I've recently placed my xbox beside one of my speakers - a Dali 104 with 2 x 6,5" speakers and a 1" softdome. The cabinet is solid wood, and I have my original metal shielding intact.

I have read erlier that placing a xbox near a speaker/magnet, would damage your xbox HD, while others claim that a speaker of this size would not interfer with your HD drive operation.

Anyone have any experience with such a setup. Is my HD safe?

I havent used this specific speaker, but it isnt advertised as being magnetically shielded, I would put the xbox a few feet away to be safe. one way to check if the speaker is sending out a magnetic field(which will be what would damage the hd) is to place it next to your TV. If you get a rambow effect then it might damage the xbox, if not your probably relativly safe.

Both my speakers are already placed besides my CRT tv, and I do not have any discoloration or rainbow effect on the screen/corners of the screen. So I guess I'm safe.

My drive (a WD 200GB) does however often tics - like it's seeking on the platters, but not quite the same "hard" sound. It keeps this up for a 10-15 seconds, and then quits. Repeats in 1-2 minutes. It has done this since it was brand new - it's currently 1 year. Is this something some drives do (self-diagnostics?), or am I looking at a faulty drive. No problem whatsoever, except the sound.
Anyone have any ideas to what this could be or similar experiences with your drive(s)?

ticking noises associated with hard disks are never good

maybe you should hook it up a PC and run S.M.A.R.T. diagnostics and/or the western digital diagnostic utility. If you find anything reported, return the disk.

Anyway, keeping HDs near magnetic fields is obviously not recommended, however the HD itself is shielded enough to protect itself from relatively weak magnetic fields. Your TV is more at risk than your data, provided the xbox is >0.5m away from the woofer magnets.
Also the xbox shielding does a pretty adequate job of neutralizing fields on the inside...
If you're still worried, try to keep the xbox off the axis of the magnets, where the magnetic field is significantly weaker.

The speakers shouldn't cause any problems for your HD, but it sounds like it's already running downhill... I've got two WD 200GB drives (one in my box, the other in one of my computers), and I've never heard any clicking from them. Sometimes HD clicking is a problem of not recieving proper power. The HD in my GF's computer has been acting up lately... clicking at boot. I wiggle the power cord a little and it stops clicking. Make sure your molex connector isn't damaged.