[opensuse] Turning off the hard disk

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Albrecht Mehl

30 Oct 2007 30 Oct '07

13:38

I would like to use my opensuse 10.2 system on a MSI K8N Neo2 Platinum board with a Hitachi SATA 160 GB HDS722516VLSA80 hard disk mostly without the hd running, i.e. I imagine copying the files needed for my daily work at the beginning of a session to a ram disk and then working from there. At the end of such a script the hd will be turned off. But ... I do not know how to accomplish this turning off. So for hints as detailled as possible as to how to turn off the hd in a script I would be very grateful. A. Mehl -- Albrecht Mehl Schorlemmerstr. 33 D-64291 Darmstadt, Germany |sehenswert - Relativist. Effekte Tel. (+49 06151) 37 39 92 |www.tempolimit-lichtgeschwindigkeit.de -- To unsubscribe, e-mail: opensuse+unsubscribe@opensuse.org For additional commands, e-mail: opensuse+help@opensuse.org

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Aaron Kulkis

30 Oct 30 Oct

14:07

Albrecht Mehl wrote:

...

I would like to use my opensuse 10.2 system on a MSI K8N Neo2 Platinum board with a Hitachi SATA 160 GB HDS722516VLSA80 hard disk mostly without the hd running, i.e. I imagine copying the files needed for my daily work at the beginning of a session to a ram disk and then working from there. At the end of such a script the hd will be turned off. But ... I do not know how to accomplish this turning off. So for hints as detailled as possible as to how to turn off the hd in a script I would be very grateful.

The very nature of your question reveals that you are not very experienced with Linux, or Unix machines in general...and thus, don't have any idea of how complicated it would be to do what you propose. for example, right now, as you read this, run the command that lists all open files: lsof Now, for you to turn your hard drive off, you have to close each of those files... of course, some of those have to do with the execution of essential systems program. So good luck with figuring out how to do that. Are you planning on copying over your entire home directory into the ramdisk? Otherwise, your home directory will be "busy" and the system will NOT let you unmount the hard drive. Modern disk drives last for YEARS running 24x7. And how do you intend to recreate /bin, /lib, /usr/bin, /usr/lib, /var and other vital directories in your ramdisk without using up so much memory that you don't have enough free memory to even load a program and its data. How many gigabytes of memory do you have on your main board? Memory might be cheap, but it would be even cheaper to buy a 2nd 160 GB disk drive as a spare. In short, you're essentially asking how to modify your car so that the engine can be removed very quickly while your car is moving, so that you can drive around town in stop-and-go traffic with no engine. Answer: It doesn't work that way.

...

A. Mehl

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Albrecht Mehl

18:12

Aaron Kulkis schrieb:

...

Albrecht Mehl wrote: The very nature of your question reveals that you are not very experienced with Linux, or Unix machines in general...and thus, don't have any idea of how complicated it would be to do what you propose.

This can be true, but your ideas put forward below are not the whole truth either.

...

In short, you're essentially asking how to modify your car so that the engine can be removed very quickly while your car is moving, so that you can drive around town in stop-and-go traffic with no engine.

I put a similar question to the newsgroup de.comp.os.unix.apps.kde In reply on 13 June 2007 Henning Paul wrote This [Linux without harddisk] is possible indeed.... Here in our institute we do similar things. All computers run without hard disk. And he asserted that 1 Gb RAM would be sufficient for running two or three applications like Firefox or Thunderbird in a ramdisk. The corresponding key word for having a kernel _not_ using the hd regularly is 'laptopmode'. I do hope that there are people here in this group knowing a bit more about that than either you or me. A. Mehl -- Albrecht Mehl Schorlemmerstr. 33 D-64291 Darmstadt, Germany |sehenswert - Relativist. Effekte Tel. (+49 06151) 37 39 92 |www.tempolimit-lichtgeschwindigkeit.de -- To unsubscribe, e-mail: opensuse+unsubscribe@opensuse.org For additional commands, e-mail: opensuse+help@opensuse.org

Aaron Kulkis

18:27

Albrecht Mehl wrote:

...

Aaron Kulkis schrieb:

...
Albrecht Mehl wrote: The very nature of your question reveals that you are not very experienced with Linux, or Unix machines in general...and thus, don't have any idea of how complicated it would be to do what you propose.

