HP 1TB Personal Media Drive Buzzing Noise

[jsmiddleton4]

My 500gm drive fan making noise.  Out of warranty.  Getting to point where external 2 tb drive's so cheap not worth messing with a 500gd drive.  That is kinda sad but true none-the-less.

[PickeringDan]

I have the issue with the noisy/failing fan on 2 of these drives - a 500GB that is about 2 years old, and a 6 month old 1TB drive. I can't believe the HP continues to walk customers through hours on the phone with incompetent help line staff in India when this is clearly a pervasive manufacturing quality issue. That was my first and last HP computer purchase.

Your link to the drive enclosure fan on mouser seems to point to exactly the same fan that was originally in the drive. Do the replacement fans still fail?  What's your experience with the repair?

The failed fan is a ADDA AD0205DX-K50  5V with 'Hypro bearing' which seems to be the consistent failing component.

[mkia007]

I am having this same problem - i thought i had lost my mind!  PLEASE ANYONE LOOKING TO BUY THIS HP PERSONAL MEDIA DRIVE  - DONT!  I have the 500gb, it started 1 month after purchase, and i thought it was the laptop docking station i got with it (also HP product).  Well i stopped using the docking station, waste of money #1, then i went through a huge move, changed offices, etc, and had not used the media drive until recently.  I was trying to back my stuff up and all of a sudden that horrendous sound started again.  I called and spent way too much time on the phone, and they tell me my warranty is out of date and there is nothing they can do.  I started explaining to them it does not matter since i am an attorney and understand the law to be that if the manufacturer creates a faulty product, it does not matter out of warranty or not  - it is there responsibility!  I asked for a manager and after much running around, i got the manager (or so they say) and after he also told me tha it is out of warranty, my stupid iphone dropped the call (stay away from AT&T too)!!!  

I am so frustrated but i am just too tired to have to deal with it!  

[gobarman]

So my 2TB HD was doing noise for about 2 months; now it has stop but I can't figure out if the fan just died or the noise stopped. I put the HD out of my docking station and connected it via USB cable and I've been watching the fan grid and don’t seem to move at all.  I've monitored the temp of my drive and it reaches 50 C some times (while the laptop drives remain under 40 C) So I've assume that the fan is dead. Or probably the thermostat failed.

Any feedback from the people who replaced the fan, have the problem came back? Just wondering that is the fan itself and no the termostat don't working properlly and making the fan fail

Cheers

GO

[EF_Photo]

The fan probably won't come on if you removed the drive from the docking station, as when the drive is in the small tight encloseure is when it really heats up and causes the fan to kick on.  When it kicks on is when you have the potential to hear if the bearings are shot or not!

Before I replaced the fan in my unit it would work fine for a month or so then the fan would start making the noise for maybe a few days to a week and then stop..so it was completely random.  As I'm sure the fan was kicking in between the "noisy" sessions!

I did replace my fan and for the most part the noise has gone away.  I have heard it maybe once or twice since then but I replaced my fan maybe a year or so ago..(go back to the first page of this thread as I posted when I replaced it there).  

Now in my case HP did send me a new drive that I use only for back-ups, the original one I have had for over a year I belive and it is still working like a charm!  When the original one get's full I will start using the back-up as my primary and I'm guessing I will have to replace the fan on that one as well.

[Sorcerer59]

Hmm-I have the same problem on a 1TB drive and i disassembled it and reseated the fan but when i ws going to plug the fan back into the circuit board, the two lttle pins broke off so now the fan is disconnected and i monitor the temp to see if it is getting too hot-what a shame that they sell this product-However, I have another 1TB drive and it is an HP and that one is fine and hasn't made nay noises after four yeaqr-they are made in different places-one in China and one in Thailand..HP doesn;t sell the 1 TB anymore as far as i could find out...

[utalice]

You never did get back with us on this. Did you buy a new connector?
Thanks.

[Sorcerer59]

Nope-I actually am runing it without the fan and the temp hasn't gotten that hotter but i backed up all the files to another PMD that has a fan that works-I am trying to locate empty enclosures that have the circuit board and fan but no HD but they are very hard to come by-

[utalice]

what about soldering the old connector to the fan as EF_Photo did ? did you save the old fan ?

[Sorcerer59]

Hmm well I messed up taking the fan out so it is gone now-the circuit board is okay since it works without the fan connected so I think I might order a fan for $12.50 and solder it to the circuit board