Ubuntu on the Samsung NC10

TeutonJon78 · Joined: 29 Nov 2008 Posts: 6

Is anyone else having this problem? Some laptop drives don't show it, but I'm pretty sure the Toshiba drive in the NC10 does (not sure about the other HD variants).

During the time was installing software (almost constant HD usage), the my load count went from 977 to 1006 in around an hour. WAY too high for normal usage. I haven't tried applying the fixes, because I'll need to so some research about best way to fix.

JBack_Admin · Site Admin Joined: 27 Nov 2008 Posts: 25

I assume you have seen http://nc10ubuntu.wordpress.com/2008/11/13/hard-drive-excessive-load-cycling/

I have not done anything about it yet either ... I'm not entirely sure if the excessive load cycling has anything to do with the clicking that I can hear?

TeutonJon78 · Joined: 29 Nov 2008 Posts: 6

it has everything to do with the clicking that you hear. The click is the hard drive parking it's heads.

There are 3 places the power control comes from:
1) hard drive firmware
2) BIOS
3) OS

Some hard drives have more aggressive power settings than others. Toshiba seem to be pretty aggressive from some of the forum posts I've seen.

the NC10 BIOS doesn't change the settings I don't think

Windows does lower them some, but not much. I get about 20-30 cycles every few hours (there is no what to change this that I'm aware on WinXP).

However, in Ubuntu, I was getting like 20-30 in like 20 minutes. That will definitely shorten the drive life. I haven't played with it yet, but here is some info:

GRRR..I can't post them yet.

I haven't played with setting yet, but I've definitely limited my Ubuntu time to not drive up the count.

TeutonJon78 · Joined: 29 Nov 2008 Posts: 6

So, I posted some questions on Ubuntu Forums, and it seems the Wiki got some cleanup as a response if nothing else.

The current "best" solution is to just enable "laptop mode" in /etc/default/acpi-support. This is a deprecated workaround and will be removed once a newer sync with Debian is done (9.04?).

Then you can go into the laptop mode configs and alter the params as you see fit for your hardware.

billyjones454 · Joined: 02 Feb 2009 Posts: 1

If I ran Ubuntu off an SD card, would it still access the HD?

This is my school computer, and a 16 gig would work fine for me. I assume that even if I was running Ubuntu from the SD card, if I accessed the HD it would still give me the same problem...

If anyone has run it off a Class 6 SD card, how does its performance compare to the HD?

vhenninot · Joined: 05 Feb 2009 Posts: 6

Hello,

I'have enabled the laptop mode, but i still have the clic...
Is there another thing to do ?

Thanks for all your work here !
Vincent

vhenninot · Joined: 05 Feb 2009 Posts: 6

cat /proc/sys/vm/laptop_mode
always return 0, that is to say that laptop mode is NOT enabled !

even if
sudo /etc/init.d/laptop-mode start
return OK

I have read a lot of threads, but wonder HOW to realy enable the laptop-mode !

Please Help !
Vincent

TeutonJon78 · Joined: 29 Nov 2008 Posts: 6

Enabling laptop mode doesn't mean that it won't park the heads (make the click), just that i won't do it constantly. The click is just the natural noise the HD makes going into power-save mode.

You can configure the laptop mode if you want to change the settings for different power levels.

vhenninot · Joined: 05 Feb 2009 Posts: 6

OK thanks for your response...

I found why the laptop mode always return 0...
I forgot to unplug my AC cable !! Laughing

But i still hear the click + spin down very often, i think we can modify setting in the laptop-mode.conf file ?

Il will try and report here the result...

vhenninot · Joined: 05 Feb 2009 Posts: 6

Well... With good values in laptop-mode.conf => No more click !! Very Happy

It works !

But the disk spin down, and spin up again when we open new widows etc...
Now, i wonder if we can (i think yes but where?) modify the delay before spin down...

Vincent

JBack_Admin · Site Admin Joined: 27 Nov 2008 Posts: 25

I'm also getting abnormal spin up and spin down after applying the fix...

TeutonJon78 · Joined: 29 Nov 2008 Posts: 6

I think in the laptop mode config file you can specify the spin-up and spin-down parameters.

I haven't played around with that file though, so definitely don't quote me on that.

And perhaps I should note that the "solved" problem was how to control the clicking---which is via laptop-moded. The best/working parameters is not solved, and it seems like there are lots of opinions out there.