Computer won't detect hard drive, and clicking noise

h2l

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Feb 14, 2012
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So, I just setup my new rig today, and everything is working great and very silently. However, the only thing that doesn't seem to want to work, is my hard drive. It won't be detected by my computer, and it makes this weird almost silent clicking sound. It's not a fast clicking or a slow clicking, it's about moderate.

It's a sata hard drive, so I have the sata power connector connected and the sata data cable connected to my motherboard in slot #2, because my DVD drive is in slot #1.

Anyways, could it be that my hard drive is dead? I have an Ultra 550W Dual 12V Rail power supply, and the only other thing that I could think of that really eats up power is my Radeon 6870.

Could it also be that the HDD LED's are not hooked up correctly to the motherboard?

Thanks!
 

h2l

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Btw, I have an Asus P8H61 motherboard, an an i3-2120 CPU, LG super multi DVD drive, radeon hd 6870, 4GB kingston HyperX memory, and an Ultra 550W Dual 12V Rail PSU.

Am I asking too much of this PSU? I really thought it was enough...

Also, everything powers on except the hard drive, or at least everything is detected. I get graphics from the graphics card, the motherboards menu pops up, which obviously means the CPU is working as well. The DVD drive works because I put in XP in there, all 4 fans work, idk what's going on.
 

rmiiirusty

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Yes, the only time I have ever heard a ticking problem was with a bad hard drive. I would try another and see if it is any diff.
Also if you have another pc that you can plug your drive into, go into disk mgmt and see if you can find it and if so make sure that it is formated correctly. I have had that make a diff.
 

h2l

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Damn.. this hard drive was literally working a week ago. It's a 250GB Barracuda hdd in pretty nice condition. This sucks. I don't have another hard drive to try in my computer, I only have another computer to put this hard drive in and its being used right now. :(
 

h2l

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It works... I flipped the red switch on the back of the power supply to 230V or whatever, and now it works. What did I have it on before? I don't get it...
 

rawraj

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It works?
I am getting a similar clicking sound. When clicking it does not show up on Windows. The problems started when my legs got tangled in my earphone and I pulled it so hard my front audio panel does not work anymore.
I guess after that I had my OS crash
I reinstalled on another hard drive.
After many months I got this clicking sound where it would stop showing up on windows.
It show constantly on the bios.
Then I tried something I would go to device manager and click on "scan for hardware changes" It would come back.
It would be there until I restarted my computer. Rather kept my computer shut down for a while.
Its like if the Harddisk kind of stops then it takes a while a lot clicking sound to show up again.(it shows only if "Scan hardisk is clicked".
Of late even that does not work. It takes a long time. Infact for the last week I was not able to use the hard drive.
I had got an external hard drive and was shifting stuff.
Right now I clicked "scan for hardware" and got my harddrive back and I copied one drive another drive is being copied as I type.
In between it stopped detecting. I hit "scan hardware" and it came back. Thankfully MiniTools Partition Wizard continued Copying(wow software really rocks).

Now my question is is this a power Issue?
I tried switching power cables ports everything but to no avail.
Right now my other working Harddisk is on Sata port 1(where this used to be).
For some reason my Xaamp Server won't start. Its like the hard drive is not accesible.
But my windows keeps running does not crash.
So Am not sure if its a Xaamp problem. Or does my hard drive go dead.

So I am not sure if its a Port problem. But asking anyone opinions.
If it was a port problem then my bad hard disk should have started working.
But maybe the port is what made my harddisk bad.
I tried all tools The hard disk are seagate.
I checked for errors in Seagate tools and almost all famous HDD tools. When the hard drive is detected it show no errors at all.
Both hard drives.
So now since I took a back what I want to know is, that is there any way to salvage this bad harddrive with a Low level format.
Or is this a port/power cable problem(when I yanked my computer really hard).
Is this is a problem with my Motherboard.
can yanking the audio cable really hard affect the mother board ports?(I am trying to imagine if this is physically possible). I know my front audio ports don't work. I think I have some problem with my USB ports)
But do I have to change my motherboard?
Or is this a SMPS problem. Maybe its not taking the load.
 

missionsbound

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When I reinstalled my power supply, I realized that some cables were loose and after tightening all plugs, I've never had a problem again. It may very well be that when you pulled that wire some things came loose and have caused your pc to become buggy. It's a simple solution but it may just be the one you need.
 

rawraj

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I forgot to mention I already did that. Actually many years ago I had s similar problem with sata power connecter actually shorting and creating a sound due to sparks as it was lose. Thank goodness my hardiks did not die.
I checked all the connnections they were fine. I even checked it in all ports and it was the same