Hard Drive Light Flickers Maddeningly

[TishTash]

Here's a weird one: My external drive is supposed to emit a steady (maddeningly bright, but that's another story ...) blue light indicating power, with a (barely) visible red light indicating drive activity.

Well, my latest drive did have a blue light, but every time the red light went on, the blue light would flicker. Now it's completely stopped, while the (now much more visible) red light goes on its merry way.

Adjusting the enclosure (short of banging it) results in a (previously mentioned) brighter red light flashing angrily, but also in the return of the blue light! (albeit termporarily). Then it disappears again, leaving a (as far to my knowledge) valid red flashing light.

Opening the enclosure and unplugging & re-seating the switch going to the lights again brings back the blue power light, but after a while, things go back to the way there were.

The TiVo, btw, works flawlessly, recognizing the external storage device accurately.

My question: Is this light switch something that I should leave unplugged and un-seated? (That blue light is bright, so its extinction may not be such a bad thing; then again, at the same time, I'd lose the red light.) More pertinently, is all this instability (blue light going on, going off) a short circuit issue that will eventually catch up to the hard drive's longevity?

[lafos]

On all the enclosures I've seen, the lights are LED's that are connected to the circuit board in the case. One is for power, and another for activity. I have never seen one that fails if the LED's are disconnected. I've run computers with the front panel LED's disconnected, too. If you don't like them and don't need them for your purpose, you should not have a problem leaving them disconnected.

[TishTash]

On all the enclosures I've seen, the lights are LED's that are connected to the circuit board in the case. One is for power, and another for activity. I have never seen one that fails if the LED's are disconnected.

The funny thing is, the blue (power) lights flickers low-to-off it seems depending on how intense the red (activity) lights flickers. So it appears to be a "power sharing" issue where there may not be enough between the two lights. Which I agree is odd, but brings up the (unsubstantiated) feeling that it may affect the hard drive somehow (which seems, as mentioned, ok). Anyway, I disconnected the LEDs just to be anally sure. Thanks for the advice.