01-19-2010, 07:23 PM

The only thing I hate about my mac. I don't know why there's so much confusion about this. The **** clicking in my macbook pro 13" hard drive.
In mine, it's a low subtle click that happens every 60-90 sec.

I heard it all, The sms, it's a normal, it happens at startup, the heads are parking, the 7200rpm drives do this, only the 5600rpm do this, it's this or that brand hard drive.
My brother and I have the same macbooks except mine has a faster processor and his doesn't click.
Well after a month of searching and talking on forums I finally broke down and called applecare, spoke to two different techs, pressed assorted buttons in a gymnastic fashion and ran hard drive checks.....
The result, they absotively posilutely informed me that my hard drive should not click at all, except maybe with the sms on a sudden movement. I have an appointment at the apple store so the mac "genius" can look at it, but I've seen this movie, he'll tell me he can't hear it (noisy store), and that he's never "heard" of this problem before.
I'm a little angry at this point. I'll keep you posted on this issue after I see the genius on friday.

01-19-2010, 08:09 PM

Wait till the Genius on fri......
Your hard drive should NEVER make clicking noises unless it is faulty or dying!
I don't know about this rubbish... "I've seen this movie, he'll tell me he can't hear it (noisy store), and that he's never "heard" of this problem before." , but don't fret, just back up your system onto an external HD, and on Friday, if you are still under warranty, or even just a little over, you will more than likely have your HD replaced.

01-19-2010, 08:43 PM

Originally Posted by 6string

Wait till the Genius on fri......
Your hard drive should NEVER make clicking noises unless it is faulty or dying!
I don't know about this rubbish... "I've seen this movie, he'll tell me he can't hear it (noisy store), and that he's never "heard" of this problem before." , but don't fret, just back up your system onto an external HD, and on Friday, if you are still under warranty, or even just a little over, you will more than likely have your HD replaced.

Well, that's not necessarily true. The heads parking will make a clicking noise, as will the heads moving rapidly across the disk in a quiet setting. It should not clunk loudly and repeatedly in a rhythmic fashion - that's the sign of a mechanical failure in the drive mechanism.

As I understand it, some Seagate models suffer from this issue and it's well documented on Apple's own forums. If they swap it with a WD drive, it should go away, although I will tell you that WD drives vibrate more (and have more of a hiss in a quiet setting) in my experience.

OP: Does the machine function properly? If so, a wise man once had the following line in his sig...

"Being happy doesn't mean everything's perfect, it means you've decided to see beyond the imperfections."

01-19-2010, 09:23 PM

Agreed, however, for me I have never suffered clicking other than HD failure, and cheap external WD which I believe is on it's way out after years of abuse. In saying that, I like the wise man's saying, even if I lean towards the perfectionists side of the fence

01-19-2010, 11:44 PM

Well everything thing works fine. No sluggishness or pauses. Just this subtle clicking sound and worrying that I may have a defective HD.
The problem is the overall inconclusive solution to this issue. There isn't a general concensus on what causes this, just what seems to be random anecdotes.

01-20-2010, 12:26 AM

Main thing is to keep current backups with time machine, even better, use Carbon Copy Cloner - Home or SuperDuper! and keep current bootable backups in case of the hard drive dying.
Otherwise, as I said earlier, if you are still under warranty, get it seen to Friday, and if you are way out of warranty, just as long as you have those bootable backups and everything is running smoothly, there is really no need to worry.
Worst case scenario, the Hard Drive does dies, you get it replaced then, and meanwhile, you can still boot from the external hard drive and use your machine.

01-20-2010, 11:56 AM

Thanx, I'm also now looking for an online backup service.

01-22-2010, 01:31 PM

So if you're wondering, today I took my macbk pro 13" in for the hard drive clicking. The genius was very helpful and knowledgeable. He knew about the clicking complaints.

He fed me the heads parking and sms lines. I didn't bite. Of course he couldn't hear the clicking in the store, but that's why I recorded it on my Iphone . However. there wasn't a need for that just yet. I told him I heard all the reasons I'd read cause the clicking with the explanations, but my brother who has the came mac as I do (as well as some here) don't have any clicking of any kind.
He took it to the back to check it out and came back with paper work for me to sign for my new hard drive.
He said he didn't hear the clicking but wanted to be safe because as a general rule the hard drive shouldn't click.
Yes, he. said. the. hard. drive. shouldn't. click.

Btw, there were a few people with mac issues there also as you would expect, one with an imac with messed up screen issues and guess what another person with a clicking hard drive that had failed. To be fair, his was a black one.
I'm extremely pleased with apple and this has confirmed me as a customer. Whether the genius just appeased me or didn't want to admit that there really was a problem, he was very helpful and knowledgeable.

In summation, clicking not good.