This can be true, but your ideas put forward below are not the whole truth either.

...
In short, you're essentially asking how to modify your car so that the engine can be removed very quickly while your car is moving, so that you can drive around town in stop-and-go traffic with no engine.

I put a similar question to the newsgroup

de.comp.os.unix.apps.kde

In reply on 13 June 2007 Henning Paul wrote

This [Linux without harddisk] is possible indeed.... Here in our institute we do similar things. All computers run without hard disk.

That's a diskless workstation, running off of other disk drives on a file server which is completely different. We were doing that with Sun workstations at Purdue in the 1980's. But performance sucks.

...

And he asserted that 1 Gb RAM would be sufficient for running two or three applications like Firefox or Thunderbird in a ramdisk.

Depends on how the user actually uses those applications. I often open several web pages, but don't get around to reading them until days later....meanwhile, still doing all of the other web-browsing activity that I would still be doing otherwise. I have 2 GB on my laptop, and I'm using another 1 GB of swap right now.

...

The corresponding key word for having a kernel _not_ using the hd regularly is 'laptopmode'. I do hope that there are people here in this group knowing a bit more about that than either you or me.

A. Mehl

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Jan Engelhardt

19:42

On Oct 30 2007 14:27, Aaron Kulkis wrote:

...

...
Aaron Kulkis schrieb: In reply on 13 June 2007 Henning Paul wrote

This [Linux without harddisk] is possible indeed.... Here in our institute we do similar things. All computers run without hard disk.

That's a diskless workstation, running off of other disk drives on a file server which is completely different.

We were doing that with Sun workstations at Purdue in the 1980's. But performance sucks.

...
And he asserted that 1 Gb RAM would be sufficient for running two or three applications like Firefox or Thunderbird in a ramdisk.

Depends on how the user actually uses those applications.

I often open several web pages, but don't get around to reading them until days later....meanwhile, still doing all of the other web-browsing activity that I would still be doing otherwise.

I have 2 GB on my laptop, and I'm using another 1 GB of swap right now.

...
The corresponding key word for having a kernel _not_ using the hd regularly is 'laptopmode'. I do hope that there are people here in this group knowing a bit more about that than either you or me.

I know as much that repeatedly spinning it up and down is not good either. So I better let it run and tune it so that it does not do too much activity. -- To unsubscribe, e-mail: opensuse+unsubscribe@opensuse.org For additional commands, e-mail: opensuse+help@opensuse.org

Neil

21:57

Hello for noise reasons I am interrested aswell. I'd like to turn of all drive exept the drive where / is. Would umount shutdown a drive (if all partitions of a drive are umounted)? Thanks Neil On 10/30/07, Jan Engelhardt wrote:

...

On Oct 30 2007 14:27, Aaron Kulkis wrote:

...
...
Aaron Kulkis schrieb: In reply on 13 June 2007 Henning Paul wrote

This [Linux without harddisk] is possible indeed.... Here in our institute we do similar things. All computers run without hard disk.

That's a diskless workstation, running off of other disk drives on a file server which is completely different.

We were doing that with Sun workstations at Purdue in the 1980's. But performance sucks.

...
And he asserted that 1 Gb RAM would be sufficient for running two or three applications like Firefox or Thunderbird in a ramdisk.

Depends on how the user actually uses those applications.

I often open several web pages, but don't get around to reading them until days later....meanwhile, still doing all of the other web-browsing activity that I would still be doing otherwise.

I have 2 GB on my laptop, and I'm using another 1 GB of swap right now.

...
The corresponding key word for having a kernel _not_ using the hd regularly is 'laptopmode'. I do hope that there are people here in this group knowing a bit more about that than either you or me.

I know as much that repeatedly spinning it up and down is not good either. So I better let it run and tune it so that it does not do too much activity. -- To unsubscribe, e-mail: opensuse+unsubscribe@opensuse.org For additional commands, e-mail: opensuse+help@opensuse.org

-- To unsubscribe, e-mail: opensuse+unsubscribe@opensuse.org For additional commands, e-mail: opensuse+help@opensuse.org

Patrick Shanahan

22:04

-----BEGIN PGP SIGNED MESSAGE----- Hash: SHA1 * Neil [10-30-07 17:59]:

...

for noise reasons I am interrested aswell. I'd like to turn of all drive exept the drive where / is. Would umount shutdown a drive (if all partitions of a drive are umounted)?

