Hard drive enclosure power consumption for backups

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slux
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Hard drive enclosure power consumption for backups

Post by slux » Mon Aug 30, 2010 4:59 am

I have an external hard drive from LaCie that I use exclusively for daily backups. This means it's only typically used for something like 30min - 1 hour per day but the time does vary depending on how much new data I have managed to generate in the 24h period. I do the first obvious thing to do for saving power which is to spin it down after each backup operation and that gives me a change from 10w to 4w consumption when idle. I also obtained a timer that I could use to cut power from the external brick completely but due to the varying times it takes to make the backup that has not worked reliably enough. Maybe the disk also has some issues with not properly powering up every time.

I'm thinking of upgrading my storage space and that got me thinking about different options for shaving off all or some of the remaining consumption. It seems to be hard to find information on external hard disk/enclosure power consumption and saving features. There has been a now discontinued product line named GreenStar from Welland that offered the option of completely powering down the hard disk inside the enclosure. I also know there are devices designed for restarting a colocated computer remotely but I doubt they'd be an improvement here.

I guess just reducing the idle power draw would be good, but there are so few tests around that I'm left guessing. The only thing I found with Google is this, but it is old enough that things could have changed and ideally I'd like an enclosure I can put my own disk in. The LaCie device fares pretty well there and they do also have an enclosure.

Any products I've missed, recommendations for good ones or alternate backup solutions?

lm
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Post by lm » Mon Aug 30, 2010 5:16 am

Your maximum savings would be a whooping 4W. Don't you think much larger savings could be obtained by optimizing some other appliances than your PC?

F.ex. an inductive stove can be over twice as efficient than a regular one.

slux
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Post by slux » Mon Aug 30, 2010 5:37 am

lm wrote:Your maximum savings would be a whooping 4W. Don't you think much larger savings could be obtained by optimizing some other appliances than your PC?

F.ex. an inductive stove can be over twice as efficient than a regular one.
You're right, it's of course more of an obsession than something that really makes a difference. But this forum is full of similar things. The stove isn't on 24/7 though and I might be running more than one external disk though. :P

CA_Steve
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Post by CA_Steve » Mon Aug 30, 2010 7:07 am

The lowest power solution: eSATA + AHCI. You can hot swap bare external drives. :D

scdr
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Post by scdr » Mon Aug 30, 2010 11:47 am

Would using an enclosure for 2.5" drives be an option? 2.5" drives use less power than 3.5" (but lower capacity, more expensive) Some of them are powered from USB (so they can't draw more than 2.5 to 5 watts). (Doesn't help with the turning it off when idle, but idle power on 2.5" might be less).

Could use a computer controlled switch on the drive power. For off the shelf you could use X-10. (Of course the X-10 controller and switch use some power, partly defeating the purpose.)

Or you could build it yourself (for those familiar with working with mains level power there are various examples on the web - e.g. using a parallel port to control a 120 volt relay). for example: http://www.cheapvegetablegardener.com/2 ... tlets.html

Another option - power the external drive from the computer PSU, but put relays (solid state or otherwise) on the power lines, again, control it from the computer so it can turn on before backup and turn off after done. (Doesn't require messing with high voltage, fewer PSUs about.)

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