How to change WD Scorpio Blue WD7500BPVT spin down time

[tHeDa!]

I would like to share my experiences with WD7500BPVT hard disk. It is a 750GB HDD and I used it as external backup for Mac with the use of enclosure (Firewire 400/800 and USB). While using, I have noticed that it always spin down after 8 seconds of inactivity. After this whenever I try to access the HDD, it takes 3 seconds to wake up from the spin down. It is really annoying. So I went to configure it using wdidle3 tool but it didn’t help me much despite the successful message. But then I managed to correct these issues using WDIdleDisable and the tool CrystalDiskInfo.

[Vicky Woodley]

I have also followed the same thing in my case. WD7500BPVT disk connected with Sata port didn’t detect in WDIdleDisable tool running on windows XP because it was in an enclosure. So I then connected to the hard disk via USB. This time the tool detects the model (WDC WD7500BPVT-80HXZT1) and 01.01A01. There was a update option. I clicked on it and few minutes later I got a message saying “Drive has been successfully updated". Then I verified the settings using theCrystalDiskInfo and for the power settings. I also set the Automatic Acoustic Management and Automatic Power Management to maximum.

[Echa]

I have a MyBook Studio II 2TB Firewire 800 and a MyBook Essential 500 GB USB 2.0 connected to a Macbook Pro. Both go off after 10 minutes in the standby mode (called this process apparently spin-down) and yet I find no way to prevent this. WD offers itself no software with which it could be set and the disk utility does not offer that option. It is all very well to save power, but does not suffer when my workflow. Especially when video editing and image manipulation that harshly annoying.

[Dabert]

I think, it is due to the capacitor provided for the startup behavior from the stand-by.

Furthermore, the interval of an Eco-chip is controlled, thus the intervention would not readily available.

An alternative HDD enclosure would be the only way, in my view.

[Appaji]

Yet I have neither an exchange nor a conversion to a different case before, but I would just like to know how exactly this 2-minute timeout does. I assume that it can be controlled somewhere. I use this hard drive as a pure backup drive so that this problem is irrelevant. Since I have some other external drives without the spin-down would not really matter. I am concerned however about the mystery as such, so finding the exact cause of this spin-down. Somehow this little board but a SATA command to send the record or they simply switch off the power for the engine or something of that nature. Maybe it is just one of the capacitors, which may be empty after 2 minutes of access, thereby triggering the shutdown then.

[Gameli]

The spin down of the internal disk is also much later in that of the external drive. The external drive starts with the spin down after about 5 minutes. I think that it can be controlled by using some kind of SATA commands. Otherwise I think that it is perhaps the default settings of the APM plate under 0x80 turn off the engine. Values only about parking the heads, 0xFE means never.

[JErastus]

The plate was already without housing directly connected to the SATA controller and there was not this spin-down. So a firmware update does not help either.

What makes you so sure, and why it cannot be one of the capacitors are discharged after 2 minutes, which induces the spin-down?

Which device could be read as the EEPROM and reprogram?

[Denholm]

I also have USB enclosure from Western Digital (My Book), but they have this spin-down problem. Even with the WD or WD Elements Essentials I have not seen this effect before. Because you could do to find out what housing should be the WD.