X220 - periodic "click" from HD every 4-5 seconds?

Is this normal for this type of hard drive or is there something wrong with this one? I have the 7200 RPM one by the way.

When the drive is idle, there's a somewhat subtle "click" every 4-5 seconds, but sometimes every 2. It varies a bit. If the disk is active, like while defragging or running a disk benchmark, this noise is not present (and it is louder than normal random disk access so I would still be able to notice it). As soon as the activity is finished, about 10 seconds later it will start doing this. I don't know what parking of the heads should sound like, but is that what is going on? If so then it doesn't seem right for it to be doing it that often. It's definitely annoying as it is noticeably audible.

Other than that, the hard drive seems fine -- I ran diagnostic tests on it a few weeks ago and it passed everything.

 

I think I am also having the same problem but I think the noise is actually made by the internal fans?

 

Well I get a pulsing from the fan every 4-5 seconds, but that's a well-known issue. I'm 99% sure this is from the HD.

Also, this does not always happen when it's idle... it's almost like whatever is controlling the drive gets into a state where it's confused and is constantly parking the heads (if I am to assume that's what is going on. I hear this same noise once when the laptop turns on).

 

Nvm it is the hard drive... basically the hard drive makes a reving kind of noise and that stops every time the hard drive light blinks..but I still have no clue why?

 

What hard drive is it? If it's a Seagate, see if there is a firmware update available for it. That usually fixes audible clicking/vibrations.

If you don't have a Seagate drive, try QuietHDD and mess around with AAM/APM settings.

 

It's a Hitachi HTS723232A7A364.

And the normal drive noise (spinning, seeks) is hardly audible -- it's these clicks that occur sometimes that bother me. Evidently they only occur when the drive is idle, and only sometimes. But when they do occur they happen repeatedly.

Is there any APM for Hitachi?

Edit: Found that there is some control I can try in CrystalDiskInfo. I'll try this out when I get the opportunity. Thanks.

 

I'm not 100% certain but i think these clicks may be the result of the "head/reader" of the drive hitting the central axis every time it stops. Because that is the default position when the drive is not active. I had an external hard drive that would do this every time you disconnected it.

 

This click is normal for the Hitachi drive. I had the same clicking noise and it annoyed me endlessly, so I put in a different drive.

 

There is a section in the power mananger that tells the he drive to stop after x amounts of time. This depends on your power profile so I would look at that as well. If the hd is parking sooner than you like then you need to adjust that timeout setting.

 

It's set to 15 minutes... but even if it was 1 minute it shouldn't be making that noise every 3-5 seconds IMO.

So it appears as if disabling/adjusting APM will prevent this noise from occurring. If it's happening, and I disable APM, it goes away. Enable it again, it comes right back.

 

I just noticed this on mine the other night. I have the 320gb, 5400rpm Hitachi drive. Hopefully it's not about to die!

 

It's probably parking aggressively in an attempt to save power.

I've had a couple of desktop WD drives that used to do this too. Annoying, but harmless.

 

It depends. The noise is a result of aggressive power management: as ThinkRob said, the drive parks and unparks the head constantly.

The only problem is, sometimes the combination of software and hardware PM results in an excessive number of park cycles. IIRC the average laptop drive is rated for around 300000 load cycles. Theres also a relevant SMART attribute, 'Load Cycle Count' that one can check for peace of mind. Hitachi drives do park aggressively, however the level of power management can be set in the drive's firmware.

 

There's also the extra fun quirk that some drives ignore the APM setting and basically do whatever they feel like power-management-wise. (I'm looking at you, WD...)

So yeah: try setting different APM values. If that fails... well... you too can share in my increasing dislike of various groups of embedded systems developers.

 

When you say the level of power management can be set in the drive's firmware, do you mean that Hitachi has software that can be used to adjust this?

I have to disable this -- it's very very irritating.

 

I recently I started to hear a "click" (like a frog croaking) every 3 or 4 seconds or so. But I have an SSD, so it can't be that!...To test if it was software-related, I tried Ubuntu, but clicking/croaking still there, so hardware issue. Finally I fixed it through upgrading to the latest bios...I just wonder if the initial issue is really a HDD problem...I had indeed changed the power manager settings recently, and now also wonder whether that is at the heart of the pulsing sounds...

 

You are hearing a HDD click when you don't have a HDD? That means something is seriously wrong .