Thanks Neil

On 10/30/07, Jan Engelhardt wrote:

...
On Oct 30 2007 14:27, Aaron Kulkis wrote:

...
...
Aaron Kulkis schrieb: In reply on 13 June 2007 Henning Paul wrote

This [Linux without harddisk] is possible indeed.... Here in our institute we do similar things. All computers run without hard disk.

That's a diskless workstation, running off of other disk drives on a file server which is completely different.

We were doing that with Sun workstations at Purdue in the 1980's. But performance sucks.

...
And he asserted that 1 Gb RAM would be sufficient for running two or three applications like Firefox or Thunderbird in a ramdisk.

Depends on how the user actually uses those applications.

I often open several web pages, but don't get around to reading them until days later....meanwhile, still doing all of the other web-browsing activity that I would still be doing otherwise.

I have 2 GB on my laptop, and I'm using another 1 GB of swap right now.

...
The corresponding key word for having a kernel _not_ using the hd regularly is 'laptopmode'. I do hope that there are people here in this group knowing a bit more about that than either you or me.

I know as much that repeatedly spinning it up and down is not good either. So I better let it run and tune it so that it does not do too much activity. -- To unsubscribe, e-mail: opensuse+unsubscribe@opensuse.org For additional commands, e-mail: opensuse+help@opensuse.org

-- To unsubscribe, e-mail: opensuse+unsubscribe@opensuse.org For additional commands, e-mail: opensuse+help@opensuse.org

man umount will tell you what umount is/does - -- Patrick Shanahan Plainfield, Indiana, USA HOG # US1244711 http://wahoo.no-ip.org Photo Album: http://wahoo.no-ip.org/gallery2 Registered Linux User #207535 @ http://counter.li.org -----BEGIN PGP SIGNATURE----- Version: GnuPG v2.0.4-svn4472 (GNU/Linux) iD8DBQFHJ6pfClSjbQz1U5oRAlZ4AJ9kjcrjZc9O+EI69pc2qXc+79H6jwCcCa3Z PLPu4cGXLv4FQQWU4z1V1GU= =jI81 -----END PGP SIGNATURE----- -- To unsubscribe, e-mail: opensuse+unsubscribe@opensuse.org For additional commands, e-mail: opensuse+help@opensuse.org

CF

31 Oct 31 Oct

02:28

Neil wrote:

...

Would umount shutdown a drive (if all partitions of a drive are umounted)?

Not at all. As long as you keep the computer turned on, the disks in the hard drive keep spinning all the time, even when not in activity (reading / writing). Unmounting the partitions contained in that drive is not enough to shut it down. CF -- To unsubscribe, e-mail: opensuse+unsubscribe@opensuse.org For additional commands, e-mail: opensuse+help@opensuse.org

Anders Johansson

30 Oct 30 Oct

18:25

On Tuesday 30 October 2007 15:07:49 Aaron Kulkis wrote:

...

Answer: It doesn't work that way.

No it doesn't, but putting the hard drive in sleep mode will work, and is quite easy to do Anders -- Madness takes its toll -- To unsubscribe, e-mail: opensuse+unsubscribe@opensuse.org For additional commands, e-mail: opensuse+help@opensuse.org

Anders Johansson

18:24

On Tuesday 30 October 2007 14:38:39 Albrecht Mehl wrote:

...

I would like to use my opensuse 10.2 system on a MSI K8N Neo2 Platinum board with a Hitachi SATA 160 GB HDS722516VLSA80 hard disk mostly without the hd running, i.e. I imagine copying the files needed for my daily work at the beginning of a session to a ram disk and then working from there. At the end of such a script the hd will be turned off. But ... I do not know how to accomplish this turning off. So for hints as detailled as possible as to how to turn off the hd in a script I would be very grateful.

I'm not sure if it works for SATA drives, but there is a tool for IDE drives called hdparm, and hdparm -Y /dev/<device> will put the disk in sleep mode. The man page says it should work with SATA as well, but I have never tried it. I did try it once with an IDE drive, and then it worked well Anders -- Madness takes its toll -- To unsubscribe, e-mail: opensuse+unsubscribe@opensuse.org For additional commands, e-mail: opensuse+help@opensuse.org

Aaron Kulkis

18:37

Anders Johansson wrote:

...

