Q800 ray gun noise

[kokorozashi]

My Q800 periodically makes a noise like a kid trying to sound like a ray gun.

Pyooooooooooo!

Pyooooooooooo!

Pyooooooooooo!

I have a sense of what this probably is, but I don't want to bias you, except to say I bet some component is trying to tell me it wants to die.

Ideas?

 

[Bunsen]

Sounds like a cap is periodically discharging to me. Perhaps there's a short, or a near-short which gets bridged when the voltage is high enough?

 

[kokorozashi]

That sounds like a good guess, but I can't say for sure.

I was worried it was something in the power supply.

It turned out to be something in one of the two internal SCSI hard drives, both of which were non-functional anyway.

I feel like I dodged a bullet. Replacing the power supply would have been a pain.

I pulled both drives and replaced them with one I ordered from We Love Macs. It boots.

The new drive was cheaper than the ACARD ARS-2000SUP adapter box I was considering, but I still wonder if I should have gotten the adapter.

The drive probably won't last as long as the adapter, and I had forgotten just how loud those old SCSI drives were. Wow.

 

[CelGen]

Yeah, I was about to say I've heard some really south hard drives make that noise. The four that I pulled out of a sun server made me feel like I was in a sci-fi movie when the box was running.

 

[Arkku]

My Q800 starts to make the same noise if I use the pass-through electric outlet to power an external SCSI drive. If I use the same drive connected to a wall outlet with its own power cord, the noise goes away… So I would guess something inside the power supply is to blame.