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I have the click + beep

  • Yes - 6/09 MBP with 7200 rpm drive

    Votes: 64 58.7%
  • No - 6/09 MBP with 7200 rpm drive

    Votes: 30 27.5%
  • Yes - earlier MBP with 7200 rpm drive

    Votes: 4 3.7%
  • No - earlier MBP with 7200 rpm drive

    Votes: 11 10.1%

  • Total voters
    109
Having had a Genius appointment - spoke to Genius who recommended I could get it serviced in store, but said that for this issue with a new MBP, it's legitimate to request a new machine to get shipped out, and to put this plainly politely and firmly. I wonder what a "goodwill gesture" is? Not using UPS? Here goes another 5-7 (+1) business days.
Youtube video of my version of click beep here - sounds different to some of the other ones, but similar to wessto's wav file.

Thank you for posting this. My beep is exactly the same as yours, although I've never had it do it that many times in a row. I occasionally have it happen 2-3 times in a row, but usually its only once. I'll update my other threads original post with this link. Thank you again.
 
Thank you for posting this. My beep is exactly the same as yours, although I've never had it do it that many times in a row. I occasionally have it happen 2-3 times in a row, but usually its only once. I'll update my other threads original post with this link. Thank you again.

What did you go for in the end? Swap out the HD with a new one, or exchange the MBP? Just wondering, as the Apple rep mentioned possibility of a goodwill gesture (not sure what though, so don't know if they could have bumped the CPU to 3GHz for free) though might have to wait 2 weeks to find out. Will hopefully have an order confirmation sometime today/tomorrow at least for the replacement. Luckily you can get to choose the time the courier comes to pick up the chirping MBP, so you can use that till the new one comes. WIll be interesting to see how many have this - the Apple thread seemed to have >20-30 people with it already.

Edit - the Apple thread here. Seems there are some posts of extra vibration from the 7200rpm drive too.

When the genius booted off an external drive, she did comment that it was running pretty slow. Not sure if this was due to the booting from USB, or whether it was as she stated, a problem with the MBP.
http://discussions.apple.com/messageview.jspa?messageID=9710458&stqc=true The hard drive screech or scratch seems to be another issue/normal noise? http://discussions.apple.com/thread.jspa?threadID=2053824&tstart=105
 
Thanks for the youtube link t0mat0. That's the exactnoise I'm getting as well, although never that many times in a row. Let me know how things go with Apple. The Apple store near me has ordered another drive but I'm concerned after getting it replaced I'll still have the issue. I'd rather find out if this is a MBP problem, HD problem, or software/firmware problem before getting it replaced. Anyone know what we can do to find that out?
 
Thanks for the youtube link t0mat0. That's the exactnoise I'm getting as well, although never that many times in a row. Let me know how things go with Apple. The Apple store near me has ordered another drive but I'm concerned after getting it replaced I'll still have the issue. I'd rather find out if this is a MBP problem, HD problem, or software/firmware problem before getting it replaced. Anyone know what we can do to find that out?
With the results of booting up on an external drive showing sluggishness, it suggested a HD hardware issue for me, others might have a responsive drive, but with the clicking and beeping - which may be hardware, firmware, software...

Knowing the lead time it takes to get a replacement out, what I paid for this new computer, and the view of the Genius I saw, I went ahead and asked for a replacement off the bat - gives Apple a week or two to figure out the problem! I'm guessing there are 7200rpm 17" AG mid 2009 MBPs out there, right :) I guess the shop store demo models run on the 5000rpm drives - will have to check.

Another strange thing I've noticed come on yesterday, was this tingly vibration sensation (will try and find the thread talking about it) - you run a hand over anywhere round the keyboard and trackpad up to the screen and it'll feel a vibration through the surface. If you have a hand pushing down on the surface, it goes, suggesting the hard drive is causing the vibration which you can dampen down through downwards palm pressure. The other thread on a similar line about the Hard drive, is the flexible bottom panel - there are some queries on how much it should flex when pressed with a finger - what degree of rigidity it should have at different points along the bottom panel.
I'll probably call aftersales tech support to see if they've heard more - the Apple support thread should have some more info soon (I disagree with the last post I saw on there, which said sit tight - yes you can, but if it does vary from MBP to MBP, may as well get onto searching for an exchange model that doesn't have the issues).
 
Just to keep these threads in sync, as I posted at

http://discussions.apple.com/thread.jspa?threadID=2049659&tstart=0

I got some unhelpful feedback from apple engineers regarding the bug that I posted. They told me to take it to a Genius bar because it sounded like hard drive failure. I had already taken it to Genius bar and they said they had not heard that sound before and it was not a typical hard drive failure sound.

