Drive 'gravelling' away quite happily...

Lashout_UK · 22 Sep 2006 at 18:21

I've just built a new machine, using an Asus P5WDH Deluxe S775, E6400 and a brand new Seagate Sata 2 200gig drive.

However, despite all being new the hard drive 'gravels' a lot, grinding away to itself quite happily.

Is this common for new drives these days? I was always under the impression only dodgy drives did it. It seems to buffer and run alright....then again, anything would be an improvement over the old one.

Also - I'm totally new to the SATA world so is it caused by a setting or jumper that I've got in the wrong place?

Any ideas appreciated

wizardmaxx · 22 Sep 2006 at 18:24

Sounds like pagefile activity, how much memory do you have installed and do you have a spare hdd (40 or 80gb) that u not using

Lashout_UK · 22 Sep 2006 at 18:32

I have a gig of memory installed. I haven't even looked at that yet

What are the best settings for initial and maximum size of the pagefile?/virtual memory

I'm sitting here and every few seconds it will click to itself (Steam re-downloading HL2 in the background, for example)

wizardmaxx · 22 Sep 2006 at 18:39

System managed works best for me. There are lots of theories about that, tried them as well, didnt work at all. Mabye a bit for 98 i spose, but xp - system managed. If u can get a spare hard drive and stick the pagefile on that instead of you OS drive the sound should improve, unless you use a real shocker of a spare drive.

Lashout_UK · 22 Sep 2006 at 18:41

Ta, I'll give it a whirl

wizardmaxx · 22 Sep 2006 at 18:43

Should improve performance as well. Always worked for me. If it doesnt work there is alwys the possibility of a problem. Also make sure u defrag the C: drive

basmic · 22 Sep 2006 at 18:49

Defragmenting the drive will not do anything to reduce the "'gravelling' away" noise.

I would suggest running Seagate's diagnostic tools, making sure you run the Quick test before the Advanced/Extended test.

If diagnostics come back all clear and the noise irritates you, see if you can modify the drives accoustic levels.

wizardmaxx · 22 Sep 2006 at 18:50

Agreed, but at the cost of performance of course

Lashout_UK · 22 Sep 2006 at 20:20

I have defragged, error checked and done a few other tweaks, to no avail.

I shall run the 'full' checkthrough now I've done the quick one, which reported no issues.

Neil79 · 22 Sep 2006 at 20:41

Lashout_UK said:
I have defragged, error checked and done a few other tweaks, to no avail.

I shall run the 'full' checkthrough now I've done the quick one, which reported no issues.

My raptor did this , grinded every so often for no reason... it was noisy and annoying , the unallocated sector count became too large according to speedfan.

The hard drive later died

wizardmaxx · 22 Sep 2006 at 21:25

Thanks guys now mines started gravelling as well. Spose norton is running though

Lashout_UK · 23 Sep 2006 at 00:23

Oooh, I just got a lovely "hit platter" whirr then too.

Well, 8 hours isn't bad for the lifespan of a hard drive, I guess

Sigh

Recommendations, anyone?

ByteJuggler · 23 Sep 2006 at 01:55

Run the manufacturers disk diagnostics, and do a thorough surface check. (back up first, that's usually a destructive operation) Check for any other anomalous data (e.g. high numbers of remapped bad sectors, which due to being remapped will not show up in Windows chkdsk but probably will in the diagnostic or another S.M.A.R.T compliant tool.

Lashout_UK · 23 Sep 2006 at 09:39

Thanks. I'll try that later today and report back!