Date: Tue, 17 Jul 2001 15:08:29 +0930 From: Greg Lehey <grog@FreeBSD.org> To: Bob Johnson <bobj@ufl.edu> Cc: David Gray <David_W_Gray@tvratings.com>, FreeBSD mobile list <freebsd-mobile@FreeBSD.ORG>, blovett@bsdguru.com Subject: Re: Disk clicking... (Was: Re: Dell Inspiron 8000 and suspend-to-disk) Message-ID: <20010717150829.P70499@wantadilla.lemis.com> In-Reply-To: <3B53C11B.1E692E47@ufl.edu>; from bobj@ufl.edu on Tue, Jul 17, 2001 at 12:37:47AM -0400 References: <01D4D419B1A4D111A30400805FE65B13070AC38F@nmrusdunsx1.nielsenmedia.com> <3B53C11B.1E692E47@ufl.edu>
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On Tuesday, 17 July 2001 at 0:37:47 -0400, Bob Johnson wrote:
> David Gray wrote:
>>
>> I have an older Toshiba Tecra with a 5G IBM drive that does this. It
>> runs *extremely* slowly under load. It appears to be re-calibrating
>> (thats what a seek to home position, then back to the target track
>> is called) constantly. This is related to the ATA driver. If I use
>> the WD driver (deprecated), it works just fine. Or, {shudder}, Win95.
>>
>
> Well, you got me curious, so I started paying close attention to
> what my Inspiron 7500 is doing. I even booted Windows (the things
> I do for FreeBSD...) and used it for a while.
>
> So here's what I think I am hearing:
>
> 1) Seeks are a fairly noisy operation on this drive. Activities
> that only require track-to-track seeks (or at least short seeks)
> are quiet, e.g. deleting /usr/obj or booting FreeBSD in the first
> place. Things that move the heads long distances are noisy.
>
> 2) The drive parks after 8 seconds (roughly) of inactivity. This
> operation is fairly noisy and takes about 1/2 second. It is
> distinguished by the fact that the disk activity light does not
> come on when you hear the activity. The park operation probably
> includes a calibration (that would help explain why it takes so
> long).
>
> 3) Because the heads are parked, any new activity begins with an
> initial seek that covers enough distance to be fairly noisy.
> It takes long enough that I suspect it includes a calibration.
>
> 4) There is not noticable difference in disk activity or the amount
> of disk noise that I hear in Windows and FreeBSD. There is enough
> ram in the system that neither needs to be doing swapping. Almost
> any activity in Netscape causes a noisy disk operation (this may
> be more prominent in FreeBSD, but if so I think it is a function
> of the application, not the operating system).
>
> 5) The noises are present even in the early stages of a cold boot,
> when the BIOS is still controlling the system. My system has a
> boot password set, and when it stops to wait for that password,
> I hear the drive park, for instance.
>
> 6) The sound of the spinning disk seems to be getting louder
> with time. I hope that's my imagination, because I consider it
> to be far more sinister than noisy seek operations. It is a sign
> of failing bearings. Maybe I should see if I can get Dell to
> replace it before it fails, instead of waiting for it to do so.
Nice analysis. I don't have mine here for comparison, but note that I
had this problem from new, complained about it and got a new machine
(it wasn't the only thing I complained about). The new machine was
about one month newer than the old, came with a faster processor and
as far as I can see the same drive, but it doesn't make nearly as much
noise.
It's difficult to describe the sounds it makes; it's quite possible
we're talking about two different levels of sound here. Certainly
there wasn't anything as regular about the sounds as you describe.
Greg
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