Computer help forum: Multiple HDD's dying - Grinding at startup - NEED HELP!

Do we presume they were not new or came without warranty? You said the hard drives make a grinding sound but then normalize. Are you finding that the PCs do not boot properly as well? There are hard drive diagnostics one can perform. While maybe far fetched, I'd wonder if the power supplies are on the weak side and not providing enough initial current to spin the drives up.

The PC's are fairly new, bought within the last 6-7 months. They are not under warranty but the company "Cyberpower" who built them to spec has offered to replace any faulty parts. The issue here being that I don't know what the faulty part is right now since at this point the HDD doesn't seem to actually be the source of the problem.

Regarding the HDDs, now that I've seen the problem happen to multiple HDDs I have the situation down pretty well.

-When the problem first begins the grinding sound happens loudly for about 30 seconds when the machine is first powered on but then normalizes and runs great.
-After 3-5 boots the grinding during boot-up becomes louder and longer with more noise in the mix.
-After 5-10 boots the machine still normalizes but performance is getting notably worse.
-After 10-13 boots the machine fails to boot up and asks for an OS to be installed. Upon launching windows setup the OS cannot find the HDD to install on (signaling that it's dead).

Currently they each have an 800w power supply. Though I will admit it's a stock brand and probably not the best quality.

All in all, you really haven't told us the whole PC make-up. What brand or model#, or DIY build. Even, if this continues to need to zero-on, testing one PC in order to resolve it all. Make 100% sure that the HDs are dying as in they don't boot-up anymore or reflect bad s/w results. I mention that as other items can cause a grinding noise, most notably,
"fans".
As for any lacking PSU issues, besides if they're simply cheap. I suggest you visit the www.newegg.com and find the PSU calculator section and enter the parameters of possible watts used. Then add 100W to that total to get a real feel of what's needed and anything bigger is a plus to include a decent brand name. Also, if you have a huge GPU needs this too has to be addressed, what it really needs.

Finally, what warranty do you have. After all, some 2 wks. into ownership and you got HDs grinding(if so) is not a good sign.

tada -----Willy

Thanks Willy,

I included much of these details in my response to the post above but the computer was built by a custom shop out in california called Cyberpower and most of the hardware is name brand. The PSUs are stock however so if quality is a serious issue that may be it.

Currently the PSU is 800w and the broad specs are as follow:

NVIDIA GTX560
AMD FX-6100 3.3GHZ
KINGSTON HYPER-X 4 GB DDR3/ 1600 MHZ x 2
BLACK CAVIAR WESTERN DIGITAL 7200 RPM 1TB

Ah, CyberPower, please don't even play around with these people. Start the return process, to have this happen is just not right. While, i can't say for sure, you maybe a victim of recycled parts, etc.. Don't let this drag on, demand your money back. I get the feeling they will drag this out past the initial warranty and put point you the manufacturer warranty or similar. Just google CyberPower for what at times are very unhappy owners. Some oweners complain about sloppy work too, so its not always the delivery people causing issues. Sorry....

tada -----Willy

Willy,

Thanks for the help.

When you say "return process" are you talking about for the entire machine? I highly doubt they would do that at this point, it's been quite a few months.

Or simply a single component or two?

The majority of the hardware is name-brand so I'm not too concerned about those pieces outside of the stock PSU.

What do you recommend?

You're now into a warranty area issue as I view this. They will once you start suggest this or that and/or what if there some warranty service involved. Usually, this falls on your capable hands what you can do and/or follow instructions via phone or postings. You can decline and send it all back and let them fix it and be waiting for its return. At the same time for both of these to be having big problems also makes me wonder and only bad thoughts come to mind. Now because of warranty repair, using recycled parts or refurbed, etc., is all quite normal in the business, so now you're at their mercy of a good fix. It's your choice and expense for any S/H unless proven otherwise(yeah right). You can also politely demand that considering your problems, they replace as whole units the PCs involved or ask for your money back, minus some. Of course this is all in the fine print. You will now understand the warranty, what it does or can't do for you.

I don't think I can offer anything more, unless your resolve to fix this at your expense. Checkout these PSU, understand why they're expensive, as they work well: http://www.pcpowerandcooling.com Any other decent brand should be well over 100W over your needs for a good match. Just hwo good is your PC case coolings? Heat stress, destroys under-cooled PCs as well as overstuffed PCs.

tada -----Willy

The HDDs haven't been tested because they've completely failed prior to that point.

Additionally, we bought both Windows 7 licenses from the manufacturer of the PC so I don't have any idea if they're cracked or what. Although both times I've been able to use the provided license key without issue.

You seem to be into electronic repairs so it's time to measure what you can.

Also, I had a client with over 100 bad drives. Well they were bad in their machine. And they could not be formatted. It was quite a test to show them that most were fine on another machine and how we had to use some other than Microsoft CD/DVD to clear them of the bad content.

Bob