Talk:Laptop-mode-tools

Problems with spindown

On my T43p (2.6.15.5), these tools plain don't work for me -- the daemon refuses to spin down my hdd despite the most aggressive values put in the laptop-mode.conf file.

So far trying to debug the problem:

# hdparm -y /dev/sda

works perfectly -> drive will spindown properly. I obtained the much simpler spindown shell script, and looking into this issue noticed that the command:

# hdparm -C /dev/sda

always returns:

    /dev/sda:
     drive state is:  standby

regardless of the current state of the drive, and the script never goes further (thinks the drive is in standby, when it is clearly spinning...)

Of note, I do not have the IDE driver in my kernel, only using the SATA - ATA_PIIX compiled in. Perhaps I need to include the IDE module to sense the drive state correctly? This seems a bit bizarre, as everything else works well.

Update - compiling IDE drivers into the kernel does nothing to change the output - drive is always listed as "standby" no matter what state it actually is in. Of note, setting the spindown parameter (e.g. 10 seconds with:

# hdparm -S 2 /dev/sda

works correctly...

gsmenden 2:55 05 Mar 2006 (EST)

Also of note, PRINTK needs to be active in your system for laptop-mode to work correctly; can not have a silent kernel. gsmenden 22:09 05 Mar 2006 (EST)