Smoking hard drive

[leespooner]

just got a new 500 gig sata hard drive, plugged it in, turned on the pc and smoke started coming out of the drive!!! ahahahahhhh

i unplugged it str8 away, and u can see slight blistering on the bottom where it must of got hot inside.

Any ideas as to why this happened.

It says about putting the jumpers on to limit it to 1.5G mode, but i didnt,
Could this have caused it>???

Do u reckon the drive is now buggered or should i try it with the jumpers on n see if it works???

Cheers Lee

 

[SNGX1275]

Its dead. Jumpers don't matter. Either your PSU screwed up that rail, or the drive was faulty to begin with. Once you let the magic smoke out it never works again.

 

[Rick]

This was definitely an electronics problem. This had nothing to do with your configuration, settings or intervention... short of a fork in the socket... :hotouch:

 

[leespooner]

wat sort of problem u reckon, cos me pc is running fine,

reckon it was just a faulty drive?

 

[dmill89]

wat sort of problem u reckon, cos me pc is running fine,

reckon it was just a faulty drive?

My guess would be a bad resistor or voltage regulator on the HDDs PCB(however any short or bad component could have caused it). Given that everything else works the problem is most likely limited to the HDD itself.

 

[leespooner]

u reckon i'd get a replacement?

 

[Rick]

But of course, as long as it is within its warranty period... which is probably 5 years for a 500GB.

 

[foozy]

Yeah, definately just a faulty drive somehow. I'd be more inclined to say it was a wiring short that caused heat build up.

That's pretty awesome though, nothing says "dead component" like smoke billowing from your computer.

 

[Tedster]

undoubtably caused by a short to ground or an internal short. Consider the drive dead. Be glad you didn't have a major fire.
I would strongly consider replacing the PSU before you replace the HD.

 

[Samstoned]

dito on the new PSU
ya beat me to it
care taken mount the drive in the case rail that drive lays on may have caused short

 

[SNGX1275]

Good thing nobody suggested it could be either the power supply or the drive itself in the first reply...