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Clicking/Grinding Noises Regular?

S

Sobering

macrumors regular
Original poster
Hey I'm a new Mac user (1 week old 😀) and my Mac when I first boot or load programs or load some web pages my iMac 17" makes a weird clicking/grinding noise. I've heard other computers do this but my five year old Dell Pc dosn't even do that. Just wondering if it's normal or if theres something wrong.

Thanks 🙂
 
clicking noises seem OK (i think) but grinding? how loud is it? what area of your iMac does it seem to be coming from?
 
It's not so much grinding just like when I boot up a program I'll get little clicks coming from the iMac. My friend says it's from the HD but I know nothing about computers.
 
i've heard similar noises (i think). The best way i can describe what i'm thinking of is a ball dropping and bouncing onto something (like a gum ball in one of those 20c machines where the ball drops to the bottom)

Is this the noise you mean?
 
No not really lol. I will video tape me on my computer and post a link. It's very faint, I think it is a regular noise. It dosn't nessecarily sound bad.
 
usually any clicking noises coming from the hard drive indicate the hard drive is failing. i would back up the contents of your HD and take your machine to the nearest apple store ASAP so they can swap it for a new one.
 
Thing is I don't even live anywhere near an Apple store! I bought it at London Drugs (like a Wal-Mart with a Best Buy attached 😛). I do have Apple warranty though, could I give them a call?
 
Hard drives do make noise when in use. I think what you're describing is normal. If they're faint, well correlated with hard drive activity and you haven't noticed any problems that seem to be hard-drive related, I think you're fine. All of my Macs (all of my computers for that matter) make noise when the hard drive is being accessed.
 
Yeah thats what I was thinking. It's just when I start doing stuff like opening a program it's quite faint. Then it stops after the program is loaded and once and a while I'll get a short millisecond little click here and there. I think it's all good.
 
The HD on every PC I have had is/was really loud. More than just noticable. The XP machine I have now isnt as loud as the old 98 machine I had (which literally sounded like thunder), but its noticable from across the room. My Mac however, is the quitest computer I've ever owned. But of course
 
pianoman said:
usually any clicking noises coming from the hard drive indicate the hard drive is failing. i would back up the contents of your HD and take your machine to the nearest apple store ASAP so they can swap it for a new one.
Click to expand...

Mine has made soft, intermittant clicking noises from day one. Bought it (17" PB) in May of 2004, still going strong.
 
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