Anyone have any other updates on this? I'm getting anxious every minute there is no official response.
 
So I added a poll to this thread. Let's try to get some sort of a consensus on who this is happening to.
 
Mine is a Hitachi 320GB 5400RPM, but then when the computer receives a small shock, or movement of any kind in a vertical motion, there is a tiny metallic clinking noise, as if the hard drive was disrupted. It is almost the same sound as what happens when you hold the power button, but more metallic and less electronic. The drive checks out to be okay, and I know that it is not the optical drive because I checked by disabling the drive. Do you think that this is an oversensitive drive shock sensor, or is it something more serious?
 
Thanks for the youtube link t0mat0. That's the exactnoise I'm getting as well, although never that many times in a row. Let me know how things go with Apple. The Apple store near me has ordered another drive but I'm concerned after getting it replaced I'll still have the issue. I'd rather find out if this is a MBP problem, HD problem, or software/firmware problem before getting it replaced. Anyone know what we can do to find that out?

You could hear something on that video? All I heard was hiss and some kid making noise. I could see the guy reflected clearly in his MirrorBook Pro, though!
 
I am experiencing strange mechanical (clicking) noise without a beep sound. And it happens at irregular intervals. My voice recorder caught it last night, and I wanted you guys to listen to it, but .WMA file format isn't supported by MR or YouTube :(
 
Oh come on. First we have the 1.5/3.0Gb SATA threads, now this? A hard drive will make sounds. Less so than before. My white MacBook would make a zip type of sound when waking up from sleep. The drive head was parked during sleep and once the CPU wanted info, the head had to spin while the disk was spinning. That made noise. Now, there's a buffer before CPU and HD so the head will not spin while the drive is spinning.

To make it simpler, the hard drive will beep and make occasional sounds. It is MECHANICAL. The disk SPINS and the drive head does move rather quickly. Its 7,200 RPM drive, of course it will make sounds. The 5,400 RPM drive spins slower so less chance of noises and beeps. It's perfectly normal
 
Oh come on. First we have the 1.5/3.0Gb SATA threads, now this? A hard drive will make sounds. Less so than before. My white MacBook would make a zip type of sound when waking up from sleep. The drive head was parked during sleep and once the CPU wanted info, the head had to spin while the disk was spinning. That made noise. Now, there's a buffer before CPU and HD so the head will not spin while the drive is spinning.

To make it simpler, the hard drive will beep and make occasional sounds. It is MECHANICAL. The disk SPINS and the drive head does move rather quickly. Its 7,200 RPM drive, of course it will make sounds. The 5,400 RPM drive spins slower so less chance of noises and beeps. It's perfectly normal


Of course mecanical noise is normal... The clicking seams to be mecanial and might be normal. But the beep, don't tell me it's mecanical! It is a beep... made by the hard drive. Apple should bring us a frimware update to remove this beep if possible. It's not lound, but it is still anoying, especialy when you need to use your laptop in super silence room.
 
Last night when I closed the lid to put the computer to sleep, my computer kept waking up and going to sleep agian every minute, clicking and beeping each time. I had to shut the computer down just to keep the thing off. This is ridiculous. What's up with Apples QC? Did nobody on their end experience this issue before these 500GB 7200 drives were offered in these computers? It's the kind of thing that makes me hope it's a hard drive issue, as it would be extremely irresponsible of Apple to have let this issue through.

Do we know if it's an OSX issue rather than a HD issue? I think heard somewhere that it doesn't happen in boot camp but does happen in Linux.
 
Oh come on. First we have the 1.5/3.0Gb SATA threads, now this? A hard drive will make sounds. Less so than before. My white MacBook would make a zip type of sound when waking up from sleep. The drive head was parked during sleep and once the CPU wanted info, the head had to spin while the disk was spinning. That made noise. Now, there's a buffer before CPU and HD so the head will not spin while the drive is spinning.

To make it simpler, the hard drive will beep and make occasional sounds. It is MECHANICAL. The disk SPINS and the drive head does move rather quickly. Its 7,200 RPM drive, of course it will make sounds. The 5,400 RPM drive spins slower so less chance of noises and beeps. It's perfectly normal

none of the 7200 rpm drives I've used in either desktop or notebook systems, mac or pc, have ever made this sound and yes I've used a lot of them. It's a given that hard drives make noise, we are not arguing that they shouldn't. This is clearly a deviation from normal.
 
