Hard drive is emitting a clicking noise

I bought a brand new 2.66Ghz macbook pro about two weeks ago, and I have found that the hard drive is making faint clicking noises. They are too quiet to hear in normal use, but when it's quiet, they are noticeable and annoying. This is either a sign of normal use, in which case I might want to get a larger hard drive, or of imminent disk failure, in which case I'm going to back up my data and head to the Apple Store real fast. Any ideas?
Thanks

Yes. It is normal to hear a clicking noise whenever a Mac portable is moved.
It is the Sudden Motion Sensor trying to park the read/write head
to prevent the drive damage and data corruption.
http://support.apple.com/kb/HT1935#

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Hard drive making a scratching/clicking noise and Macbook playing up

Hi all,
I have had my Macbook for 2 years in March, and last night I discovered that my hard drive started making a scratching/whirring/clicking noise every now and then, also, it has been playing up really badly. It seems to be whenever I try to access certain files or applications, and if I do, my Macbook will completely freeze up and can take up to a minute or two to fix itself.
So, in a panic, today I bought an external hard drive (a 1TB My Book for Mac) to back up in fear that my hard drive would crash, but whenever I tell Time Machine to back up, the progress stops in the same spot (1.09GB out of 105GB) and after a few minutes gives me an error message saying that the hard drive cannot be read.
So, does anybody have any ideas as to what's going on? And if I take it into my nearest Mac repair shop (we don't have an Apple Store in my city) will they be able to fix it without losing too much of my data?
Hardware Overview:
Model Name: MacBook
Model Identifier: MacBook4,1
Processor Name: Intel Core 2 Duo
Processor Speed: 2.1 GHz
Number Of Processors: 1
Total Number Of Cores: 2
L2 Cache: 3 MB
Memory: 1 GB
Bus Speed: 800 MHz
Boot ROM Version: MB41.00C1.B00
SMC Version (system): 1.31f0
Serial Number (system): *********
Hardware UUID: 6A2B870D-5356-597D-89EC-C7F8889CAEB1
Sudden Motion Sensor:
State: Enabled
Feel free to ask for any more information if you need it.
Thanks (I hope).

In this particular case, I would recommend that you get an inexpensive external enclosure for your current internal 2.5" drive. Then, pick up a new drive and do a fresh install of OS X on it. At this point, you may have enough damage that restoring from a TimeMachine backup (or a clone)may result in copying over corrupt data which might result in stability issues. Also, by limiting the use of your old drive (as in not trying to make a clone or TimeMachine back up)you'll reduce the chances of doing further damage. The fact that your machine still runs seems like there would be a good chance of recovering your data, but limiting the drives use is key. After you do the fresh install on the new drive, connect your old drive and grab your data from that. I would also suggest against actually doing a migration due to the potential for moving corrupt files from your old drive. At least this way you'll have a fresh new install of OS X.

Hard drive makes plunking and clicking noises after Firmware Update

My Macbook hard drive worked fine for 9 months until I installed the EFI Firmware Update 1.1 a few months ago. The hard drive then started making plunking or clicking noises every 30 seconds or so, which is beyond annoying. Eventually, I became worried, backed up my data and took it to Apple to get the hard drive replaced. They replaced my 120gb Toshiba drive with a new 120gb Fujitsu drive and it does the same exact thing.
Apparently the plunk is the sound of the drive head parking on the disk. I am now pretty certain nothing is wrong with my hard drives but something was changed during a Firmware or Software Update that tells my hard drive to park the disk head every 30 seconds. Ive found a few other similar cases on the internet. The drive seems to function fine otherwise.
I know two other people with Macbooks and their hard drives don't make the same noise as mine despite having the same drives. Ive tried two hard drives now, Ive tried various power settings, disk utility doesn't find any issues and performance hasn't suffered. Its just an incredibly irritating sound every 30 seconds that is driving me crazy.
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Hi, welcome to Discussions,
You may have seen some of the various threads about this on this forum. There were many last year (summer 2006) and I've noticed some recently:
http://discussions.apple.com/thread.jspa?messageID=5747020&#5747020
http://discussions.apple.com/thread.jspa?threadID=1226956&tstart=0
None of the threads last year provided any "fixes" as far as I remember, the way people are attempting hacks above.
I had the parking-like sound (never found out if it really was parking) on three consecutive Seagate 80Gb drives in a first generation MacBook Core Duo. It would start after about a day and a half after receiving it, presumably after Spotlight had finished indexing and the drive was then being left idle. The drives were perfect otherwise, and whisper quiet (which made the thunking sound easier to hear). Finally the Apple Store in Brent Cross, London determined that the sound was normal, saying these newfangled smaller SATA drives make such sounds which are normal to their operation. I decided to drop my concern, because the drive (#3!) was working fine.
Your experience is interesting because it seems to relate the offending drive action to the EFI Firmware Update. In my own case my MacBook was replaced last month because of a different issue and the new one (Core 2 Duo – yay!) has a Hitachi 120 Gb which is noisier in general, but no clunks to be noticed yet.
Good luck!
Rhys

