Old hard drive?

I have a one year old refurbished Thinkpad. In the past week or so I have heard a "thrumming" sound coming from it at a rate of about 2 hz. It reminds me of an old fan from the days before everyone had air conditioning. (Oops - telling my age.)

"In the day" I would have put a couple drops of oil on the fan...

Sounds like they used a "pre-owned" hard drive in the refurb. Any reason I should NOT expect a hard drive crash any day now?

 

Hi Jim doesn't sound like your HD is failing, that is a Resounding intermittent ''CLICK'' Thrumming sounds like you have vibration running through to your desk/table. Does this noise continue on different surfaces, have you moved it to a differnt Table/Desk recently ?? Have you checked the cooling fans are clean and free of dust etc. Have you left a disk in the Rom. Does the position of the lid/screen make any difference ??

 

I see no dust accumulation and haven't moved the computer. Removing CD/DVD makes no difference.

I do get a little different sound when I pick it up off the pullout. Then when I put my ear close to the keyboard (laptop) it sounds almost like it is searching back and forth on the hard drive disk - like a very, very much quieter version of a floppy drive (which same should be banned from the galaxy). But the hard drive light doesn't come on.

Maybe my hearing suddenly got a lot better?

 

You may be correct in your first thoghts- fan, and it is not always obvious that laptops can have an accumulation of dust and fluff, inside, that is not obvious from the side that you may be able to see of the fan. It could also be that the laptop is now heating up more, as this accmulation happens, so the fan comes on more, too, to keep it cool.
Some older ide hard drives, particularly can be a litle noisy, but not always an indication of nearing failure (I would run a hard drive utility test on it to be sure-most manufacturers have their own checking tool- look in majorgeeks downloads for a software tool to check)

 

Is the machine working well otherwise - any obvious hard drive or hardware issues? Any out of range temps?

Bad fan bearings can cause a low 'thrumming' sound or vibration.

One quick test: disable or disconnect the hard drive - you should still be able to POST with the fans running, and see if your symptoms change.

 

Fans will sometimes make intermittent noise (squeaking, humming, etc.) as a first sign they're going bad. I currently have a Sony VIAO notebook with this problem. The repair shop is trying to get the parts from Sony which may take several weeks. Until then, I just have to keep my ears trained to be sure the fan is running properly (Yes, I know this is risky; however if the PC bites it before the shop can get the parts MasterCard's purchase protection will replace the notebook. I already checked on this).

Depending on the model, it may have two fans (one at the corner of the unit plus possibly one on the CPU heatsink). If the parts/labor are in line with the value of the PC, I would replace both just to be on the safe side.

 

Considering it's windows I'd have to say it runs better than average...

No hardware issues in the laptop itself.

How would I go about disabling the hard drive while the system is running?

 

Shut down the machine, disconnect the drive, and restart. If the motherboard will POST with the fans running, you should then be able to tell if the sound/vibration is present or not.

If disconnecting the drive is not an option, then reboot, disable the drive in BIOS, save and exit.

This is just a troubleshooting procedure to differentiate between the hard drive or a fan causing the issue, and will only apply if the fans run during POST.