Well, my Intel SSD makes the same noise when it wakes up from deep sleep. I won't call it clicking, i think it's what you guys refer to as beeping. "Te...de....".

It did have the same 'noise' when I had the 5400 hitachi stock hard drive.
 
Oh come on. First we have the 1.5/3.0Gb SATA threads, now this? A hard drive will make sounds. Less so than before.

This is not a normal hard drive sound. The beep is distinct, louder than clicks, and also causes a total system pause.

Someone put up a better YouTube video of it here:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cGDuAtEX8EA

It is loud enough that the guy sitting a few feet away from me can hear it. The system hiccups are annoying enough that my 3 year old MBP seems a lot more appealing than it used to...
 
You could hear something on that video? All I heard was hiss and some kid making noise. I could see the guy reflected clearly in his MirrorBook Pro, though!

Happy to put up a better video - it was merely to confirm the basic noises. The hiss would be a fault with the new iPhone 3GS with the ringer not on silent. If you cant hear the click beep then maybe turn up the volume? And the reflection is curious as it shows more with phone's video than when looking at screen in person.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=X5WPNwtlwd0

Is anyone else getting a strong vibration around the keyboard and monitor due to the drive - seems pretty noticeable - can either feel it when just touching back of monitor, or if moving hand at all on palm rest, can feel the resonance.
 
Hope the new has the same error.

I have a MacBook Pro 17" 2.8 GHz 500 GB / 7200 RPM and it also says a sound one time in between. It is the same as we are talking about. My previous MacBook Pro 17" 2.66 GHz said the same, just with a smaller sound. 2.66 GHz, I returned and got the money again. Ordered as a 2.8 GHz and it says the same sound as yours. I called Apple and they sent me a new one. I got a new order number and email so that I could follow it. So it's service.

Hope the new has the same error.
 
Any updates?

Hello all,

Just curious to know if anyone experiencing this has any new information on a fix or knowledge of apple working to resolve this problem. Its kind of frustrating not knowing how to fix this issue.
 
Happy to put up a better video - it was merely to confirm the basic noises. The hiss would be a fault with the new iPhone 3GS with the ringer not on silent. If you cant hear the click beep then maybe turn up the volume? And the reflection is curious as it shows more with phone's video than when looking at screen in person.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=X5WPNwtlwd0

Is anyone else getting a strong vibration around the keyboard and monitor due to the drive - seems pretty noticeable - can either feel it when just touching back of monitor, or if moving hand at all on palm rest, can feel the resonance.

I am not getting a vibration on mine.
 
Ok -- I just got my MBP 17" with the 500/7200 drive. I have the click beep issue that people are talking about in this thread. I am not clear as to the fix. I called Apple Support and they said that no one has reported this issue. I find that hard to believe. They guy really had no info for me. The laptop seems to work fine otherwise. Sometimes it can go for several minutes with no click/beep, other times it does the click/beep a couple of times in a row.

Do we know if this can be solved by a firmware update? Or, is this a hardware problem and I need to get the drive swapped out?

If I need it swapped out, can the local Apple store do this? I do not want to return it because this is the second one I have received. The first one had a scratch below the keyboard area.

What should I do? Thanks!
 
Issue reported to Apple Support

I can confirm that at least one other user has reported it to them. I spoke with an Apple rep and have a case id for the issue. He had me try to boot with a couple different boot key combos, but none of the attempts helped. I have frequent backups, but I guess I'll take it in to the store to see about a replacement. It seems a bit hopeless since no one has gotten an answer from Apple about what exactly is going on, why, and what needs to be done to fix it.

My configuration is 15" MBP, 3.06ghz, 4GB ram, 500GB 7200pm faildrive. The Apple Support email referred to it as "MacBook Pro (15-inch Mid 2009)".

[Edit]
I spoke with Apple Support yesterday, June 29 at ~5:00PM EST.
 
had a 13" unibody MB with the 500.4 7200 RPM seagate. no beeps. than i got a 17" june 2009 MBP. I have got one beep so far. about 3 days ago..

once people noticed the beeps, is it consistent?
 
had a 13" unibody MB with the 500.4 7200 RPM seagate. no beeps. than i got a 17" june 2009 MBP. I have got one beep so far. about 3 days ago..

once people noticed the beeps, is it consistent?

My beeps have not been consistent. Sometimes they'll happen a few consecutively and sometimes there will be only one in an hour. Sometimes they'll happen when the laptop is moving (slight movements) and sometimes they'll happen when the laptop is stationary.
 
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