Keep HDD from sleeping

[Insomniator]

Kind of a stupid question, but my data drive is a 1TB Samsung F3. Whenever I click on the D : drive, or do anything that involves accessing it after being idle for a while the computer freezes for a second while I hear the drive spin up.

Is there a way to eliminate this minor annoyance? Do newer drives wake up faster? Is this an OS setting in regards to power?

 

[HalfCrazy]

Yes, there is a setting to change it. Go to Control Panel > System and Security > Power Options.

Then click on "Change Plan Settings". Then click on 'Change Advanced Power Settings". Then scroll down to hard disk.

This works in Windows 7 but don't know about Windows 8. Since I don't care for Windows 8. lol

 

[BonzaiDuck]

Yes, there is a setting to change it. Go to Control Panel > System and Security > Power Options.

Then click on "Change Plan Settings". Then click on 'Change Advanced Power Settings". Then scroll down to hard disk.

This works in Windows 7 but don't know about Windows 8. Since I don't care for Windows 8. lol

Sooner or later, we'll have to give up our affinity for Win 7. I'd find it hard to believe that your advice wouldn't apply to Win 8, though.

 

[Shmee]

Hey, you can still get win 10 for free 😀 I believe it should work for any win 7 + OS, though I am not certain. Which OS are you on?

 

[BonzaiDuck]

Hey, you can still get win 10 for free 😀 I believe it should work for any win 7 + OS, though I am not certain. Which OS are you on?

Me? Me?! Win 7 64-bit SP 1. If I install a Win 10 Beta, it would be for some . . . . spare system. My systems here are all tip-top-perfect -- Event logs all in the blue. I "use" my computer(s), so I don't like too-frequent changeovers with unforeseen problems.

Put it another way -- I try to "manage" my headaches so I don't have too many . . .

 

[greenhawk]

The windows power setting is the main location to check as it will power down drives when not being used, but this will not help any internal power down feature of the HDD itself. This includes all "green" or "Eco" drives. Some I think can have this feature turned off, but they are turned on by default for these low power usage drives.

The easiest way to avoid it is to avoid green/eco drives when looking for drives when wanting to use them as OS or program drives.

 

[WhoBeDaPlaya]

Me? Me?! Win 7 64-bit SP 1. If I install a Win 10 Beta, it would be for some . . . . spare system. My systems here are all tip-top-perfect -- Event logs all in the blue. I "use" my computer(s), so I don't like too-frequent changeovers with unforeseen problems.

Put it another way -- I try to "manage" my headaches so I don't have too many . . .

Amen. I have my standard Win7 image juuuust perfect right now (Win + apps + all preferences), don't feel like changing anytime soon.
Win10's DX12 might be the siren song though.

 

[corkyg]

Sounds like your drive is waking from hibernation. This a bit slower than simple sleep wake up because it must load a hibernation file and execute hiberfil.sys. What I do is disable hibernation and set my drives sleep function in Power Management to NEVER.

I would not mess with Win 10 at present - it is barely Beta, and anything you install will all have to be redone when it goes final. It's OK to play with on a mule drive, but not for those who do real work on their PC.

 

[Carson Dyle]

On my home file server I wanted all storage drives except _one_ (containing my music library) to be allowed to power off. The way I had to do this was to set hard drives to turn off in the power settings, then schedule a small batch file to access that one hard drive every couple of minutes. The scheduled batch file kept the drive from ever spinning down.