HDD clicking on X41T - cache problem on the drive?

[nikemen]

I did this upgrade, since I didn't have much stuff on the drive, it didn't take much time to copy over all critical files.

It took about three minutes, it runs on reboot, and then hot patches the drives firmware, mine needed the patch.

Seems to work fine, the clicking has STOPPED, and there is no degradation to drive performance, as noted in a second run of HDTEST, which actually showed a bit of a speed pop.

[K0LO]

Wow, I wouldn't have believed that if I hadn't tried it myself. The noisy hard disk in the X41T has bothered me since the day I started using the machine. If the clicking noise (head parking) on the X41 hard disk bothers you, then try the firmware upgrade. My 60GB disk had firmware version 00P3A0B4, and after upgrading it now has version 00P3A0L0.

This firmware upgrade does not stop the head-parking noise, but it sure makes it a lot less bothersome. Before upgrading, my X41T would go "click-clunk" about once every 10 seconds when it was just sitting idle. After the upgrade it only does it about once every 3 or 4 minutes. If you are doing anything at all on the machine, the interval seems to extend. It's a LOT quieter now.

Highly recommended.

[mhca]

I have now updated my 40 GB drive on my X41 to the new firmware from 2. of May:
http://www-307.ibm.com/pc/support/site. ... 82#changes

It is called AOL2.

I used an USB key and an external USB CD-drive. I followed this guide:
http://forum.thinkpads.com/viewtopic.ph ... highlight=

I still had the CD lying in my external CD-drive which I hadn't used since September

I can't say if there is any audible difference with the new update, it's just nice to know that I have done what I could to improve my laptop


Regards Martin


PS. I probably won't be checking on this thread but if you need to get a hold of me for help with this a PM might be able to get my attention.

[The_Nox]

Hello,
Just a quick note to let you know that I finally managed to upgrade my hard drive's firmware by booting a dos network floppy over pxe and connecting to a network share.

You can find a complete guide on my Blog entry http://www.fritscher.ch/blog/2007/05/26 ... oting-dos/

And yes the clicking sound has significantly been reduced!

Good Luck

The_Nox

[danfoxley]

I updated my drives firmware by burning the ISO provided by IBM putting the files on USB flash drive, then burning and booting from the PC Doctor bootable CD.

PC Doctor for DOS bootable CD - ThinkPad
http://www-307.ibm.com/pc/support/site. ... 56222.html

I made sure to read the readme.txt included with the drive firmware files.

[mhca]

...
I used an USB key and an external USB CD-drive. I followed this guide:
http://forum.thinkpads.com/viewtopic.ph ... highlight=
...

I have now put the ISO image on my webpage
http://www.student.dtu.dk/~s052285/Blan ... FWHD44.iso

I don't know for how long I will keep it there but good luck with it if anybody wants to try it.

Regards
Martin

[blacktomb]

Folks, I am new to here. This is a very interesting topic that I have spent a lot time on. Here are something that I found:

1- It's something with the Hitachi HD settings, the firmware upgrade helps, but not permanently, I recently upgraded and solved it but it came back in several days. I guess the upgrading just correct some of the settings, but there must be something turned it back, I mean the settings. I have to say it's a bug.

2- It's related to XP, I am using a XP SP2. If you have enough time, just reinstall your laptop, because everytime I re-install (not upgrade OS), it goes away. of course, after several days, it will come back. Nightmare.

3- The performance when this issue comes, goes very bad. I have to say 3-4 times longer it takes to read or write files, roughly. A very simple way to test is hibernation, when it happens, it takes 5 minutes to go hibernation, I have 1G of memory, and normally the hibernation takes less than 1 minute. Another way is copy a file, say 100MB, you can see it takes minutes to finish when the bug comes out. If you use a tool, the reading throughput is about 2-3MBps compares over 10MBps normally.

4- I saw somebody discussing a tool from Hitachi, Feature Tool. I guess it should be helpful, because my guess is the setting of this HD is messed. I don't have the dock with me so I can't burn a bootable CD and I don't use floppy disk for a while (I even have some trouble spelling this word)

5- Not only X41 (that I am using), I had a T30 before and the issue is the same. How come it happenes for so many years but IBM didn't evet fix it?

I am on trip, and will let you folks know if it helps with the Feature tool..

[blacktomb]

Hi, I just got something new, and I think this solved this problem. MS has a KB 817472, which exactly explained why the performance of the hard disk reduced significantly.

