McMaster

Hi there, the problem with the clicking noises which can be heard every few seconds, even if the hard drive is not being accessed, also annoyed me very much. Unfortunately, in my research, I found that it is a feature of most newer hard drives. So, unfortunately, it is normal. At least at Western Digital, this feature is called PWL "Preventive Wear Leveling". But other manufacturers probably do the same. It's a periodic head sweep to distribute lubricant and prevent wear in a particular place if lubricant were to build up in one spot. On many older models, this would happen maybe once a minute. But on some builds it's maybe every 5 seconds. If that happens in a raid system in the server room, it's not that bad, but it drives me crazy on my desktop. Unfortunately, this feature and the associated problem is very poorly communicated by the manufacturers, which I consider to be quite a failure. If they are even aware of it. I also tried to get in touch with the technical support of WD to find out whether there is a possibility to deactivate this feature, but unfortunately it is almost impossible to find someone there who has the competence or even just knows that this feature exists. I then spoke to an employee who knew the feature, but he said that's just the way it is and I also don't know whether something can be done against it. A very frustrating experience and I find it very embarrassing for WD. I don't know if Seagate is better there. in the end it made little sense to swap all possible hard drives. that wouldn't have changed anything. My solution is not to screw the hard drive to the housing. it is now lying loosely on a foam mat in the case so that I can no longer hear the clickind noise. Not perfect but it works. i hope i could help someone with this.