"Richard Urban" <richardurbanREMOVETHIS@xxxxxx> wrote in message
news:uWHAucE9JHA.288@xxxxxx
Quote:
> FOOD FOR THOUGHT
>
> I was talking to Western Digital today and they gave me an RMA to
> return a "defective" 1 gig hard drive that sounded like a garbage
> truck for the past 4-5 days. I could hear the drive in the next room
> while watching television. I'm glad to say I don't have to return the
> drive.
>
> Today I downloaded the beta of Microsoft Security Essentials for
> testing purposes. I uninstalled Avast and installed MSE. After a
> reboot (I always do this after an install) the hard drive was quiet!
> The drive had previously sounded like the heads were slamming into the
> stops. What a noise. I also checked my processes in Task Manager and
> found that one Avast process had over 22 **BILLION** read accesses
> within 1/2 hour after booting up.
>
> Anyway, all now seems well. I guess it was an Avast update that
> started my main hard drive going spastic.
I don't see how that is possible. I would still be very suspicious of
the harddrive. Thrashing can be software related, but doesn't quite
reach "garbage truck" level - not like defective bearings would.