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I just assembled a new Linux file server with several Samsung HD103UJ 1TB hard drives and I am currently optimizing it.

The question I can't find an answer to is: is it reasonable to set a spindown timeout (with hdparm -S) for the drives? Can the spindown/spinup be harmful to the disk in the long run?

My previous file server did not have this timeout and the hard drives have been operational for 3+ years with no problems (always on) so I am not sure if I need this optimization at all.

What are your thoughts on this?

Thanks!

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5 Answers

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I'm by no means expert on disk drive physics, but I see disproportionally many hard drives fail soon after the spinup. Probably the temperature change just does not serve them well. I would say: let them spin forever.

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+1 on spin forever. We once had to shut our server room down for the air conditioner to be repaired (it was scheduled maintenance). The EMC tech we contacted told us to leave the SAN running. He said we would have fewer drives fail due to heat than if we shut down and restarted once the work was completed. – KevinH Jun 21 '09 at 12:17
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I've heard horror stories about long running SANs that had several drives with "stickage", after they powered it off then on again during maintenance. They ended up using a small sledge hammer to get them working again. shudders – Joseph Kern Jun 22 '09 at 13:05
A previous company that I worked for had a slew of HP NAS boxen (which happened to be the corporate standard for storage in the branch offices) die after shutting them down for any reason. Someone eventually established a policy of never allowing those Nas's to be shutdown... they were simply guaranteed to die if you did so. – Sean Earp Jun 24 '09 at 7:00
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up vote 4 down vote

Is there any hard data on this phenomenon?

Frankly, this issue reminds me of my grandmother flipping out about using the phone in a lightning storm.

You always hear anecdotal accounts about how you need to keep drives spinning, but I've never seen anything based on verifiable data. I've run into a few instances where drives didn't come back after being powered down, but I've also run into many instances where everything came up just peachy.

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up vote 2 down vote

** Attribute #4 of S.M.A.R.T. is Start/Stop Count, which seems to indicate that start/stop count DOES play a role in disk fitness and when to expect a failure.

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up vote 0 down vote

It's going to depend on the workload. You probably only want to spin the drive down, if it's not likely to be used for quite a while...

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up vote 0 down vote

There even is a new trend in high-end storage : MAID (Massive Array of Idle Drives). Basically it's only big RAID arrays with support for spin down to save power... So if the big guns find it good for them, it may be good enough to you :)

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Who are the "big guns" you're talking about? I'm sure there are plenty of others reading this who would also be interested. – John Gardeniers Aug 7 '09 at 8:09
HP, EMC, NetApp, DataDirect Networks, Pillar, Copan ... all propose MAID solutions now. – wazoox Aug 7 '09 at 14:58
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