiba's tool to work and so I downloaded SeaTools (from Seagate) and put it on a bootable USB-drive, but that couldn't detect my HDD. This can be because their tool doesn't support my HDD OR because it really is broken. I might try installing it on a desktop computer but I'm not really experienced with what cables go where etc.

By the way, the BIOS tells me there is no HDD connected.

 

So I just did the most advanced thing ever, I removed the HDD and put it in my desktop! Okay, I heard it was easy, but THAT easy! Again, the HDD started ticking and the PC didn't even recognize it. This confirms it right? It's dead!

 

Yep, pretty much, as long as you connected both the SATA and power cables which i assume you did.

 

Yeah, I connected them both.
So now the question is why it's broken. Is it possible that it overheated (I did do some overclocking of my GPU, but the GPU temps were just fine) or is it something else? I don't want to hook up a new HDD and see it die again in less than a year.

 

Laptop hard drives die. It's somewhat a fact of life if you carry your laptop around with you frequently.

Re: the diagnostic tools, since you have the bare drive out of the machine, just check the label to determine which manufacturer's tool you should use. It's safest to use the manufacturer's own software to do diagnostics and repair.

If it's repairable, I would absolutely NOT throw it in the garbage or recycle it if it has any personal info on it (it probably does). Based on the ticking sound you reported, it sounds like a head failure, so the data might still be intact. With the right tools and repair components, it's very possible to pull data off the drive - it's just not practical for most users.

If you have the tools for it, either drill holes through the drive to shatter the data platter, dismantle and destroy it, or do some other serious damage to it. A screwdriver/chisel hammered straight through a couple times works pretty well.

*edit*
Then again, I'm paranoid about this stuff because I've revived "ticking" drives before.

 

I tried the manufacturer's tool but for some reason I couldn't get it to work. Thank god I backed up all important data a few weeks ago, and most of my schoolwork is on Google docs, so that's not that big of a problem. I'll try some more things to fix it and else i'll drill some holes in it

 

If the manufacturer's tool isn't working, check whether the BIOS even recognizes the drive and lists it as an installed drive. Drives can tick on power alone, regardless of whether data is flowing. If it's not listed in the BIOS, manufacturer's tools won't see it either.

If it IS listed, you could try using GParted or another non-Windows tool to see whether you can get at the info from another angle.

 

Nope, it's not listed

 

Sounds like it's confirmed dead in my opinion, yes probably head failure. Do to the need for moving parts, things break over time whether it's from being hit on something, everyday use, or just happenstance. If you're really paranoid about your personal data go ahead and destroy the thing with hammers and the like.

 

Nah, I'm not really afraid someone will use my data. But drilling holes is fun

 

Drilling is boring, blow the drive up instead

 

if your sure its dead i'd take it apart and make use of the guts....those magnets are handy and the platters make pretty wind chimes