How to Set hard disk spin down time in Ubuntu

Ubuntu has a powerful raft of power management features, accessible through System > Preferences > Power Management, but you might notice one missing if you're used to Windows or OS X: hard disk spin down time.

This is where the hard disk powers-down after a period of inactivity. When data is requested after this, it spins up again, although there is sometimes a momentary pause while this happens.

It's possible to set your hard disk to spin down under Ubuntu, in order to save power and/or wear and tear (particularly on a computer left on most of the time), but you'll need to edit a configuration file. Follow these steps:

1) The configuration file containing the settings is hdparm.conf, so open it in Gedit by typing the following into a terminal window:

gksu gedit /etc/hdparm.conf

2) Look for the line that reads #spindown_time = 24 and remove the hash from the beginning of the line, so it reads simply spindown_time = 24.

3) Alter spindown_time time to any value you want. Each number is five seconds, so the default setting of 24 equates to 120 seconds (24 x 5 = 120 seconds). However, a value over 240 changes things - beyond 240, each unit equals 30 minutes.

So a value of 241 will spin down the disk after 30 minutes, a value of 242 will spin down the disk after 60 minutes, and so on. Setting the line to read spindown_time = 241 is a good choice, because the disk will spin down after 30 minutes of inactivity.

4) Save the file when you've finished and reboot for the changes to take effect. Remember that this doesn't mean the hard disk will spin down 30 minutes after you stop using the computer. It means it will spin down 30 minutes after all hard disk access has ceased. Often Ubuntu will do
things like flush its caches or run anacron jobs in the background, meaning the hard disk can't spin down until 30 minutes after these jobs have finished.

Tags: Power Management,hard disk,hard drive,gedit

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