Harddrive seem to be constantly active under XP

[Fuelrod]

I recently upgraded my operating system to XP and also got a cable modem. Ever since the upgrade it seems as if my harddrive it constantly being accessed for some reason. Under WinME if I left my computer on for hours with no activity, the hard drive would eventually spin down. Under WinXP, the dumb thing never spins down and the harddrive activity light seems to blink at random intervals every five to ten seconds. My concern is the hardrive is never getting a rest even when I'm not really using the computer. Do other with XP see this or could this be related to the new cable modem. Any comments are appreciated.

 

[Lord Evermore]

Well don't be too concerned about it never getting a "rest". The expected life of most drives is 5 years or more. There's also actually an expected number of times the drive can stop and then spin back up (50,000 times for a Seagate 7200.7).

How recently did you upgrade? WindowsXP has an automatic "optimization" routine for the file system. It essentially starts to defrag the drive when the system is idle for a certain period of time. It only does a partial defrag though, just moving data around for the best access based on recent usage logs (XP logs every file that is used when you run a program). This can take a while when you first start using the machine, until it's had a chance to see the "normal" usage patterns and get everything in place; then it will happen every once in a while.

Also, XP has the Indexing Service, which goes through every file on the drive looking for text strings, to make searching faster and more thorough when you search for text contents of a file rather than just a file name. Depending on how many files you have, this can take a very long time, and it also gets done on a regular basis.

Both of those are however pretty continuous usage for a period, then it stops mostly.

You may need to check the power settings in XP's Display Settings, under the screensaver tab. Make sure it's set to power down the hard drive.

This may also be due to activity coming from your cable modem. The OS may be having to process traffic coming from the Net, resulting in it needing to check the drive once in a while.

 

[TheCorm]

Also worth mentioning that the Microsoft Office Fast Find also causes background hard drive activity as does windows xp system restore. But like Evermore says, hard drives are designed to go on for a long while, if it does fail, it's almost always because of a physical defect and not because it's been used a lot.

Corm

 

[Rav3n]

Just to test, try disabling System Restore and see if that solves your problem. Try disabling your antivirus. The other thing that has not been mentioned is the possibility of your having some Spyware on your computer. Spyware would have you sending personal info (cookies, random files, your internet cache maybe) to some server out in space. If this is the case, your HD would be actively searching for this stuff at all times. Do a Control-Alt-Delete and just start closing open programs and tasks (not Explorer). See if when you close something your HD stops, and this will be a good way to diagnose and see what is making your HD constantly go. Oh yeah, in the power settings you could try setting your HD to spin down after 10 minutes or something of inactivity - that might do it.