On Don, 2004-04-08 at 06:30, Henrique de Moraes Holschuh wrote:
>
> Disks will have their lifetime reduced by spin-ups and spin-downs, and they
> may stress the PSU at spin-up. During startup, this is worse, since the PSU
> is already strained by it's own powerup cycle.
A long, long time ago, when I was searching for a new 2Gig disk for my
desktop system, I checked some datasheets. One could have any sort of
objections to how the data is generated, but I still belive this is the
best data I'll get. I right now had just a few glances at current
datasheets, but it seems as if my then observations ar still valid.
If the vendor went so far as to specify start/stop cycles, I've seen two
extremes and nothing in between: the one sort (like the IBM DCAS I
eventually bought) had a ratio of start/stop cycles vs. MTF that would
allow 20 or more spindowns a day; the other (eg Seagate Barracuda IIRC)
had not enough start/stops for a daily shutdown.
Combined with the fact that the one class also happened to be
considerably more noisy than the other, I inferred that the silent disks
with many start/stop cycles were designed for desktop use while the
others were aiming at the server market.
Later, I when I placed the DCAS in my gateway machine that's supposed to
be up 24/7, I noticed that the disk would stop/restart once a week. Huh?
Yes, and that's OK.
As I can't expect anyone to belive this...
"ADM function is equipped to maintain the reliability even in continuous
usage beyond one week. ADM function is to perform a CSS automatically
after detection of idling time for 1 minute at intervals of 1 week.
Enable and disable of ADM function is in control of Mode Page 0, and the
shipping default is enable."
-- from IBM's specs, a file named dcas_spw.pdf, p.203
-- still on the web in some places
According to c't Magazin 19/1998, p144 (costs money),
(http://www.heise.de/kiosk/archiv/ct/98/19/144/)
this is due to the desktop models accumulating a film of lubricant on
the head; powering down the drive will result in the head being cleaned
by the specially textured landing zone.
So, as a summary, I do not think it is worth bothering too much. I mean,
it's not as if powering up the box once (or sometimes even three times)
a day will qualify as a constant strain. Will it really be less
demanding to keep it running for eight hours than a single power-up? And
while being extra careful may squeeze yet another year of life out of
the box -- hell, what gives?
And how long do you expect to use the same machine?
My Athlon 650 is now 3 1/2 years old and doesn't feel slow -- something
I admittedly haven't experienced with any previous machine, despite
those being constantly upgraded. Still, I expect to by a new one within
a year.
For current systems, I don't even see demand in secondary functions. As
an internet gateway or MP3 station I tend towards early Pentium/K6
machines that allow fanless operation, and still have too much Ooomph
for their task while underclocked.
When it comes to Video stuff, like my very own digital VCR, I'd rather
spend money on new Epia or Centrino hardware than trying to make my
current machine run as silent as the task requires.
cu,
Schnobs
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