Whoa...Crazy Mini Noise?

[$MacUser$]

I've been sitting here working/typing the past few hours. My new 5,1 as quiet as it has typically been.

Out of the clear blue sky it made this fairly loud, kind of scratchy sounding WAHH-CLUNK. It's late and quiet, and made me jump. And I would def not categorize this as any kind of normal HDD or other noise.

So, uh, thoughts? The computer didn't skip a beat at all...no hang up, restart or other weirdness besides the sound, which stopped as fast as it had happened.

Oddly enough, I seemed to hear a beeping of electronic equipment from my neighbor's immediately after the mini noise. Could it have been aliens or a gamma ray burst or something screwing with electronics?

EDIT: It retrospect there's a small chance it could have come from my time machine drive, but I'm fairly certain it came from the machine itself.

 

[spacesamurai]

That is a very interesting problem. My Mac Mini 5,2 will giving little noises, but nothing like the explosion you describe. I can tell for the noises that mine are from the disk, but it is hard to think you have the same problem. Is you box showing you any issues? From my experience, large noises come from the fan, but how is that running?

At most, I would like to say aliens seem to be messing around with you and your Mac. Coincidence or evil plot?

 

[$MacUser$]

It just did it again...a loud SQUEAL...like, NAAAAHHHHHH!!

...what the hell is wrong with this thing?

EDIT: Did a hardware test and it's reporting no trouble. Should I be concerned about this heinous banshee shriek, and if so what should I do about it?

 

[gabicava83]

That is strange.

Has it been knocked or anything at all?

It could be the bearing going.

I would take it to the store and demo it (book appointment before)

G

 

[$MacUser$]

Hasnt been knocked or anything at all. Literally just got it and hooked it up last Wednesday.

What's the demo thing accomplish? If I need to demonstrate the problem in store we'll be sitting there a while; it's only made this noise twice after a few hours of steady computing in the same night.

 

[MJL]

A noise I have heard a few times after changing to AHCI (now back to "normal" for Windows) is like the HDD heads were parked with force. SMART will seldom indicate a fatal upcoming crash. It is a sound which made me start to look for a SSD.

 

[gabicava83]

Hasnt been knocked or anything at all. Literally just got it and hooked it up last Wednesday.

What's the demo thing accomplish? If I need to demonstrate the problem in store we'll be sitting there a while; it's only made this noise twice after a few hours of steady computing in the same night.

Demo = replacement.

If it's brand new, phone up Apple Care, tell them the issue. Hopefully you can just avoid the demo and do a straight store replacement.

 

[$MacUser$]

Demo = replacement.

If it's brand new, phone up Apple Care, tell them the issue. Hopefully you can just avoid the demo and do a straight store replacement.

Have an appointment to speak to them tomorrow morning.

I'm curious, though...you say demo = replacement, but then say hopefully avoid the demo and do a straight store replacement? Not following? I'm not going to be getting some kind of "off the floor" demonstration model as a replacement, am I?

This is a real PITA. Should have just upgraded my 2,1.

 

[gabicava83]

Have an appointment to speak to them tomorrow morning.

I'm curious, though...you say demo = replacement, but then say hopefully avoid the demo and do a straight store replacement? Not following? I'm not going to be getting some kind of "off the floor" demonstration model as a replacement, am I?

This is a real PITA. Should have just upgraded my 2,1.

Apologies, it's my Spanglish, not making sense

Demo as in, if you demonstrate in-store having booked an appointment and you are within your return period, I am sure they would give you a new replacement straight away.

However it might be a well known issue and therefore you might not need to demonstrate the fault in the store and they will swap out your box for a brand new unit straight away.

Again, apologies.

Gabi.

 

[$MacUser$]

Well the good ol' apple store exchanged it out. They seem to think it was a hard drive issue...like one in a million (almost literally). Got a freshie. No issues to report.

 

[brentsg]

Well the good ol' apple store exchanged it out. They seem to think it was a hard drive issue...like one in a million (almost literally). Got a freshie. No issues to report.

Hard drive defects are actually pretty common.