My Desktop PC is making weird clicking sounds, what could be the cause?

[kate-the-cookie]

This is the link to the weird sound my PC is making: [MEDIA=soundcloud]farah-foory/pcclickingsounds/s-bFeh11ccHiO[/MEDIA]
This occurs most often after starting the PC back up from energy saving mode, but (rarely) also happens randomly or after normal booting. It seems to be happening more and more frequently. Sometimes, it just goes away by itsself but most of the time, I have to shut down and restart my PC in order for the clicking sound to go away.
Which part of my PC could cause this sound?
I have been using this PC every day for almost 5 years now, except the SSD and my second HDD that I got later.

My system:
Intel Core i7-4790 CPU @ 3.60 GHz
8GB RAM DDR3
Nvidia GeForce GTX 950
one 250 GB Samsung SSD running Windows 10
two 1 TB HDDs (Toshiba DT01ACA100 and WDC WD10ezex)

[Rustys]

Sounds like one of the HDD is failing and or ha failed.

Run the check disk with the /r

https://pchelpforum.net/r/run-chkdsk-using-command-prompt.20/

Run the command on both HDD(s) then to get the results.

Press the Windows + R keys to open the Run dialog
Type powershell.exe
Then press Enter.

In PowerShell, copy and paste the command below, and press Enter.
get-winevent -FilterHashTable @{logname=“Application”; id=“1001”}| ?{$_.providername –match “wininit”} | fl timecreated, message | out-file Desktop\CHKDSKResults.txt

The CHKDSKResults.txt file will be created on your desktop,

COPY and PASTE the contents from the CHKDSKResults.txt file into a post. You can also attach the files.

[kate-the-cookie]

Here are the results. (It took over 2 hours to finish). But it looks like check disk didn’t find any problems.
Is there any other way to find out which of the two HDDs is causing the problems, so I can replace it before losing my data?
Thank you in advance!

Edit: I hope it’s no problem that the results are in German, I didn’t realize it before mb

[Bruce]

also concur it probably is one of the hard drives.
they are the only mechanical devices in a PC that could make such a noise.

while the sun shines, do backups on both of the HDD’s.

hopefully your OS is on the SSD, if so, disconnect both HDD’s and reboot the PC, if we have guessed right, that clicking noise will go away.
if it does, shut down, connect only one HDD and boot up, repeat until the noise re-appears then you’ll know the culprit that needs to be replaced.

sorry Rustys - didn’t mean to stomp on your advice - but if the drive is making the click of death noise then it can’t be trusted and should be removed.

[kate-the-cookie]

Yes, Windows is on my SSD
I would love to do that, the only problem here is that I can’t “reproduce” the clicking sound reliably. It happens only sometimes when booting, mostly when booting after I put it in energy saving mode. But I guess I will just have to do that several times, even if it takes a while.

Thank you for your advice!

[Rustys]

Download the standard version of Crystal Disk Info

https://crystalmark.info/en/download/#CrystalDiskInfo

This should show us if there is a possible HDD failure.

You have not other devices connected when this happens?

@Bruce may have other and or more ideas

[kate-the-cookie]

I have to admit that I don’t really understand the values provided by CrystalDiskInfo, but it is probably the HDD from Toshiba that I need to replace, because it says “caution” there. Do any of the other values look unusual or alarming?
In any case, I already ordered a new HDD that should arrive in a few days and I backed up all my data to an external drive.
Thanks a lot for your help!

[Rustys]

This will explain what Crystal Disk Info is showing us.

https://harddrivegeek.com/reallocated-sector-count/

It appears the the D Drive is starting to fail and needs to be replaced.

You should be constantly backing up your data and not just when something happens.

I will rotates through three or more separate backups as a precaution.

[kate-the-cookie]

Yes I think we now know with very high certainty that it’s the D: drive. The clicking sounds just occured again, and afterwards the Reallocated sector count went up from 29 to 33. I will replace it in the next couple of days. Thank you for your help guys, I think we can mark this thread as solved now. And from now on, I vow to always back up my data regularly.

[Bruce]

both those drives have roughly the same power on count and power on hours, so I’m guessing they are the same vintage. if one is dying you’d have to also have questions on the other and while a drives life span can vary greatly when compared to others, you have to ask the question “knowing what I know, do I still trust the drive?” and considering the cheapness of drive at the moment, I’d be replacing both units but that’s just me.

the regularity of your backups is totally related to the importance of the data being backed up.
family photos that cannot be reproduced - backup weekly.
continually changing documents - backup daily.
tax/finance records - backup monthly.
that sort of thing.

the important thing is - have a copy of all your personal data in more than one location.