I have a mid 2012 MacBook Pro and the hard drive keeps making a clicking noise. The computer is still under warranty. Will it cost anything to be repaired and will all the data on the hardrive be lost?

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DenholOliver wrote:
Forgot to say the computer will not start up and goes to a white screen.
It's related to your hard drive failure.
White screen means the EFI partition isn't loading and it's the first partition on the drive to load up, EFI contains the gray boot screen.
See this
My computer is not working, is my personal data lost?

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Hi Ana,
Try this link Disc Utility lost connection ......
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When this was help full ore solved your problem Why award ponits?
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Hard Drive is making a loud noise on my laptop! Help!

Hello,
I have owned my hp envy 17 laptop for almost 2 years now. Recently my computer has been making a really loud noise and it seems it is working a lot harder than it needs to be. I suspect the fan or the hard drive is the culprit but I have convinced myself it is the hard drive.
When I start up my computer the loud noise begins almost immediately after startup. This noise sounds like the computer is working as hard as it possibly can, almost making a grinding noise. Even after the computer has booted up, this noise continues for another minute or two before it stops, then my laptop becomes quiet. What puzzles me, and leads me to believe it is the hard drive, is the fact my computer get unreasonably hot when the noise occurs; it never used to do this before.
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Sincerely,
Greg
This question was solved.
View Solution.

Without hearing the sound it is hard to judge but it does not sound like a hard drive from your description. Hard drive noise is usually a rhythmic "click" not a sustained "whirr". That kind of noise comes from a cooling fan. We can test the hard drive in the BIOS. Tap F2 as you power up to enter UEFI diagnostics and look for the hard drive test. If you do not have UEFI diagnostics (i.e. your laptop came with Windows 7 not Windows 8) then tap F10 and look for a hard drive diagnostic in the old-school BIOS interface.
The Envy 17 series tends to run hot and cooling fan issues are not uncommon. Sometimes it can be fixed by self-help such as blowing out the fan with compressed air. If it is the fan, the replacement fan is not too expensive but labor might run $80-150 for replacing the fan. Post back with any questions.
If you are going to post back please give us your full model number found on the bottom of the laptop or in the battery bay.

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Hi,
It's been a couple of months since am I hearing a lot of noise from my hard drive. Supposedly I am browsing safari and the next moment, I open a finder window, it feels like the HD rises from the dead with that noise and it takes about 3-5 seconds to get that finder window. I hear s stomach grumblking noise (as reported by many others) and its mostly everytime. Simple tasks like writing an email or browsing or opening an application or compiling some code; absolutely anything.
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Regards
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I have a 2008 MacBook 4,1 (Early 2008) MB404LL/A. Im thinking about switching out the hard drive for a bigger one. Would the 2.5" HGST 5400RPM 7mm HD be compatible? Or would you guys recommond a different one? Also, every now and then, my fan will blow pretty loud. Any ideas on how to fix that? Any tips would be appreciated.

Most 2.5" SATA drives should work with the machine; the drive that originally shipped with the machine was a 9.5mm so 7mm will fit.
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Since you'll have the machine apart while replacing the drive, take the opportunity to remove the fans and blow out the heatsink fins with a can of compressed air.
If you're feeling up to it, you can remove the motherboard along with the heatsink assembly and replace the ancient factory paste with a fresh new coat - I suggest Arctic Silver 5 thermal paste.

15.4, 7200RPM Hard Drive NOT beeping and clicking

As a recent purchaser of a new 15.4 MBP with a 7200RPM hard drive, the discsussions regarding the beeping/ clicking/ freezing has caused me great concern.
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thanks in advance

Hi Kmac,
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Dennis

I want to search an external hard drive but when I click on it and do a command F the darn highlight jumps right back to 'home computer'. How can I search the actual external drive?

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Recovering data from problem hard drive?

