Clicking Noise From PC

SoAdCrAzY · 1 Oct 2011 at 16:43

Sorry but I have no video evidence of this. Will hopefully get my hands on an iPhone soon. I have youtubed it and seen clips of hard drives clicking. However, the noise coming from the PC doesn't sound like that.

I first thought that it was a loose screw that was bouncing around into fans but that is not the case. Sometimes it is silent and sometimes it is really noisy. I really am unsure about how to diagnose this. Does anyone have any advice?

Thanks.

Nymins · 1 Oct 2011 at 16:50

Could be a fan coming a bit loose. Pop open the case, turn the PC on and lightly push the center of each fan to see if it stops the clicking.

My GPU fan clicks quite often, I fix it by pushing it in slightly.

MrElve · 1 Oct 2011 at 16:57

I had a clicking noise problem a few months ago, give a listen to your power supply because it might be a capacitor clicking, that was the source of mine

Other than that, just try as said above and stopping each fan individually or maybe booting up your PC with only different HDD's active?

Hope you solve your problem

Mak3R · 1 Oct 2011 at 16:58

Could be a cable hanging over a fan blade thats whacking off it? That used to happen to mine and a quick smack on the case made it go away for a while...

SoAdCrAzY · 1 Oct 2011 at 17:00

Mak3R said:
Could be a cable hanging over a fan blade thats whacking off it? That used to happen to mine and a quick smack on the case made it go away for a while...

Yeah, I've had a look and that isn't the case.

I'll do the other advice when it starts again. It happens at random times.

Thanks.

SoAdCrAzY · 5 Oct 2011 at 10:51

Update: I can't see anything wrong inside the PC.

I would describe the noise as more of a rattling than a clicking.

If the noise is going on whilst the PC is shutting down, it continues when it is turned off and gradually gets slower which leads me to believe it could be a fan.

iostream · 5 Oct 2011 at 11:19

MrElve said:
I had a clicking noise problem a few months ago, give a listen to your power supply because it might be a capacitor clicking, that was the source of mine

Can you do anything about a clicking capacitor?

pat_c · 5 Oct 2011 at 12:00

iostream said:
Can you do anything about a clicking capacitor?

Not unless you are an electrician, then caps are quite easy to purchase and solder replace.

Else RMA.

Also depends if you can identify the specific cap that is clicking.

http://www.capacitorlab.com/visible-failures/

iostream · 5 Oct 2011 at 12:28

I don't mind a bit of soldering, just getting my hands on the correct replacement capacitor would be the real issue I think. Anyways thanks for the link, handy for future reference