WD Red Ticking every second

General system Newbie
1

Hello,

I got an WD RED 10 TB HDD, the smart status and the things I could check, with the WDsoftware, say good status under windows. Now I wanted to use the HDD to expand my movie collection, but when I mount the drive under linux, the HDD is formatted to ext4, I get a ticking noise every second. I played around with hdparm and changed values like Advanced Power Management and Time to Standby, I have not seen any change. The only way to get the HDD silent again is to unmount it.

Does anybody know which parameter i can set to get rid of the ticking noise?

Is there a way to check what the HDD is doing? If it is writing something?

2

Firstly, and urgently, I suggest backing up anything important on it, just in case.

That ticking noise can be a precursor to total failure. It’s dubbed “the click of death”. Does it sound like this?

3

Mine is faster and different, it really sounds more like a watch. I don’t know how to upload a sound.

4

Yeah a ticking sound in a HD is a bad sign!

It’s from the arm(that’s reads you HD) that’s not function properly.

Save any data if you can, or it will be corrupted.

And if new send back for warranty.

It can survive for some time(had an old IBM HD that’s had clicking sounds but didn’t die, but corruption was rampant.

And if you have sensitive data on HD try wipe it before sending it for warranty.

5

I know. I will also try to format it to NTFS and mount it in windows, because i don’t know if that is Linux related problem or not. Every HDD i had, makes some kind of periodical noise, but this ticking is really unusual and I guess you are right and it is already close to death, even if the smart parameter says different.

6

HDD doesn’t really care what OS or FS it’s running.
There are some benign clicking noises that can happen, like periodic head sweep that some WD drives perform as preventive/preemptive wear leveling (PWL). Tho to my knowledge those are more prevalent in bigger drives used in NAS, servers etc.
Any new clicking noise should be considered a possible malfunction and get the drive tested, at least with the manufacturers’ software. Periodic, rhythmic ticking noise is telltale of head problem.

example of PWL noise: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ksgOgrbRPOo

3 Likes
7

I can confirm @seeji. I have lost drive this way, although long time ago. As it was days of old (and I was inexperienced), I thought that this was normal.

Well, turns out it wasn’t. Although I don’t remember sure, it was most likely a head problem. Luckily I was able to limp with that disk until got new machine.

So my advice, as others have already pointed out, is to take that disk to warranty, if possible. :computer_disk:

8

I left the system on for a work day and now it is quiet, except the ticking every 5 seconds,
which I learned is a feature not a bug. So i guess it was doing something.

@seeji nice video

Also the 5 seconds tick is so damm annoying, so i think about skipping large hdd and go for 4tb ssd.

9

You’ve been able to confirm this?

If you copy a large file to the disk, is it the same type of noise, just much more rapid, or is that a distinctly different sound?

10

As people have mentioned, back up now. If it is making any odd noise, drive is failing or about to. I learnt the hard way.

11

Hi,

just found in German c’t computer magazine (unfortunately they do not offer this article in an English version, but may be throw it into a translator?)

Didn’t read further but there are also some links provided that might be in English!

https://www.heise.de/news/Defektgefahr-Datenretter-raten-zu-Backups-von-aelteren-WD-Festplatten-10798732.html

In short: BACKUP NOW! Failure due to a firmware bug more than possible.

Edit: currently affected HDD from 2 TB to 6 TB. HDD with more capacity are not affected as of now. But pls. read complete article and BACKUP. Better safe than sorry…

12

@Bink I was able to confirm that yes. I copied the last parts of my tv show collection to it and it is still silent.

@PeterRies I read the article and the 4-6 TB are affected. I will backup the important and hard to get stuff, I don’t care about the other movies.

Any recommendations for a 4-10 TB HDD for movie and tv show collection or is SSD the better option for such usecase? The hdd is only up when my pc is on and only mounted when i watch a movie or transfer data to, so it does not have to be very durable. My 1,5 TB hdd is still in good condition after 18 years.

13

The price you pay, whether SSD or traditional HDD, will largely be reflective of performance.

If performance and reliability don’t matter much to you, the options are pretty simple: something cheap.

1 Like
14

Could it be that the sound that i heard was just defragmentation? I transfered 1,5 TB of movies to the drive and after that the ticking every second started.
Could it be that the drive transfers the data as fast as possible and after that it starts the defragmentation process.

15

If it’s a different sound to what it’s making when data is being transferred, I’d be concerned.

That is, is it a distinctively different tick, unlike regular data read/read?

16

So after hearing the ticking sound again, I sold the drive and i will try to get 4 TB SSD for the same price.

Thank you to all your comments.

Noise outside the usual = Bad sign, even when the smart values are good, short summary.

1 Like
17

I hope that you told new owner that it’s potentially faulty.

3 Likes
18

You may want to keep that money available. Someone might want it back.

2 Likes
19

I bought the drive last week used, so I sold it again. The original seller denied hearing any noise and i am so annoyed by the PWL every 5 seconds. I wanted to buy a HDD, not a ticking watch. There is no ticking only the 5 second one.

20

It’s a mechanical drive so the arm or head is catching as it rotates. I think you’ll probably have to replace it.