I just installed two external Firewire hard drive cases with two hard drives. When I shut off my system the drives keep running and they don't power down when my PC is on after 15 minutes-the setting I use for turning the hard drives off.
Is this normal for a Firewire external drive or is there something I need to do to get them to power down.
I can shut them off when not in use but it would be more convenient if they just turned off according to my power schedule.
I'm a huge fan of external drives. In fact, I own three of them now.
But, being the kind of guy I am, I leave my computers - all of them - running all the time. If you don't, what you want to do depends on exactly what your external drive does when it gets "bored".
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First, to my knowledge, the Windows power schedule for disk drive shutdown really only applies to internal drives. And it certainly only applies while the computer is running. If the computer's powered down, it has no way to tell the external drives "it's time to shut down now".
That's why I say it kind of depends on what your external drives do when they get "bored", as I call it.
You didn't indicate what brand of drive you're using, so I'll mention my Maxtors. Even with the power on, the drives themselves automatically turn off after some period of inactivity. I believe that's just part of the drive's configuration, and not something that's controlled by the Windows power settings. In fact, in the morning when I fire up my MP3 player for the first time (all my MP3's are on an external drive), it takes a few extra seconds for the drive to "wake up", and spin up to speed before the files can be accessed. If you've ever noticed such a delay after not using the drive for a while, that's probably what's happening. I've also actually heard the drive spin up, if the room is otherwise quiet.
If your drive does that, then personally, I'd be totally happy just leaving it powered on, even if your computer is not. The big power sink for a drive it the motor that spins it, and the actuator that moves the disk head. If it's spun down due to inactivity, it's using just a little power to keep the circuitry alive and listening for requests, but not much more.
Now, if you're uncomfortable with that, or you're certain that your drive does not spin down when it's not been used for a while, then as far as I know your only real recourse is the power switch on the drive itself.
Related:
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Ask Leo! - What backup program should I use?
Article C2573 - February 27, 2006
I have three "OneTouch" drives from Maxtor - so they're self contained, with external powersupply and USB/Firewire interface. I can't say that I've paid attention to how long it takes for them to spin down, but I would guess 10 or 15 minutes of inactivity or so.
Posted by: Leo at February 28, 2006 8:06 AMWell, I also had a one touch external and it never shut off. It was a USB.
It took a dump on me not long ago so I don't use it anymore.
Posted by: Dominick at February 28, 2006 9:39 AMFor Maxtor external 1394/USB2 drives, the newer one-touch configuration software that you can download from the maxtor website has the ability to customise the timeout period before the disks will turn off. The choices range from 1 minute to never. The default is 15 minutes for my OneTouch if I remember correctly.
I've now purchased a Seagate 400GB external 1394/USB2 drive, and it has a time of 5 minutes, after which it will power down if there is no disk activity. Unfortunately Seagate don't have a utility which is able to customise this, and the Maxtor utility only works for Maxtor drives.
I find that 5 minutes is way too short, and while actually using the computer, the drive will constantly wake-up then go back to sleep. Simply double-clicking the my computer icon wakes it up, simply composing email for 5 minutes puts it to sleep. Because this constant spin-up and spin-down can't be good for the drive, and because it annoys me too, and there was no way to adjust this time peiod, I had to come up with a solution. I wrote a visual basic script which simply writes to a file (on the drive) every 4 minutes, which is enough to keep it running continuously.
The script is attached below, and you can use Microsoft's InstSrv.exe and Srvany.exe to make this script run as a system service.
Script:
'***********************************************************
' The purpose of this script is to keep external hard
' drives awake which would otherwise turn off after their
' 5 minute timers detect no disk activity.
' To use, simply place this script on the hard disk
' you want to keep awake, e.g. in a sub folder.
' Double-Click to run the script, there is no GUI.
' A file will appear that has the same name as the script
' with the extension "-timestamp.txt" appended.
' This script writes to this text file every 4 minutes
' Simply create a shortcut to this script in your
' startup folder so that it runs everytime your PC boots.
' Advanced technically minded users have proven good
' results can be achieved with SrvAny.exe and InstSrv.exe
' from the Microsoft Resource Kit, to create this as
' a service.
' This script is in the Public Domain 2006
'***********************************************************
Const ForWriting = 2
Dim fso, f
Set fso = CreateObject("Scripting.FileSystemObject")
Function WriteToFile
Set f = fso.OpenTextFile( Wscript.ScriptFullName & "-timestamp.txt", ForWriting, True)
f.Write Now
f.Close
End Function
Do
WriteToFile
Wscript.Sleep (240000)
Loop
To install as a service, use instsrv.exe (from the Windows Resource Kit Tools for Windows Server 2003) as follows:
instsrv TimeStamperScript "c:\Program Files\Windows Resource Kits\Tools\srvany.exe"
Then add the these registry keys:
Windows Registry Editor Version 5.00
[HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SYSTEM\CurrentControlSet\Services\TimeStamperScript\Parameters]
"Application"="c:\\windows\\system32\\wscript.exe"
"AppParameters"="s:\\TimeStamper\\TimeStamperScript.vbs"
As you can see, the script itself is on the external drive, in this case in the TimeStamper directory.
Posted by: MRIS at March 17, 2006 6:37 PMThere is something wrong with my computer. It was working fine, then every time i turn it on, it wont start up. I have to take off the power from the back and put it back on for it to turn on. What is wrong with my computer
Posted by: Angel Martinez at April 24, 2006 12:50 PMMy computer keeps shutting down automatically, when I'm playing computer games and if I walk away for more than 10 minutes.
What's wrong?
I have a Windows XP professional, with comcast.
Help!
:) Paulette
Posted by: Paulette Reynolds at September 18, 2006 6:42 AMKinda sounds like standby. I'd look in power options and see if that's enabled.
Posted by: Leo A. Notenboom at September 18, 2006 10:21 AMHmmm...ok, "power options"...is this somewhere on the Windows screen? Your talking to someone who's not really computer savvy...sigh...
Help x 2...:)
:) Paulette
Posted by: Paulette at September 20, 2006 6:05 AMIt's in control panel :-). (Start->Settings->Control Panel)
Posted by: Leo Notenboom at September 20, 2006 8:57 PMI got a maxtor a usb2.0 300GB 3100 i believe the model before the one touches. It came with no manual or drivers just plug in and play as the saying goes, i'm currently just turning it on and off at the powerpoint as it seems to have no auto shutoff or powerdown and makes a fair humm when everything else is off, so i'm unsure should I be doing something to 'ready' it for shutdown? am i quickly setting this drive up for failure? It does take a second or two to shutoff once i disconnect the power, does anyone know if they use capacitors or some stored power to shut itself down without harm to itself or data?
Posted by: Steve R at October 1, 2006 1:10 AMYou can shut down your computer in a particular
Posted by: u.karthikeyan_MKU at April 9, 2007 3:42 AMtime(Like a sleep timer in TV) for that U need to write code in Visual C++ (MFC).. and the API to shutdown system is ExitWindows(); search in MSDN you can get more....
you ca post your queries to u.karthi@gmail.com always 4 U from MKU