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Forum Discussion
External USB backup drive spinning continuously
I've bought a Seagate Expansion 1Tb USB 3.0 2.5" external drive specifically for use as a daily backup device for my ReadyNAS Duo v2; it is therefore plugged in continuously because the ReadyNAS does an incremental backup each night after I've gone to bed.
This works perfectly, however I'm concerned that as the ReadyNAS runs 24/7, my external drive is spinning away despite not being accessed all day long, and I'm not sure that it's up for this level of duty. Am I right to be worried about this?
If so, is there any way that I'm missing, that I can use to prevent the ReadyNAS from accessing its front USB port all the time like this?
The only solution I can think of is to unplug the drive each morning, and to remember to plug it in again each night before bed (I'm bound to forget, and it rather defeats the whole 'hands-off' non-interventional backup routine too.)
Thanks for any advice
This works perfectly, however I'm concerned that as the ReadyNAS runs 24/7, my external drive is spinning away despite not being accessed all day long, and I'm not sure that it's up for this level of duty. Am I right to be worried about this?
If so, is there any way that I'm missing, that I can use to prevent the ReadyNAS from accessing its front USB port all the time like this?
The only solution I can think of is to unplug the drive each morning, and to remember to plug it in again each night before bed (I'm bound to forget, and it rather defeats the whole 'hands-off' non-interventional backup routine too.)
Thanks for any advice
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- I don't know of any way to spin down the USB disks other than remove them. Make sure you eject them from the web GUI before you remove them,
- Rats.
Does the panel think I am being overly concerned about the potential longevity of my USB drive, used in this manner? freddyfruitbat wrote: Does the panel think I am being overly concerned about the potential longevity of my USB drive, used in this manner?
Some of the USB drives hanging off my ReadyNAS boxes spin continuously and some spin down after 20 minutes or so, and I haven't had problems with either set. But of course I'm just one small sample, and even my oldest USB drive has only been spinning for a year, so who knows?
I generally prefer to leave everything on all the time, because I believe -- with no real evidence -- that the most common failures are caused by thermal or physical shock, or power-on current inrush, rather than by gradual wear of the drive's motor or spindle bearings (and I don't want any failures from crappy software that expects every attached drive to be instantly available and won't wait for the external drives to spin up)... But if you want to change the sleep time of your external Seagate drive, you can do so using the Seagate Drive Settings program:
http://www.seagate.com/support/downloads/item/drive-settings-master-dl/
Personally I believe that disk spindown does no harm if you don't do it too much -- with no real evidence ... It is surprising that there is so little information available on this topic. It's a pretty simple question, and you'd think that one of the academic papers or the drive manufacturers would have answered it.fastfwd wrote: ...because I believe -- with no real evidence -- ... - Well, also, -- with no real evidence --, I don't really see any issue with the spin down or even power down. For example, I switch my PCs off every night, and I've not experienced a 3.5" HDD failure in over 10 years. Having said that, I did havd a 3.5" HDD fail ~15 years ago and a 2.5" laptop HDD fail ~5-6 years ago (but after I bashed the laptop), so they are pretty robust. Having said all that, it is of course personal preference. I do of course leave my ReadyNAS on 24/7, just for simple access.
I have set spin-down timer on the ReadyNAS, and I wonder whether this applies to internal only drives or external USB drives as well.
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