The hard drive makes clicking, screeching or scraping
noises.
The hard drive is not "seen" by the computer
when connected. It does not show up in "System Devices" in
Windows or "System Profiler" on a Mac.
The actual hard drive device is "seen" by
the computer but the files are not accessible.
Slow, sluggish or erratic operation.
The "hour glass" in Windows or “spinning
beach ball” on a Mac frequently appears during operation and the computer
seems "sluggish" or does not respond for periods of time.
The computer will not boot or hangs during boot.
High levels of read retries or remapped sectors
appear in SMART status tools.
There is apparent corruption of the file system.
Some files or folders will not open or take a long
time to open.
Common Causes
This is a fairly common problem.
The computer slow down is caused
by the hard drive attempting multiple read and write retries in bad
areas.
Can be caused by head crash
when the heads contact the spinning platters or by contamination inside
the hard drive.
Continuing
to use the drive, create a normal image of the drive allowing data recovery
software to run for hours or even days may cause additional damage.
