I have a Dell dimension 8100, pentium 4, windows xp pro sp2, 1.3ghz, 256mb ram, "DIAMONDMAX PLUS 60 ULTRA ATA 100" hard drive. Not sure what other information is important to help me out here so if i'm missing something please let me know.

My problem is that my hard drive started making a clicking noise recently and last night it started as soon as I powered up my pc and wouldn't stop and now the bios aren't even detecting a hard drive at all and when the HD is connected it will not detect my secondary drives (cd rom and cd r/w drives) either. I found a cut in the connector so I replaced it with another and still no difference. I've tried other HD's and the computer will not detect any of them.

I'm trying to find out if my hard drive is shot or if its something to do with the settings or motherboard. If the hard drive is bad can it be fixed or can i get the information off it somehow? Is there anything I can do? Is it the motherboard and/or connector on the motherboard? Arg.....been workin on it for over 10hrs and i'm so frustrated now so this forum is one of my last resorts before saying #*^$-it and if nothing here i guess its time to start with a new hard drive and if that doesn't work a whole new motherboard so PLEASE help if you can!!!!

Thanks in advance to anyone who has info that will help me I really appreciate it.

Hi,

Try placing hard drive as Master by itself on one IDE cable. Try it on Primary IDE and Secondary.
Does it detect it on bootup? Go to bios (DEL key usually works) and see that it is recognized.. on auto-detection.

After backing up data to USB keydrive or CD/DVD media (should have backup measure in place), use MaxBlast utility to diagnose/repair Hard disk. It will allow you to make copies of hard drive. Get it here.

The drive might be going bad.. if other devices don't work, it might IDE port or mobo. Could try Dell tech support (NOT!). Your system is bit dated so may want to consider upgrading to a 3000+ system anyway.

How are you doing with this problem?

As Mishcabob outlines, the problem could originate in a bad bios setting, or a problem with the hard drive itself.

The checks he recommends are pretty much mandatory first passes at each of these.

I would suggest careful inspection of your BIOS settings first, to make sure they are properly set to attempt an autodetect of the hard drive. The fact that your machine will not detect other hard drives might - but not conclusively - indicate a problem with BIOS settings.

Isolate the HDD by removing other devices from the cable it is on, and see what if any error messages are returned when you start the machine. Have you been getting error messages? If so what are they?

You mention indirectly your CD drive will read when the HDD is not installed. Can we assume it is NOT on the same cable with the HDD when that is installed?

Is your BIOS set to automatically seek the CD, in the event that the OS does not load from the first (HDD) device? If not, change that setting so that it is, at least until this is resolved. (You report that the CD is not detected when the HDD is present, but that may change if you set the BIOS to look to the CD for its boot instructions before looking to the HDD.)

If you can get the CD drive recognized when the HDD present, you may be able to use the Recovery Console to start your machine. This should allow you to do additional diagnostics and repair. Here is a copy of "HELP" material on the Recovery Console from an XP installation:

To start the computer and use the Recovery Console
From the Setup CD-ROM

Insert the Setup compact disc (CD) and restart the computer. If prompted, select any options required to boot from the CD.
When the text-based part of Setup begins, follow the prompts; choose the repair or recover option by pressing R.
If you have a dual-boot or multiple-boot system, choose the installation that you need to access from the Recovery Console.
When prompted, type the Administrator password.
At the system prompt, type Recovery Console commands; type help for a list of commands, or help commandname for help on a specific command.
To exit the Recovery Console and restart the computer, type exit.

Important

Because the Recovery Console is quite powerful, it is recommended for use only by advanced users or administrators.

Once you have access to the machine - you have accessed and validated BIOS settings, the machine is detecting the CD drive whle the HDD is present, and you have the recovery console working - You may be able to load and use disk diagnostic programs, such as SpinRite from GRC.com

SpinRite is claimed by Gibson Research to recover data from many drives - but you have to be able to access the drive to at sufficient level to run the program.

Let us know how this is going for you. I have not had time to do much research on the items I mention here whle preparing this post, but may be able to do more if you provide additional information and confirm the need.

Good luck.

Sounds like the brush in your hard-drive broke off. I have seen the problem once before , a clicking noise for several days was followed by the hard drive being un detectable , After opening it up in a clean room it was discovered that the brush had broken. I'm not sure if it is exactly the same problem, but if the advice of the chaps above dosnt help, expect the worst and buy a new hard drive.

I agree with Speed here my friend. If your drive is making new noises and they are metallic in nature, it's time for a new drive. You might get a bit more time out of it with some tweaking but reliability and performance will be running outside any reasonable expectations for anyone wanting to keep the pc.

They do wear out, especially if ridden hard and put away wet as a normal course of business. I use my drives hard, but ensure they are being cooled by case ventilation and maintain them religiously.

The pickup on a hard drive that does something similar as a needle on a phonograph (rough analogy) has been described by WD engineers as a Boeing 747 flying at Mach 3 mere inches from the ground everytime it goes flying. Not much room for mechanical wear or similar. Eh?

If you can't get rid of the tapping, invest in a new one. They are as cheap as they have ever been right now.

Luck!

Winter

wow thanks everyone who sent a reply in this topic. i got bluescreened this morning on the xp loading page and after winxp setup had finished formatting my hard drive i got the click of death. i then had much the same symptoms as the original post so i did a few google searches on my laptop and found this. im now installing onto my backup 40gb hd but at least it's recognised and installing windows

looks like i'll be shopping for a new hard drive, i don't suppose i can complain i've had it for 5 years.

anyone know any good sites for harddrives within the uk ? :/

Unfortunately your drive is hosed. It seems like possibly your board as well. I would try a new drive with a new cable and if that still doesn't work try the new drive and cable in a different computer. If the drive works then your IDE controller chip is bad on the board and you need a new one. The only hope for the drive is a maybe if you swap the controler board from the same model drive inorder to get the data off. Otherwise you will need to take it to one of the major recovery places that have a clean room. That will usualy cost sever thousand. A note to all if you hear the click or any unusual sounds it would be best to back up your data right then.

Sorry for the bad news,
Karatecarrot

Hi Everyone

My 40 GB Seagate Harddrive was dead. When I plug power cable it making a clicking noise. I checked it to make it master or slave but it was not detected by bois and still making clicking noise... Please help me!

Thank You!

Please read all of this thread, especially the posting just before yours. I suspect the only real response to your question is, as they say in our courts, "Asked and answered."

You may want to check the article linked to at this Google search:
http://www.google.com/search?hl=en&q=%...amp;btnG=Search

Two acts of desperation included in that article (as I recall) can help with "stuck" drives. One is the freezing method, another is holding the drive horizontally, and firmly, in your hand and then giving it a sharp twist in the horizontal plane. I have, several years ago, used the latter method successfully.

I have never used GRC's "SpinRite" hard drive recovery software, but if the data is valuable, and you can get the machine to recognize the drive, you might consider buying and using it.