hard drive idle spin down power down sleep inactivity time etc

[korben_dallas]

In doing some web research, to spin down hard drives after a certain amount of inactivity seems to be quite a controversial topic.

So instead of getting into all that, I would like you to share why you don't or do, and if you do how much time of inactivity.

And if you want to make a specific suggestion for my situation: 3 drives, 1 tuner, most shows are recorded and watched during primetime (though never LiveTV, never.. never!).

[techhome]

My HTPC/SageTV server runs WinXP-MCE and is configured to spin down drives after 10-minutes. It has a total of 6 physical drives and pulls about 120w after boot with all drives spinning. After spin-down, consumption drops to about 70w. In addition to the HTPC, I have (2) HD200s. Browsing for a file on an idle drive takes a bit longer, but other than that I see no difference. It is claimed by some that a drive will last longer if left spinning continuously rather than spun-down and re-started. I've had no issue with drive failure in my HTPC, however. Drives have lasted years until they have been replaced with larger capacity drives.

So for me, it's about energy efficiency. I'd like to also have my server utilize S3 standby, but the HD200s do not wake the server up at present, so this is unfortunately not practical.