MS described this issue and cause like this:

SYMPTOMS
After you suspending and resume your computer several times, hard disk performance may be reduced. If you use Device Manager to view the properties of the IDE channel towhich the drive is connected, the Advanced Settings tab may show that the current transfer mode for the drive is "PIO Mode."

CAUSE
After the Windows IDE/ATAPI Port driver (Atapi.sys) receives a cumulative total of six time-out or cyclical redundancy check (CRC) errors, the driver reduces the communications speed (the transfer mode) from the highest Direct Memory Access (DMA) mode to lower DMA modes in steps. If the driver continues to receive time-out or CRC errors, the driver eventually reduces the transfer mode to the slowest mode (PIO mode).

and the workaround. Please check http://support.microsoft.com/default.as ... -us;817472 if you are facing the same issue with XP.

[weepy]

Yes, this is be the problem of lowering DMA modes until it hits PIO. This patch increases the time of waiting for drives to resume from standby, which was originally set too low (4s).

[rainy.sun]

I am now confused of mixed threadings with firmware upgrade.

Is there any body found that the cache memory can be seen as 2MB on HD tune after upgrading firmware?

I am wondering if I should contact IBM/lenovo help service to issue of this disappeared cache memory on my HDD.

Enjoy thinkpading

[cristimm]

Did the firmware upgrade and the hdd clicking is almost gone.

Recomended!

[pktr5]

Hi,

I have found a 95% solution to one type of the clicking problem on X40 with the DK13FA-40 HDD. I just keep the HDD busy by repeatedly asking it to identify itself using the utility hdparm. I use a script/program to run the command "hdparm -i hda" every 150 miliseconds. This prevents the HDD from unloading/loading heads (or what) after inactivity as short as 250 ms, which was the source of the clicking. Having the HDD do some uncached reads would work as well, but hdparm -i is better.

hdparm for windows can be downloaded at
http://hdparm-win32.dyndns.org/hdparm/

The little program for executing hdparm every 150 ms, I can send to you by e-mail or upload it somewhere, if there would be interest.

Other solutions didn't help -- the firmware upgrade is not for this HDD, changing APM didn't help as well. But it was helpful to eliminate all programs/activities which performed periodic writes to the hdd, e.g. firewall logging (the utility Filemon was great for identifying processes responsible for the writes).

A disadvantage is that running hdparm periodically creates a few % CPU load. I have also not much tested whether this method doesn't interfere with hibernation, battery life, etc.

edit: Warning -- today, after running hdparm for several hours, my HDD made a banging noise so loud it really scared me, I thought it was dead. Fortunately, it seems to be OK, but I won't be trying my luck anymore...

[Mr. Goodbar]

Did the firmware upgrade and the hdd clicking is almost gone.

Recomended!

Based on positive responses like, I thought the FW upgrade would solve my clicking problem too, but it did not. I have the HTC426040G9AT00 with FW level 00P4A0L2, and the clicking noise is unremitting - every few seconds. Moving to plan B: another drive. *sigh*

[ckwbff]

Here's the executable for you can run without using a boot cd: http://www-307.ibm.com/pc/support/site. ... harddrives

I'm still getting clicking.

[ReCreate]

wut your signature says you have an SSD

[Droider]

It is an old thread but if anyone happens to miss a dvd drive like me and fail to update their X40/41 hdd firmware through windows or dos, i came up with a simple solution. You just need a usb flash drive, rufus and WinImage software.

winimage : http://www.winimage.com/download.htm
rufus : https://rufus.ie
http://download.lenovo.com/ibmdl/pub/pc ... hdl2ef.exe

* Download the X40/41 firmware update utility for windows and run from your windows10 desktop and don't close the hdd utility yet.
* Press Windows key + R and type %temp%
* Locate FWHDL2AT.IMG file and open it with WinImage. This is the floppy drive image. Extract all contents of it to a new folder in your desktop.
* Close WinImage, we are done with it.
* Start rufus and format usb drive with freedos.
* Copy the extracted hdd firmware files into the usb drive. Do not overwrite anything.
* Boot your thinkpad from the USB drive.
* In the freedos command prompt, type fw.exe and follow the steps to update the hdd firmware.

Your hdd firmware will be upgraded just fine. I take no responsibility if this messes your drive or something else happens. Just sharing it cause it worked for me foolproof in 2019. Have a nice day !

[Droider]

As for the clicking problem after the hdd firmware update, it is not as severe as it was but it is still there. I think the clicking head is in the nature of this hdd and can't be solved with software.