Stop a certain HD from spinning in Vista?

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fuelvolts

[H]ard|Gawd
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Jan 24, 2005
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I don't like my main HD to stop spinning in Vista, so I turn it off. But, I have a backup HD that only runs 3 times a week for backing up data. I don't need it spinning 24x7 when it is only accessed maybe a few hours a week at most. Is there a way to stop that certain HD from spinning, then begin spinning when it is accessed, but the main OS HD spins constantly?

I have Vista Ultimate x64. The backup HD is IDE, if that matters. Main OS HD is SATA II. Thanks!
 
What I would do is buy an external IDE hard drive bay for like $10 or $15, then you can manually turn it on/off. They usually connect via USB or Firewire. I have a 120GB IDE drive in one right now and it's very nice, especially between formats.

Other than that, you could buy hard drive bays that have switches to turn them on and off, but IDE can not be hot swapped, you would have to reboot the system in order to access it. Thats' why the external idea is good. If you want an internal drive that can be 'hot swapped' (powered on/off) it has to be Sata.
 
It definitely sounds like an external drive cage would work best for your needs. The beauty of those devices is, if something drastic happens to your main system, you can quickly access your data from another computer.
 
Just set the power down time on your drives to something like 6 Hours, which I believe is the max value.

Chances are there will be very few situations where your main OS drive goes unused for 6 hours or more so it will stay spun-up most of the time. If you really only use the other drive every few weeks then it will spin down after 6 hours and stay that way.

Or you could just set the value to something smaller like 30-min, after all, what is the big deal about your main drive spinning down anyway, especially if it's only doing it after you've been gone for ~30mins?
 
Thanks for all your responses. Good advice so far.

The only thing I don't like about manually turning on and off via an external drive bay is that my backups go at 3:00 am and I'm not up to manually turn them on. Although, I could turn them on before I go to bed and turn them off in the morning, but that is a pain.

The thing I don't like about main OS drive spinning down is the delay it creates when you wake the PC back up. The PC locks for a few seconds, which can be annoying sometimes. Are ya'll telling me that I can't just select one drive to stop spinning at a predetermined time interval? Google didn't help, so it looks pointless.
 
fuelvolts said:
Are ya'll telling me that I can't just select one drive to stop spinning at a predetermined time interval? Google didn't help, so it looks pointless.
Click to expand...


Yep, that's what you're being told. Power-saving features for drives are an 'all-or nothing' prospect under Vista. You either shut 'em down or you don't, which is why people are suggesting the use of an external drive for occasional periodical dat backup, if you don't want that drive spinning at any other time.
 
alright, I guess I'll just leave them spinning 24x7. Thanks for all of your help!
 
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