to power down or spin, that is the question, whether it is b

[DG12]

What is the feelings out there regarding timeout-powerdown.
Let's assume 30 minute email check at 7AM.
Then 60 minutes of email/surfing at 7PM.
Is it better to powerDown disk during idle time or let it run?

[rchadwick]

If you're talking about saving energy, it's certainly better to power down for longer periods.

For drive life, I personally don't think there's much a difference for most people. At this moment, I have maybe 10 hard drives running 24 hours a day. I've had most running for years, and have had some kind of drive running constantly for the past 15-20 years. I keep them all cool. I've had 2 failures. One was a newer Seagate that developed a weak head or a lot of bad sectors. The other was a Maxtor with tons of bad sectors after baking for who knows how long (The fan died). Never had a spindle bearing failure. If spinning down is the only way to keep the drive cool, it might be useful. Personally, I'd rather rely on an old drive running 24 hours a day that's kept cool, instead of a new drive that gets baked.

For only 1.5 hours a day, Spindown might look attractive. I'm sure someone else here has more experience with drives that spin down regularly.

Then again, spindown may be a moot point. Even with most things turned off, I notice little bits of drive activity from time to time. I tend to think that on most computers SOMETHING is accessing the drive at least every 10 minutes or so.

[DG12]

I will post a summary of responses If I get a large number.

The question is specifically related to drive life.

I think most of us will agree that the thermal shock created by power-on causes many electronic failures.

Code:

    Warranty                         hours           power-ons
                                                in this senerio
maxtorsolutions.com  3 years           26,280          2,190
SATA II/300 STM301603N1AAAS
ATA/100 STM305004N1AAA

Code:

Hitachi Ultrastar™ A7K1000
from data sheet Reliability   50,000 Start/stops
                                        24 x 7 : 1,200,000 hours MTBF (136 yrs!)

to be continued