laptop harddrive Load_Cycle_Count issue

[dodecaman]

Seagate disks are in general made for a maximum temperature of 60C, after an hour of use my hdd temp has always been around 45-47C this without and without head parking, i guess it mainly depends on how good is your laptop cooling system.

I want to second Frodon's statement - before you get too excited about your temperature, be sure you know your manufacturer's specs. My WD Scorpio has a max temp of 60C. It takes about 45 minutes on my kitchen table to get up to 40-45C and hovers around there, but I've only seen it top 50C once. Now, if you're the type who actually sits with your laptop ON YOUR LAP - you're probably making the temp rise faster due to poor circulation - invest in a lap board.

[Keyper7]

I can also confirm that the unofficial ugly fix for Hardy works for me even after a suspend or hibernate. Everything seems to be perfect.

I have a Dell Vostro 1400 with a Samsung HD.

[Thorzilla]

Hi Everyone, from what little I understood of all the discussion about this issue, I managed to extract the following info from my computer. Would someone be kind enough to tell me whether I need to apply the fix or not?
I ran the sudo hdparm -B 254 command and the clicking reduced noticeably.
But it still clicks quite often...
I've installed Ubuntu Hardy 8.04, and I dual boot with Vista. It's a Toshiba A215-S4747 and the following...


---------------------------
Model Family: Toshiba 2.5" HDD series (80 GB and above)
Device Model: TOSHIBA MK2035GSS
Serial Number: 773IF90TS
Firmware Version: DK020M
User Capacity: 200,049,647,616 bytes
Device is: In smartctl database [for details use: -P show]
ATA Version is: 7
ATA Standard is: Exact ATA specification draft version not indicated
Local Time is: Sat May 31 15:09:55 2008 EDT
SMART support is: Available - device has SMART capability.
SMART support is: Enabled
----------------------------


ID# ATTRIBUTE_NAME FLAG VALUE WORST THRESH TYPE
UPDATED WHEN_

FAILED RAW_VALUE

1 Raw_Read_Error_Rate 0x000b 100 100 050 Pre-fail Always -
0
2 Throughput_Performance 0x0005 100 100 050 Pre-fail Offline -
0
3 Spin_Up_Time 0x0027 100 100 001 Pre-fail
Always -
1176
4 Start_Stop_Count 0x0032 100 100 000 Old_age Always -
49
5 Reallocated_Sector_Ct 0x0033 100 100 050 Pre-fail Always -
0
7 Seek_Error_Rate 0x000b 100 100 050 Pre-fail Always -
0
8 Seek_Time_Performance 0x0005 100 100 050 Pre-fail Offline -
0
9 Power_On_Hours 0x0032 100 100 000 Old_age Always -
77
10 Spin_Retry_Count 0x0033 100 100 030 Pre-fail Always -
0
12 Power_Cycle_Count 0x0032 100 100 000 Old_age Always -
46
192 Power-Off_Retract_Count 0x0032 100 100 000 Old_age Always -
0
193 Load_Cycle_Count 0x0032 100 100 000 Old_age Always -
1383
194 Temperature_Celsius 0x0022 100 100 000 Old_age Always -
37 (Lifetime Min/Max 15/49)
196 Reallocated_Event_Count 0x0032 100 100 000 Old_age Always -
0
197 Current_Pending_Sector 0x0032 100 100 000 Old_age Always -
0
198 Offline_Uncorrectable 0x0030 100 100 000 Old_age Offline -
0
199 UDMA_CRC_Error_Count 0x0032 200 200 000 Old_age Always -
1
220 Disk_Shift 0x0002 100 100 000 Old_age Always -
8267
222 Loaded_Hours 0x0032 100 100 000 Old_age Always -
67
223 Load_Retry_Count 0x0032 100 100 000 Old_age Always -
0
224 Load_Friction 0x0022 100 100 000 Old_age Always -
0
226 Load-in_Time 0x0026 100 100 000 Old_age Always -
318
240 Head_Flying_Hours 0x0001 100 100 001 Pre-fail Offline -
0






I tried to include as much information, while excluding what seemed pointless, do tell me if you need anything else.

