Is my power supply going bad?

[This One Time]

Over the past week my harddrive kept spinning down for 1/2 second then spinning back up again. This resulted in the computer freezing for several seconds and somtimes crashing altogether. Now when i try and start the computer sometimes it doesnt even find the drive and even when it does it wont get through windows loading with out crashing due to numeroues spin downs.

I thought it was hard drive at first but before i buy a new one I wanted to see if it could be my PSU or someting else going bad.

Current Build

CPU
Intel Core 2 Duo E6600 Conroe 2.4GHz LGA 775 65W Dual-Core Processor BX80557E6600
ZEROtherm CF900 92mm CPU Cooler

Mother Board
Asus P5B Deluxe LGA 775 Intel P965 Express ATX Intel Motherboard

RAM
OCZ Platinum Revision 2 4GB (4 x 1GB) 240-Pin DDR2 SDRAM DDR2 800 (PC2 6400) Dual Channel Kit Desktop Memory Model OCZ2P800R22GK

Graphics Card
EVGA 01G-P3-1371-AR GeForce GTX 460 (Fermi) FPB EE 1GB 256-bit GDDR5 PCI Express 2.0 x16 HDCP Ready SLI Support Video Card

Case
APEVIA X-Infinity ATXB6KLW-BK/420 Black Steel ATX Mid Tower Computer Case

Power Supply
Antec NeoPower 550 550W ATX12V SLI Certified CrossFire Ready Active PFC Power Supply

Hard Drives
1 x Western Digital Caviar Blue WD5000AAKS 500GB 7200 RPM SATA 3.0Gb/s 3.5" Internal Hard Drive -Bare Drive
2 x Western Digital Caviar Green WD10EADS 1TB SATA 3.0Gb/s 3.5" Internal Hard Drive -Bare Drive

 

[g048989h]

Download from the WD site a program that tests your HDD. http://support.wdc.com/product/download.asp?groupid=606&sid=30&lang=en
If the link doesnt work just google it, WD lists it under support and downloads if you would rather just pick it directly from their site. If your a windows 7 user, you'll need to find that one, the above is for XP. There are other tools you an use. Try
www.download.om and search for a program there if you don;t like the WD tool.
Good luck

 

[This One Time]

Im having trouble using the tool since most of the time it wont find the drive and when it does it cant get through the test without the computer freezing.

 

[This One Time]

I think im going to have to just buy a new power supply and see if that fixes the problem.

Which power supply would be good for my RIG and would work well with a future i7 build?

 

[g048989h]

Corsair, Antec, Seasonic are good brands. Stay clear of off brands like Rosewill, Apeva, Coolmax etc. If your going to run SLI step up to more than 550 Watts. If you're like most people though you"ll never SLI or XFire cards. I like the antec 550 Basiq becasue it is modular and has been a good PSU for me over several builds. with your 3 HDD's and 460 stepping up to a I7, you might be better off getting into the 650 - 750 range. A 650 is more than enough provided you buy a good quality unit.
I do not think your issue is your PSU though it never hurts to upgrade a PSU. I think you have something else going on and the possibilities are numerous.
I am curious about you being able to hear your hard drive spinning down. Is it really loud? if so that might be a clue. Be ready to replace your primary drive soon bro. Samsung Spin Point, WD Black or maybe an SSD?

 

[This One Time]

Best answer selected by this one time.

 

[This One Time]

Corsair, Antec, Seasonic are good brands. Stay clear of off brands like Rosewill, Apeva, Coolmax etc. If your going to run SLI step up to more than 550 Watts. If you're like most people though you"ll never SLI or XFire cards. I like the antec 550 Basiq becasue it is modular and has been a good PSU for me over several builds. with your 3 HDD's and 460 stepping up to a I7, you might be better off getting into the 650 - 750 range. A 650 is more than enough provided you buy a good quality unit.
I do not think your issue is your PSU though it never hurts to upgrade a PSU. I think you have something else going on and the possibilities are numerous.
I am curious about you being able to hear your hard drive spinning down. Is it really loud? if so that might be a clue. Be ready to replace your primary drive soon bro. Samsung Spin Point, WD Black or maybe an SSD?

I think your right about it not being the PSU. Before i bought a new i wanted to check to see if reducing the power requirments would fix it. So I unplugged the cd/dvd drive and the 2 green drives. But the main hard drive was still spinning down.

I then disconnected the main drive and connected it to one of the other non used plugs (the PSU is modular) in the same PSU. But that didnt fix the problem either.

Im thinking it really is just a bad hardrive.

What else could it be? can a bad mobo do this to a hard drive?

(about the hard drive spinning down its not a loud hard drive but when i open my case up and listen i can hear the faint sound of the hard drive spinning down the back up.

 

[g048989h]

Its not unusaul to hear a drive spinning up and down and it writes and reads data. Have you run malwarebytes? I know your PC wont run for long without locking or crashing. Waht about trying it in safe mode. There are programs that test your hardware, if only you could get it stable for long enough