Hard Drive Squeaking

[Bussani]

My hard drive has started making odd squeaking noises, as well as bit of a grinding noise when it turns off, which probably means it's starting to fail.

I've backed up just about everything, but I was wondering if it's possible to copy the entire contents of the hard drive into a new one, make that the primary hard drive, and have everything still work? Save the need to reinstall everything.

I'm not much of a hardware person, but would this work?

[Tumbleweed36]

There is a program called XXClone that is free and it will do exactly what you want. Most of the techs on this forum use that program for their personal computers. Here is the link:

XXClone and if you need any information about this program then read the
XXclone Tutorial

[Bussani]

Thanks for the advice! That sounds perfect.

Unfortunately while I'm sure the HDD is making an odd noise as it stops, I'm now wondering if the other noise is coming from the power supply unit. Oh well, we'll see.

[Tumbleweed36]

Do your backup ASAP, then we will worry about the other issue.

[Bussani]

I'll have to wait about a week to get my new HDD to do a proper cloning, but I have everything important backed up already. Till then I'm just using my laptop anyway.

[Bussani]

One question just for clarification; XXClone will make a complete copy of the drive, right? Operating system, installed programs AND files (pictures, videos, documents, etc)? And then I should just be able to put the new drive in place of the old one as if nothing has changed?

[Tumbleweed36]

Yep, that is what I use and it works like a charm. Just do the clone and try it before you destroy the original. Always best to do that in any case.

[Bussani]

Yeah, definitely. I'm the cautious type so I'll probably keep the original around for a while just in case.

Thanks again.

[Tumbleweed36]

You are most welcome. Let us know how it comes out for you. Have a great weekend.

[Bussani]

Okay, I switched out the power supply unit with one from one of my older machines and that got rid of the high pitched noise I was hearing. It was the kind of noise that echoed, which is why I thought it was the HDD at first.

That said, the HDD is still making a thudding/bumping noise as it stops, like something's out of balance. New HDD should arrive on Friday, so I'll do the cloning then just to be safe.

One more question; using XXClone, if there's any data on the target drive to begin with, is it just overwritten? Or do you need to format the new drive in a certain way before using XXClone?

[Tumbleweed36]

XXClone should take care of that when you enable the "cool tools" that will redo the mbr and other necessary options.

[Bussani]

I just got through installing the new drive and cloning the old one. I ended up using Acronis True Image instead of XXClone, since my pushy friend insisted it worked wonders for him. So far so good. I have the original drive if anything goes wrong.

Thanks for all the help Tumbleweed36.

[Tumbleweed36]

You are most welcome and acronis is a great program, but not always free. Have a great weekend.