WD HDD's AAM set to "fast" by NDAS device "Ne

[mfe555]

I'm using an NDAS device (NetDisk 351 UNE) as an external media storage for a Blu Ray player (LG BD390) in a home theater environment. It works perfect: I can upload data from my PC using a gigabit LAN connection, and at the same time keep it connected to the player by USB. The only restriction is that simultaneous access is not possible.

Unfortunately it seems that the NDAS device changes the AAM (acoustic management) settings of HDDs to "fast" which, being the loudest setting, is quite annoying.

After setting the AAM to "quiet" and checking it with the HDD directly mounted in my PC, I installed the HDD in the NetDisk 351 and attached it via USB. After some time I heard the HDD head positioning noise clearly, and, with the HDD inside my PC again, checked the AAM setting and saw that it was now "fast".

I have repeated the test several times. I have tested it with two samples of the Western Digital 1TB disk "WD10EACS-00D6B0" and one 1.5TB "WD15EADS-00R6B0" and with two different hosts (my PC and the Blu Ray player). I have also tested the behaviour in a conventional USB harddisk case again, there the harddisks maintained their AAM settings even during intensive tests.

I have never observed a change of the AAM settings when mounting the NetDisk 351 UNE via LAN, only with a USB connection.

The manufacturer of the NDAS device (Iocell Networks Technical Support) didn't have any advice ("we might just consider it un-changeable") and could not even tell me whether this is a bug or (performance wise) a feature.

Can anyone think of a way how to prevent the NDAS device from changing the AAM settings?

[theycallmebruce]

Wow, interesting first post!

Sorry, I don't have a definite solution for you. My only thought is replacing the firmware in the NDAS. Is there any open source firmware for it? Or if you are really ambitious, you could try reverse engineering it with an ARM disassembler (most of these things use ARM CPUs) and a hex editor. It sounds like it must be a "feature".. surely this could not be a bug?
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Athlon 4800+ (Brisbane, TDP 65W at 1.375V, undervolted to 1.05V), GA-MA78-S2H, Sapphire Radeon 3850 Ultimate, Antec 300, Seasonic S12 II 430W, Scythe Mini Ninja, 2x Scythe S-Flex F fans (controlled by CPU fan header on mobo + splitter), 8GB Kingston DDR2, Western Digital Caviar Blue 640GB, Windows 7 Ultimate x64

[mfe555]

Thanks for your suggestions, though they exceed the effort I'm willing to invest.

I was thinking there might be some simple solution like blocking the drive for any changes of AAM by a jumper setting (if available), setting some "lock" bit (again: if available), disabling the "write" line of the non volatile memory inside the HDD electronics that is used to store such information ... thoughts?

[theycallmebruce]

Sorry MFE, I don't know about AAM or how it is implemented.

What tool are you using to query / set the AAM properties outside of the NDAS? Maybe there is another tool which can help you (from WD perhaps)? Might be worth a try writing an email to WD to see if they have any suggestions too.
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Athlon 4800+ (Brisbane, TDP 65W at 1.375V, undervolted to 1.05V), GA-MA78-S2H, Sapphire Radeon 3850 Ultimate, Antec 300, Seasonic S12 II 430W, Scythe Mini Ninja, 2x Scythe S-Flex F fans (controlled by CPU fan header on mobo + splitter), 8GB Kingston DDR2, Western Digital Caviar Blue 640GB, Windows 7 Ultimate x64

[mfe555]

I've tried different AAM tools, same result.