Click of death from an old hard drive?

[kathayes]

I have an old WD WD2500 250GB drive that I plug into a docking station connected to my computer and it never makes itself available on my computer, though it makes a series of clicking sounds, pauses and clicks again and continues this over and over again.

Anyone have any ideas what this means and what I can do to fix it?

Thanks.

 

[danny2000]

I have an old WD WD2500 250GB drive that I plug into a docking station connected to my computer and it never makes itself available on my computer, though it makes a series of clicking sounds, pauses and clicks again and continues this over and over again.

Anyone have any ideas what this means and what I can do to fix it?

Thanks.

Those are the classic symptoms of a bad hard drive.
Just to rule out that it is/isn't a problem with the docking station, try hooking-up the hard drive to a connector inside the case instead of using the docking station. I doubt that that will make a difference, but it is worth a try.

 

[COLGeek]

Sounds like a classic case of a dead HDD. You can go to WD's website and download a diagnostic tool (free) to check its health. Go here for the tool:

http://support.wdc.com/product/download.asp?groupid=502&sid=3&lang=en

 

[kathayes]

It is a Windows formatted drive, though I'm trying to access it on a Mac. Normally, I do not have any problems accessing Windows formatted drives on my Mac.

1. Any idea if there is diagnostics software available to run on a Mac to test this drive?
2. Assuming it is dead, what options do I have? Is there anyway to recover data from it?

Thanks for the replies!

 

[COLGeek]

Have you tried accesing it from a PC? Also, check the same WD site to see if they have a OS X version.

Data recovery can be very expensive if you have to send to a service. If the drive is functional enough to allow access, you might be able to run a data recovery tool such as Recuva (for PCs) or Dik Drill (Mac).

http://download.cnet.com/Disk-Drill/3000-2094_4-75307728.html

http://www.piriform.com/recuva

 

[s3anister]

If the Hard Drive is clicking at identical intervals then it means the bearing is bad on the hard drive.

If it's clicking intermittently it's possible that the read head is damaged or the surface of the internal platter(s) is damaged. Have you dropped the hard drive recently?

Otherwise if the drive is healthy it's just inaccessible to the Mac and it's making that sound because it's old and the read head actuator is worn. My bet is that the drive is dead.

 

[scout_03]

if the drive do not pass the test send to you by COLGeek then you will need a new one