What is the problem here? Secondary HDD "shuts off" after a period of inactivity

What is the problem here? Secondary HDD "shuts off" after a period of inactivity

^topic

i've been using this hdd (Western Digital 80gig) for a long time and when i installed it onto a new mobo (NF7Sv2) with a new powersupply (300 watt Antec Smartpower), it started shutting off when not in use (as evidenced by a click and a 'winding down' whine) and would resume ordinary function when a file on the hdd is selected (with a 'winding up' whine and another click).

i ignored this problem because i'm a lazy idiot and everything otherwise seemed to be working fine. i rationalized the starting and stopping as being a new feature of the mobo and equated it with how an optical drive stops spinning when nothing is being asked of it. yes, this didn't sound right even to my ignorant ears but still i lived with it -because i'm an idiot!. anyways, today my lax attitude came back to bite my ***.

after stopping as usual, the hdd exhibited great difficulty starting back up. it switched on and off repeatedly and when i selected a file on the hdd, windows seemed to freeze. i hit reset and sure enough, the hdd was gone. i remembered then that this could all be due to an improperly seated power connection so i switched the pc off, reseated the connection and now it's back but it's still having the same start-stop problem although now it seems to go for a longer time without stopping. i don't know what's going on or what's wrong. please help!

I've had a hard drive do that when it was starved for power, the PSU just couldn't keep up with all the components. What are your specs?

Otherwise I would say check to see if windows isn't turning it off in power management, like it does for laptops. But that last thing you said makes me think not.

damarble said:

Otherwise I would say check to see if windows isn't turning it off in power management, like it does for laptops.

Click to expand...

Most likely cause.

If you had a PSU issue it seems unlikely that the problem would always target one specific drive...especially the drive that is not being accessed.

damarble said:

I've had a hard drive do that when it was starved for power, the PSU just couldn't keep up with all the components. What are your specs?

Otherwise I would say check to see if windows isn't turning it off in power management, like it does for laptops. But that last thing you said makes me think not.

Click to expand...

indeed, windows power management is set to shut off idle hard disks after 30 minutes! thanks damarble and clocker2 for spotting the cause of the mysterious and intermittent hdd start-stops! of course, this does not explain why it now seems to have increased trouble spinning up.

could someone who really knows hardware confirm that 'hdd switch-off' is actually a beneficial feature in terms of prolonging hdd longevity?


my system specs considering energy consumption are:

300 watt Antec Smartpower
-AMD xpm 2500 + 92mm panaflo
-ABIT NF7S v2 w. microcool on NB
-Yamaha DS-XG soundcard
-ATI Radeon 9550
-2 x 80mm panaflo
-ND-3540a dvd burner
-2 x Western Digital 80gb hdd
-512mb kingston value ram
-floppy drive

altogether, component energy consumption should be well under 300 watts.


EDIT: this particular hdd does get inordinately hot; there's not much airflow where it's sitting.