On Tuesday 30 October 2007 14:38:39 Albrecht Mehl wrote:

...
I would like to use my opensuse 10.2 system on a MSI K8N Neo2 Platinum board with a Hitachi SATA 160 GB HDS722516VLSA80 hard disk mostly without the hd running, i.e. I imagine copying the files needed for my daily work at the beginning of a session to a ram disk and then working from there. At the end of such a script the hd will be turned off. But ... I do not know how to accomplish this turning off. So for hints as detailled as possible as to how to turn off the hd in a script I would be very grateful.

I'm not sure if it works for SATA drives, but there is a tool for IDE drives called hdparm, and

hdparm -Y /dev/<device>

will put the disk in sleep mode. The man page says it should work with SATA as well, but I have never tried it. I did try it once with an IDE drive, and then it worked well

Good answer. That's a much better solution than trying to permanently turn off the hard drive. The sleep state induced by hdparm still allows the disk drive to be used as needed. -- To unsubscribe, e-mail: opensuse+unsubscribe@opensuse.org For additional commands, e-mail: opensuse+help@opensuse.org

Rikard Johnels

31 Oct 31 Oct

04:45

On Tuesday 30 October 2007 14:38, Albrecht Mehl wrote:

...

I would like to use my opensuse 10.2 system on a MSI K8N Neo2 Platinum board with a Hitachi SATA 160 GB HDS722516VLSA80 hard disk mostly without the hd running, i.e. I imagine copying the files needed for my daily work at the beginning of a session to a ram disk and then working from there. At the end of such a script the hd will be turned off. But ... I do not know how to accomplish this turning off. So for hints as detailled as possible as to how to turn off the hd in a script I would be very grateful.

A. Mehl -- Albrecht Mehl Schorlemmerstr. 33 D-64291 Darmstadt, Germany |sehenswert - Relativist. Effekte Tel. (+49 06151) 37 39 92 |www.tempolimit-lichtgeschwindigkeit.de

Why not invest in a solid state drive? As you are using a ramdrive when running, a solid state drive would be perfect. No sound, almost no heat. -- /Rikard ----------------------------------------------------------------------------- email : rikard.j@rikjoh.com web : http://www.rikjoh.com mob: : +46 (0)763 19 76 25 ------------------------ Public PGP fingerprint ---------------------------- < 15 28 DF 78 67 98 B2 16 1F D3 FD C5 59 D4 B6 78 46 1C EE 56 >

Eberhard Roloff

08:53

New subject: [opensuse] Re: Turning off the hard disk

Albrecht Mehl wrote:

...

I would like to use my opensuse 10.2 system on a MSI K8N Neo2 Platinum board with a Hitachi SATA 160 GB HDS722516VLSA80 hard disk mostly without the hd running, i.e. I imagine copying the files needed for my daily work at the beginning of a session to a ram disk and then working from there. At the end of such a script the hd will be turned off. But ... I do not know how to accomplish this turning off. So for hints as detailled as possible as to how to turn off the hd in a script I would be very grateful.

A. Mehl Very easy, but unfortunately not suse related.

1. Download a knoppix CD or, if you prefer, one of it'xs many deriatives. 2. Boot it 3. at the boot prompt, insert: "knoppix dma toram" and whatever additional parameters you will need or like. This will copy the entire knoppix CD into your RAM (Provided you have about 1GB, I think). After this the whole system is both -lightning fast and -very quiet. And surely you can still save all your configuration and work results to your harddisk or, better, you save soundlessly to an usb stick. Btw, if you like something as soundless, but much smaller and even quicker, DSL (damnsmalllinux) does essentially the same (with "toram"). With DSL, you will achieve the same mode of quiet and/or diskless operation from 128 MB of RAM onwards. I use both of them regularly. Essentialy anytime when I am away from a diskless Terminalserver Client but still in a mood to have a speedy computer that operates quietly.... Kind regards Eberhard -- To unsubscribe, e-mail: opensuse+unsubscribe@opensuse.org For additional commands, e-mail: opensuse+help@opensuse.org

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participants (9)

Aaron Kulkis
Albrecht Mehl
Anders Johansson
CF
Eberhard Roloff
Jan Engelhardt
Neil
Patrick Shanahan
Rikard Johnels