Brand new Seagate is playing up

[Disgrace]

Given that I ran out of space with my old HDD which has been working flawlessly for nearly two years, I thought a nice large addition from a brand well recommended on here would do the trick so I brought a Seagate Barracuda 7200.11 500GB. I format it, copy over the files I want, etc... so far so good.

Until last night when I heard my PC making a light (not rough but smooth if you like) scratching noise. I presumed it was the HDD. Perhaps stupidly, I left it until today and my computer started to freeze up for whatever reason like it can so I restart it. I open Windows up, and my new HDD is not recognised at all. It doesn't appear in My Computer and not in the disk management list either. But I hear it running. I take it out, give it a light shake and there's something very small rattling in there whereas with my other Hitachi HDD, it's rock solid. Anyway, I plug it back in as it was and hope for the best and there it is once again, as if nothing was wrong and the scratching noise has disappeared too, perhaps I dislodged something with that little shake. Anyway, I don't like it so i'm backing it all up as I speak (should've done ages ago, I brought an external HDD with the Seagate, sigh).

What do you think is up? Have I got a drive about to die? A potential lemon? It's working now... but for how long...

[GenTrapstar]

My opinion will be to back up and return the HDD for a new one that's if u still have the receipt. It may be working now, but like you said for how long. If wait to long then you can't return it.

[not important]

I also suggest that you return it. HDD's are not suppose to have anything loos or rattling around inside.

[chuck4456]

Seagate will swap it with no problem.
They have excellent customer service and support.