External hardrive clicking

bitfenix · 29 Jul 2020 at 21:38

Hi

I have a Western Digital 500GB external drive that I havent used in a few months, when I plug it into USB to use it makes a clicking sound but can hear it spinning up, is it dead?

Thanks

mickyflinn · 29 Jul 2020 at 21:54

Plug it into your pc and see if shows up in device manager then transfer a file on to it to see works.

jakedude182 · 30 Jul 2020 at 11:21

if it clicks a bit quieter when spinning up thats alright. But if the clicking is persistent when reading or writing files it might fail soon. Or if it clicks when idle also could mean its nearing the end of its days.

bremen1874 · 30 Jul 2020 at 11:25

They can make some strange noises if the USB port doesn't have enough oomph to power it.

EsaT · 30 Jul 2020 at 20:51

It's quite normal for drive to make few noise when powering up, but persistent/continuing clicking is really bad sign.