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lzap
Asked: 2011-08-29 12:23:25 +0800 CST

How to determine disc spindown time

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I am able to set both APM and spindown times using the command:

hdparm -S 246 -B 128 /dev/sda

Unfortunately I can only find the APM value in the information output:

hdparm -I /dev/sda | grep Advanced

How can I see the spindown time value? I suspect my disc it is ignoring my value. I would like to see it. Tried smartctl but with no luck, help.

Update: It turned out tuned is very aggressive. When I turned it down, my discs does not spin down. It was setting something there.

hard-drive linux hdparm

3 Answers

  1. Best Answer

    There does not seem to be a way to query that value with hdparm, however you can see if the drive is in a standby or active state...

    > sudo hdparm -C /dev/sdb

/dev/sdb:
 drive state is:  standby

> sudo hdparm -C /dev/sda

/dev/sda:
 drive state is:  active/idle
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  2. The option -B 128 inhibits spindown, so your -S option is useless. Have a look at man hdparm. Spindown is only possible with -B parameters of 127 and less.

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  3. If you have a Seagate disk which support Extended Power Controls (EPC), I assume mostly enterprise class, you can use the tool SeaChest
    First get the Seagate disk handle:

     SeaChest_PowerControl -v 0 --scan --scanFlags sgtosd

    Result:

     Vendor   Handle       Model Number            Serial      Number          FwRev
 ATA      sg0<->sda    ST1000LM049-2GH172      WN90H8BT               SDM1
 ATA      sg1<->sdb    ST1000LM049-2GH172      WN90HACK               SDM1
 ATA      sg2<->sdc    ST1000LM049-2GH172      WGS3M35X               SDM1
 ATA      sg3<->sdd    ST1000LM049-2GH172      WGS65M4X               SDM1
 ATA      sg4<->sde    ST1000NX0303            S470WNPT               NN02
 NVMe     /dev/nvme0n1 Force MP510             184282050001276960F1   ECFM11.0

    Then get the standby time:

     SeaChest_PowerControl -v 0 -d /dev/sg4 --showEPCSettings

    Result:

     ===EPC Settings===
    * = timer is enabled
    C column = Changeable
    S column = Saveable
    All times are in 100 milliseconds

 Name       Current Timer Default Timer Saved Timer   Recovery Time C S
 Idle A     *200          *10           *200          150           Y Y
 Idle B      1200         *2400          1200         650           Y Y
 Idle C      1300          6000          1300         4000          Y Y
 Standby Z  *1200          36000        *1200         15000         Y Y

    (Don't mind my experimental Idle_C and Standby_Z values which is very low)

    You can get the tool from Seagate

    The above example is from a Seagate Enterprise Capacity 2.5" 1TB SATA (ST1000NX0343). Tried the same on a Seagate BarraCuda Pro 2.5" 1TB SATA (ST1000LM049) and it didn't work, as it apparently doesn't support EPC.

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