Format C:\ usually works.
Although I was grateful for the suggestion at the time, it didn't work for me the other day.
However, another poster suggested a potted geranium, so I set one on top of the box.
Within three hours the screeching hard drive had quieted down and the smoke ceased its billowing.
Perhaps it was merely some odd vegetable/mineral symbiosis, but I'm more inclined to believe it was a true miracle, and a further sign of the end times©.