From mboxrd@z Thu Jan 1 00:00:00 1970 From: "Tvrtko A. Ursulin" Subject: Re: Western Digital GreenPower drives and Linux Date: Fri, 11 Apr 2008 22:00:28 +0100 Message-ID: <200804112200.28854.tvrtko@ursulin.net> References: <234148243@web.de> Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="iso-8859-15" Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit Return-path: Received: from mk-outboundfilter-5-a-2.mail.uk.tiscali.com ([212.74.114.4]:57971 "EHLO mk-outboundfilter-5-a-2.mail.uk.tiscali.com" rhost-flags-OK-OK-OK-OK) by vger.kernel.org with ESMTP id S1760110AbYDKU75 (ORCPT ); Fri, 11 Apr 2008 16:59:57 -0400 In-Reply-To: <234148243@web.de> Content-Disposition: inline Sender: linux-ide-owner@vger.kernel.org List-Id: linux-ide@vger.kernel.org To: devzero@web.de Cc: lkml@metanurb.dk, pernegger@gmail.com, linux-ide@vger.kernel.org, linux-kernel@vger.kernel.org, Andi Kleen > >I got back from WD's tech support and received a DOS utility which can > > control this drive feature, apparently using vendor specific commands. > > With it head unload timer can be disabled or set to a period between > > 100ms and 25.5s. Followup with some good news. Head unload timer settings seems to be persistent across powering off. Having set it to a maximum value of 25.5 seconds my disk is now behaving much more reasonable. To actually do it I used FreeDOS floppy image burnt on a CD-RW as a bootable image plus wdidle3.exe in the filesystem itself. BTW, WD's tech support has gone silent so chances for an easier solution are not so great. Tvrtko