Noises from PC

[Guest]

I have incurred problem with noises coming from the PC
and there were times XP would not load up upon booting
while the noises were going on. The noises can be
described as a series of 4 to 5 short grinding noises
followed by what might be the sound when something is
loading up. This cycle could continue for 1-2 minutes.

For a while, the noises stopped on their own and all
worked well. Now I just installed some XP updates and as
the install process started, the noises started up again.
Nothing can be done on the PC until the noises stop -
typically a minute and then the PC works well for another
minute but a cycle of noise/install continues.

Do we know a cause/solution?

Thanks.

 

[Blane]

It sounds like you might have some hard disk or file system problems.

I would first run chkdsk against the drive, this might find some errors and
correct them. I have heard similar noises when the filesystem has become
corrupt and the system is trying to load a file from that section of the
disk. To run chkdsk, right click on the driver letter and go to
properties. From the properties dialog box, choose tools and click on the
"check now" button. Another window will pop up and choose "Automatically
fix the file system errors" and "Scan for and attempt recovery of bad
sectors". The system will then probably prompt you and tell you that a
reboot is required to perform this.

Another good house keeping task is to defragment the drive. This probably
is not your problem, but it is a good practice to perform.

If that does not solve the problem, then it sounds like you might have a
failing hard drive. If that is the case you will probably need to purchase
a new one and migrate over to that.

Best regards,
Blane Clark


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