turning off a hard drive

ThriceNightly · 4 May 2007 at 00:29

i have 2 hard drives in my system. they are not running in raid. i will be periodically backing up documrnents to the spare drive manually.

how do i go about turning off this hard drive between back up times?

my mobo if that is of any relevance is gigabyte 965p-s3

thank you

ThriceNightly · 4 May 2007 at 06:54

thanks for reply... i am using xp pro

ThriceNightly · 5 May 2007 at 21:35

Katoom said:
Go to the control panel/system/hardware/device manager/ right click on the hdd and disable.

have tried this and disabled the hard drive in device manger, however after checking my noise levels and opening the case confirm it is still spinning!

any advice appreciated on turning off completly i.e. no spinning

also notice my dvd burner is also spinning with no disc in it...never realised they did this.

ThriceNightly · 6 May 2007 at 11:16

TheVoice said:
In the Control Panel, go to Power Options, set the Minimal Power Management scheme and choose a time period there after which your HDDs will, if they're not being used, be turned off.

have tried this and it's still spinning! - am i going to have to open the case and un-plug the molex?

ThriceNightly · 7 May 2007 at 09:34

come on guys there must be a way of turning off this drive without opening up the case and un-plugging it.

to re-cap the the drive (one of two) is a hitachi deskstar 320gb sata II and is only used to back up once a month.

it's in an htpc so i would like it switched off to keep things quiet and also save energy

ThriceNightly · 7 May 2007 at 09:47

Will_3rd said:
just unplug the power cable from it in the case, job done

.....sure in a desktop pc no problem , however, it's a bit inconvenient to have to do this as my htpc is in a AV cabinet in my lounge and would have to be pulled out every time. surely there is a better way to do this.

maybe i will have to speak to hitachi !

ThriceNightly · 7 May 2007 at 13:02

ali825 said:
seem like the best idea, does everything you want and will only cost you like 20 pound, plus you could store the harddrive off site if your that worried

actually a sata nas enclosure would be nice

i could then put it in the loft (my cable modem and a new router are to be installed in the loft in the next 2 months (cabling is already done underfloor and behind plaster)

the deskstar also runs very cool..only 26 degrees (good for loft temps)

the idea of storing it seperatly would be an added benefit in case the htpc got stolen.