VOGONS


First post, by Almoststew1990

User metadata
Rank Oldbie
Rank
Oldbie

When I turn on my PC the HDD does a small clunk followed by the normal quiet background hum whirs of the drive.

However it has also started doing it in Windows (98se). It will be whirring normally and then stop and immediately clunk and start whirring again. Almost as if it has been restarted. The PC froze for 5-10 seconds when this happened (not unexpected as I was navigating some folders on the drive at the time).

However it then started doing it continuously when trying to launch the Descent 3 first run set up tool. It is also doing it upon a restart.

I don't think it is a power saving setting as it is doing it continuously

I don't think it is a power supply thing as it is newish although I'll swap around the CD and HDDs molex connectors to see if that sorts it out.

So lastly... Is my drive dead?

It's a p3 450 undercooked to 300MHz with a TnT2 and 128mb of Ram.

Ryzen 3700X | 16GB 3600MHz RAM | AMD 6800XT | 2Tb NVME SSD | Windows 10
AMD DX2-80 | 16MB RAM | STB LIghtspeed 128 | AWE32 CT3910
I have a vacancy for a main Windows 98 PC

Reply 1 of 5, by Tiido

User metadata
Rank l33t
Rank
l33t

That sounds like a head crash, if you have anything to salvage from the drive then now is the last time to do it.

T-04YBSC, a new YMF71x based sound card & Official VOGONS thread about it
Newly made 4MB 60ns 30pin SIMMs ~
mida sa loed ? nagunii aru ei saa 😜

Reply 2 of 5, by SW-SSG

User metadata
Rank Oldbie
Rank
Oldbie

That will be the seek mechanism in the HDD resetting due to difficulty reading areas of the platters, either due to bad sectors, platter surface damage, misalignment of the heads with the platter surfaces, damage to the heads, or a combination of those. So, yes, backup ASAP and replace the drive.

Also lol, "undercooked" PIII. :p

Reply 3 of 5, by PTherapist

User metadata
Rank Oldbie
Rank
Oldbie

Just to say I have had similar happen in the past, where simply reseating the power connector has solved the issue. The drives would literally do as you describe, sounding like they're switching on and off, sometimes repeatedly, leading to system freezes.

The best way to test for this, would be to take the drive out of that PC and try it in another as a secondary drive (ie. don't try to boot from it).

Reply 4 of 5, by nforce4max

User metadata
Rank l33t
Rank
l33t

Whenever something odd comes up with a drive always check the smart data with a utility as that can easily show the health of a drive should the controller recorded what is going on. I would clone the drive before it clunks out, those head pre-amps can go bad as well and when they fail the drive controller won't get anything at all from the heads so you get the infamous clicking of death.

On a far away planet reading your posts in the year 10,191.

Reply 5 of 5, by jaZz_KCS

User metadata
Rank Oldbie
Rank
Oldbie

Indeed.
If several tries - lasting several seconds - of reading data from a specific part of the platter fails, and is ended/followed by a sharp *click*, that would be a head reset.
I urge you to gather all important data off the drive as long that is still possible, as Tiido suggested.