I have a TiBook 667MHz with what appears to be a hard drive problem. It starts to boot up fine, but at a certain point in the process it hangs for a while and then shuts itself off. Apparently the hard drive made an unusual clicking noise when the problem first manifested (I wasn't there).
Listening to the drive during the boot process, I hear normal noises for a while and then reach a point where the same rhythmic sequence is repeated over and over again. Sometimes it continues after a few rounds of that, and sometimes it shuts itself off.
If I boot it in target disk mode and connect it to a MacBook, the drive doesn't mount. I can see the disk in Disk Utility, but can't mount it there either. If I run a repair it says "Invalid Volume Header," then spends a few minutes in the "Checking Catalog file" step before failing with an error about a task failing to end.
If I start it in verbose mode, I see it stop at a message, "Invalid Volume Header," which is consistent with what Disk Utility says before it dies.
Obviously it'd be great to fix the machine entirely. However, the main goal at this point is to get critical, non-backed-up data off of it. Any idea what's going on? Is there a utility that might help fix or identify this issue? And barring that, should I take it to an Apple Store and hope they can recover the data?

So I'm not really sure what an "Invalid Volume Header" indicates, including whether it's a software or a hardware issue.
It's a software issue dealing with directory info, but could be caused by faulty hardware.
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There's no telling until you try it. DW has a good description of things it can/cannot do, so I'd do some reading on their website.
I'm not completetly averse to picking up one of them in case of disk emergencies (TechTool's probably preferable, all things equal, since DiskWarrior shows no signs of going Universal) but I don't want to waste money if it's unlikely to work and I should just take it into a data recovery shop.
Even if it didn't fix this issue, I wouldn't call it a waste of money; very handy to have around when you need it, and you can never tell when that might be.
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Remoed Hard Drive and Lost Display

My daughter's black Macbook did the flashing question mark folder thing yesterday and the HD started making little clicking noises. No HD showed when using the Disk Utility on the Install DVD.
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This is one of the original overheating MacBooks and was repaired by the store in Asuncion, Paraguay last year. Now this. Daughter distraught, wants a Windows machine. And I already went through the bad HD and logic board on an iBook. Fool me once...
<edited by host>

It sounds like your hard drive is faulty. Clicking noises from the hard drive usually mean bad things. When you removed the drive you either reinserted the drive incorrectly (upside down or not fully seated) or the drive finally died. I would suggest rechecking your work to see if you can get the machine to at least begin to boot. If the hard drive is seated correctly (check the RAM as well) and it still does not boot I would suggest removing the battery and power adapter and pressing the power button for 30 seconds. If still nothing then I would try a different hard drive or bring it to an Apple Store or certified repair shop to have them take a quick look at it.
FYI, Apple uses standard hard drives that every manufacturer uses. If you did have another hard drive failure I would look at why the drives are failing. Living in Paraguay can be a large contributor to the failures. The heat and moisture in that part of the world can wreak havoc on computer parts. You might also look at how your daughter treats the machine. Moving or dropping the notebook while powered up will eventually cause a drive to fail.

Upgraded the Hard drive, now sleep light and infared is not working

I upgraded the hard drive on MacBookPro3,1
with Hitachi 320GB, 5400 RPM hard drive.
I quadruple checked the connections to see if I missed
anything but the sleep light is not coming on when the machine is at sleep
and infrared is not showing up on the SystemProfiler -> USB
Any advice on what to do.

Oh I forgot to mention that the new hard drive is also
have clicking noise of parking the head that
everyone is complaining about. I thought only 7200 rpm
drives were effected.

Media Bay Fan making a clicking noise

I have a powermac G5 tower. Just recently the media bay fan located next to the hard drive started making a clicking noise. If I turn off the computer for a while and turn it back on the fan does NOT make the noise. But after the computer runs for about 5 minutes the clicking starts again. The fan is running normally but the clicking is annoying. Does anyone know what might cause this? Will it damage the computer more if I run it like this? The only way to replace the fan is to replace the case and it's not worth it to me to do that. Any suggestions would be helpful because I can't find any info on the internet. Thanks for any help!

You should be able to a replace the fan without replacing the case, but I think the fan is going out.
There can be other things, sometimes something in the case may drop down just low enough to bump into the fan. So, make sure you use a high-powered magnifying glass and a heavy-duty flashlight to inspect the fan thoroughly. Spin the fan with your finger, see if you can move the fan forwards and backwards.
If there is enough forward and backward play in the fan the noise could be coming from that. After the fan heats up the electric motor becomes loose and the fan may be jutting out and hitting the case.

Hard drive is emitting a clicking noise

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