HDD Hang/Freeze

[Deleted]

Hello my technically superior overlords.

First here is some general info:

General Information
CPU: i5-2500K 3.30GHz (Sandy Bridge) Socket LGA1155
Motherboard: ASUS P8Z68-V PRO Intel Z68 (REV B3) Socket 1155 DDR3 PCI-Express Motherboard
RAM: G.Skill RipJawsX 8GB (2x4GB) DDR3 PC3-12800C9 1600MHz
Graphics Card: MSI GTX 760 2gb
Power Supply: 850W Corsair HX Series 80PLUS Silver Modular Power Supply
Operating System: Windows 8 (Problem was also present on Windows 7)
Resolution: 1920x1080 native
SSD (OS): Corsair Force Series 3 V2 120GB 2.5" SATA-III Solid State Hard Drive
HDD: 1TB Western Digital Caviar Black 3.5" SATA III Hard Drive

I've been having an odd issue with running anything off of the HDD since the build was new really but I was never really sure what it was. When playing a game installed on the HDD all will run perfectly fine and then it will hang (these hangs can be as frequent as 10 minutes apart or several hours). Edit: Not just games even if Steam is running off the drive by itself or my GIS program for work those can hang as well before returning to normal the 30 or so seconds later.

The system itself is still functional - I can alt tab out of which ever program is running and continue to do anything else I wish. Games/programs run from the SSD never have this issue.

During the hangs the HDD read/write light is fully on though I cannot hear any kind of activity from around the drive I even stripped the computer back so I could listen closely when it happened.

30-60 seconds after the hang begins it ends and everything runs as smooth as silk until it hangs again or it may never hang again until I finish playing.

I've run chkdsk and come up with nothing and a fan/temperature sensor I stuck to the drive doesn't show up any signs of overheating.

So my main guess is that I'm an idiot (well not a guess a fact!) and somehow set the drive up incorrectly or it's falling to sleep then waking up and reading for ages or something.

Any help or advice would be greatly appreciated!

Thank you for your time.

[Vermicious]

Could be a defective drive... I'd back it up and get it replaced while it is still functional. Likely under warranty too, so you could get replaced for free from WD.

[Deleted]

Although its most likely you got unlucky with a defective drive, cause its one of the best/reliable drives around, you can try the following, just in case: Go to control panel ->power options-> advanced->go to hdd and set it to never hibernate. Check if it still happens and as above poster said if its under warranty send it back.

[IRunSoFarAway]

Go to Power options and click on "Change Plan Settings" for whatever plan you're using, then find this, and make sure it's set to 0.



If it isn't turning off, then it's most likely malfunctioning.

[Deleted]

@ IRunSoFarAway, thats what i said as well, also i think you mean "if it does turn off, then it's most likely malfunctioning"

[IRunSoFarAway]

@ IRunSoFarAway, thats what i said as well, also i think you mean "if it does turn off, then it's most likely malfunctioning"

That's great. But no, if the hard drive turning off after x minutes isn't the problem, then it's most likely malfunctioning instead. If it's turning off after x minutes because of that setting in the power plan, that's not a hardware malfunction.

Hope that clears up the original statement, if there was any confusion.

[Deleted]

When you set setting to "0" then it means that it will never power it off. Think its was pretty clear in the first place.

[IRunSoFarAway]

When you set setting to "0" then it means that it will never power it off. Think its was pretty clear in the first place.

That's what I had hoped, but you replied and attempted to correct a statement that didn't need any correction, as it was quite clear in the first place. Still, I took the time to elaborate in an attempt to make the 10 word statement more clear.

It seems to me like this may be a language barrier problem regarding the wording, or something similar. Either way, the statement was clear the first time, and there was no reason other than whatever emotion you felt when someone responded without bothering to read your reply first. Whatever the case, it's been explained enough, and I'm not really interesting in arguing over a non-argument, so you'll have to find someone else in that regard. I'd rather the OP fix his issue than have a fight over who said what first and how, that's pretty inconsequential and childish.

[Denpepe]

I used to have a couple of wd green drives who for some annoying silly firmware setting Always went to hibernate but when playing something and this happened it usually just caused a micro stutter, went away when I switched to wd black drives.

pn the off chance is it on a seperate sata channel? might just not play nice with the ssd if on the same channel

[IRunSoFarAway]

I used to have a couple of wd green drives who for some annoying silly firmware setting Always went to hibernate but when playing something and this happened it usually just caused a micro stutter, went away when I switched to wd black drives.

Well the green ones are meant to be energy efficient and slower, so most of the time they're used for low power storage. That's why you can get a green with 2x the space(2TB instead of 1TB) of a black for the same price(79.99). I think there used to be a way to tweak it so it wouldn't do that, but I'm not sure if it's possible anymore, I've never owned one so I can't test it out. Whatever the case, Black or Blue are the ones you want.