A syndrome of certain Iomega ZIP drives, named for the clicking noise
that is caused by the malady. An affected drive will, after accepting a
disk, will start making a clicking noise and refuse to eject the disk. A
common solution for retrieving the disk is to insert the bent end of a
paper clip into a small hole adjacent to the slot. “Clicked”
disks are generally unusable after being retrieved from the drive.
The clicking noise is caused by the drive's read/write head bumping
against its movement stops when it fails to find track 0 on the disk,
causing the head to become misaligned. This can happen when the drive has
been subjected to a physical shock, or when the disk is exposed to an
electromagnetic field, such as that of the CRT. Another common cause
is when a package of disks is armed with an anti-theft strip
at a store. When the clerk scans the product to disarm the strip, it can
demagnetize the disks, wiping out track 0.
There is evidence that the click of death is a communicable disease;
a “clicked” disk can cause the read/write head of a "clean"
drive to become misaligned. Iomega at first denied the existence of the
click of death, but eventually offered to replace free of charge any drives
affected by the condition.