Thanks a million!

TZ

[BandD]

@ Thorzilla

It's hard to say exactly how bad the issue is for you. If you take your current Load_Cycle_Count and divide it by Power_On_Hours you get a lifetime average of about 17 cycles/hour...which isn't really all that bad. But lifetime average my not be all that accurate...

If I were you I'd experiment with the hdparm values a little. Fist don't set any value, let the drive just be. Note the number of Load_Cycle_Count and then let it run for an hour (or 30 minutes, etc) and see what it averages out to be. If it seems high to you (keep in mind that many people seem to be comfortable with 5-50/hour, or a little more, depending on how much you are using the computer and how aggressive you want power management to be), then try out some different hdparm values and notice how much the Load_Cycle_Count jumps by after an hour or so.

[quanumphaze]

The Hardy/OpenSUSE hack works fine for me except for after suspend/resume where it resets to 128. I can also confirm that (un)plugging the power supply will run the scripts and fix it.

I am willing to try any hacks to make it run the script after resume.

[Thorzilla]

@ Thorzilla

It's hard to say exactly how bad the issue is for you. If you take your current Load_Cycle_Count and divide it by Power_On_Hours you get a lifetime average of about 17 cycles/hour...which isn't really all that bad. But lifetime average my not be all that accurate...

If I were you I'd experiment with the hdparm values a little. Fist don't set any value, let the drive just be. Note the number of Load_Cycle_Count and then let it run for an hour (or 30 minutes, etc) and see what it averages out to be. If it seems high to you (keep in mind that many people seem to be comfortable with 5-50/hour, or a little more, depending on how much you are using the computer and how aggressive you want power management to be), then try out some different hdparm values and notice how much the Load_Cycle_Count jumps by after an hour or so.

Thanks! I did some experimentation, and the numbers seemed rather scary to me. With a bit more searching, I found that my hard drive is listed among those affected - also, it was Vista that crashed my drive with the same symptoms.So I went ahead and applied the ugly fix, and now the count barely ever increases and all is well with the world.

[armitage1337]

it was Vista that crashed my drive with the same symptoms.

So this is a problem in Windows too? I thought the issue was tied to ext3. What if I'm using the ext3 driver for Windows available at http://www.fs-driver.org/ , would that result in the same issue?

And to be clear, this isn't a problem when the battery is removed and I'm using outlet power, correct?

[BandD]

Double Post. See Below.

[BandD]

So this is a problem in Windows too? I thought the issue was tied to ext3. What if I'm using the ext3 driver for Windows available at http://www.fs-driver.org/ , would that result in the same issue?

And to be clear, this isn't a problem when the battery is removed and I'm using outlet power, correct?

The problem seems to be with the firmware hard drive manufacturers ship with their hard drives. The problem has been reported across all major operating systems, including Windows and OSX.

Some think it is more prevalent on Linux systems because Linux is more efficient and actually gives the drive some time to rest, where as Windows many times doesn't (bloatware).

With regards to being on ac/battery power, it depends on your drive. Some drives' firmware is so bad, that nothing will fix the problem. The best way to find out is to use smartmontools (you can install via Synaptic):

sudo smartctl -a /dev/sda

Make a note of the Load_Cycle_Count and then let the system run normally and check again after an hour. Ideally, depending on how heavy your usage was during that time you shouldn't be in upwards of 50 cycles/hour--and that might be a little high. If you are below 20/hour I'd say there is nothing to worry about. At that rate your drive should last well over 3 years, assuming it's on 24/7. Try it with AC plugged in once, and then test it while on battery. If you have questions report back.

[Kokopelli]

To see how fast load count is going up on my laptops I usually do

 while (true); do date;sudo smartctl -a /dev/sda |grep Load;sleep 600; done

Then leave it running. You can then get an idea of what the load count is increasing by every 10 min, (Amusingly enough on my spare laptop the load count ia at 378693.)