Why does my HDD fail with one PC but not another?

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H

Hyperglyph

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Jul 18, 2017
8
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510
Long Story Short:

  • ■Bought a used Asus Maximus Hero VIII and a new SSD
    ■When I reinstalled my old Samsung HDD (from 2009) as a secondary drive, it clicked on startup and didn't register.
    ■Disabling SecureBoot made the drive register but fail its SMART test.
    ■I thought "Uh-oh, it's going bad".
    ■To test, I put it into my backup PC (an old system from ~2008). Drive works flawlessly.
    ■Thought "Maybe it's a boot/Windows thing", DBAN-ed the HDD and repartitioned + formatted with Gparted.
    ■Drive still clicks and fails to register with new mobo, but works flawlessly with backup PC.
    ■Thought "The motherboard is bad", but then realized that the SSD and my 3rd HDD work flawlessly with it.
    ■Thought "The SATA port is bad", swapped ports... no change.
    ■Thought "The SATA/Power cables are bad", swapped cables with functioning drive's... no change.
    ■Thought "The power supply isn't getting enough juice", unplugged PC from power strip and plugged into the wall... no change.
    ■Scratched head, ate a whole bag of jelly beans and came here for help.

Any Storage Masters out there who know why my new Asus is rejecting my old Samsung like this?

Oh, and one last thing of note... the clicking is a steady "TICK... 1... 2... 3... TICK..." and it only lasts a few seconds on startup (presumably, the drive is failing to spin?). Also, the ticking stops with SecureBoot disabled, although it doesn't matter because it goes on to fail the SMART test.
 
Solution
elbert
Have you tryed to change to Legacy? You may need Compatibility Support Module (CSM) to support legacy BIOS so check for that next.

Your drive may need firmware updates if nothing else works. You'll have do a firmware update on the old system. Check using your drives model number.
http://www.samsung.com/us/support/downloads/
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elbert

elbert

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Jan 11, 2005
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Some of the SATA is shared between Esata and possibly m.2 depending. Make sure you have the ASmedia sata drivers and the latest driver versions for the chipset SATA ports. I think the ASmedia ports are black.
https://www.asus.com/us/Motherboards/MAXIMUS-VIII-HERO/HelpDesk_Download/
 
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H

Hyperglyph

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Jul 18, 2017
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510


I'm avoiding the ASMedia ports, all the drives are in the Intel ones.
I'm not using the m.2 slot, although I do have an Esata cable for my front ports plugged in. Don't think that's the problem, though. I've already tried booting with only the Samsung drive plugged in and the clicking persists.

Drivers are all freshly installed from the links on Asus website.

... this is a real puzzler. Whatever it is, it's a problem specific to this HDD and this motherboard. The other HDD works fine when swapped with the clicking one... and the clicking one works fine when placed in the other PC.
 
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H

Hyperglyph

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Jul 18, 2017
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Yea, I flashed the BIOS/UEFI after installing everything (forgot to to it before). Tried the ASMedia ports & double-checked to make sure all drivers were installed. No change, the drive still isn't recognized in UEFI unless SecureBoot is disabled... and if it is, the HDD goes on to fail SMART.

... which continues to confuse the hell out of me because it STILL works flawlessly when I plug it into my decade-old backup PC.

... although, I don't think I've flashed the BIOS on that one in a looong time... if that matters....
 
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elbert

elbert

Glorious
Jan 11, 2005
9,704
6
46,965
Have you tryed to change to Legacy? You may need Compatibility Support Module (CSM) to support legacy BIOS so check for that next.

Your drive may need firmware updates if nothing else works. You'll have do a firmware update on the old system. Check using your drives model number.
http://www.samsung.com/us/support/downloads/
 
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Solution
H

Hyperglyph

Prominent
Jul 18, 2017
8
0
510


It was already booting with CSM enabled. However, I just tried switching from booting UEFI drivers first to booting Legacy only. The drive stopped clicking, but (I kinda expected this) my Windows hung on the splash screen. After multiple reboots and a system restore (something got borked, since it wouldn't boot as normal after I reversed my UEFI changes), I'm now back to where I was again minus some settings changes in Windows.

This feels like it's some issue with UEFI and old HDDs... since the WD HDD I've got as my 3rd drive works fine (and it's from ~2012).

EDIT: Give me a few minutes to update the firmware (haven't tried that yet)
 
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H

Hyperglyph

Prominent
Jul 18, 2017
8
0
510
You, elbert, deserve ALL the cookies.

One week of trying to figure this out with two PCs sitting half-open and it finally seems to be fixed.

Plugging the Samsung HDD into my backup PC and flashing its firmware with Seagate's (apparently they own Samsung's HDD division now) latest update did the trick. Drive spins up with 1 click (still clicks once on startup and shutdown for some reason) but then runs silently and is recognized in Windows 7.

You've made my week.

Just goes to show a clicking HDD isn't always dead.

For anyone else with this problem, the link to the firmware is here: http://knowledge.seagate.com/articles/en_US/FAQ/223631en

You'll need to create a bootable USB with Rufus. Make sure it's set to MBR and FreeDOS (its default settings):
https://rufus.akeo.ie/

Then just copy the .exe for your HDD onto the USB, shutdown the PC, disconnect any other HDDs, boot from the USB and type the executable's name (e.g. "F3.exe") when prompted. Hit Enter, wait... and that's it (at least for me).

Thanks again, elbert. Now I can finally move one with this build. Have a great weekend :).
 
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