Wireless LAN spins up HDD...

[mumsoft]

For a long time I had my HDD go to sleep after 5 minutes, only to find that 'something' urged it to spin up after some time. Then it would sleep again, and so forth.
Then I decided to do it the way KC Furge advised. The disk spins all the time, and the Asus takes about 11.5 Watts all day.
Now I have tested the 'goto sleep after 5 minutes' again, but only with radio off, that means: no WLAN. And with an energy meter I can see that now the Asus keeps sleeping all day long, drowsing a meager 4.6 Watts that way.

So, the WLAN causes all these unwanted spin ups!

Probably because someone scans the Wifi signals or tries to get in.
I have TKIP/AES and WPA-PSK/WPA2-PSK configured, and as you might know the Asus keeps the PSK on the disk, so if I connect to it wirelessly it will also spin up the disk. My password comes from https://www.grc.com/passwords.htm

Now I will try to make the copy button start/stop the WLAN, to have the best of both worlds: an almost cold Asus that only spins the disk when absolutely necessary.

Update:
I now know how to avoid spinning up the HD with WLAN on. The secret is a secret SSID... It is not enough to hide the SSID, no, you have to use a 'secret' SSID that you did not use before and made public. The wireless devices in the neighbourhood all keep internal lists of SSID's they once made contact with, and they will always try to renew the contact, even if your SSID is hidden.
So, to avoid this, you have to choose a new SSID and keep (i said KEEP) it hidden from the start. Then no other device will see it, nor has it's name in his list of former engagements. Bingo!
Now my Asus is quiet all day. I won't tell you what SSID I have chosen....


I provide this information in the hope it will prove useful for someone.

Regards,
Marc

[Michele Spinolo]

ciao Marc,

I usually use wired connection for my laptop, while I use WLAN for PS3 with WPA2-PSK.
When I turn on PS3 and it connects to the router the HD doesn't spin up (do you remember my post about twonky and PS3 spin up problem?).

I will try with my laptop and let you know.

[mumsoft]

ciao Marc,

I usually use wired connection for my laptop, while I use WLAN for PS3 with WPA2-PSK.
When I turn on PS3 and it connects to the router the HD doesn't spin up (do you remember my post about twonky and PS3 spin up problem?).

I will try with my laptop and let you know.

Do you have some results?

Marc

[Michele Spinolo]

Do you have some results?

Marc

ciao Marc,

I am facing tons of problems with my PS3 and WL-700: at the moment it seems I am not able to connect via Wi-fi, although It worked flawlessy for 1 month and with no reason it stopped working!
sorry!

[mumsoft]

ciao Marc,

I am facing tons of problems with my PS3 and WL-700: at the moment it seems I am not able to connect via Wi-fi, although It worked flawlessy for 1 month and with no reason it stopped working!
sorry!

Hi Michele,

Disable my hack to stop/start wlan if you use it, and try again.
There must always be a reason for a failure.

greetz,
Marc

[Michele Spinolo]

Hi Michele,

Disable my hack to stop/start wlan if you use it, and try again.
There must always be a reason for a failure.

greetz,
Marc

Ciao Marc,

atm I am not using your hack, and I perfectly agree I there should be a reason for everything but I am not able to find it!
I have KF firmware plus twonky 4.4.5 and emule running, nothing else.
TKIP (no AES) and WPA-PSK/WPA2-PSK and PS3 sometime connects smoothly and twonky works fine, sometimes it's a mess to get the PS3 connected an Twonky is sooooooo slow. I also have a lot of DLNA errors.

I read PS3's wi-fi sucks, thus I think I will try wired connection to see if it makes the trick. I am wondering if the reason I had no HDD spin up with PS3 was it was not actually connecting to the router....

[mumsoft]

Ciao Marc,

I am wondering if the reason I had no HDD spin up with PS3 was it was not actually connecting to the router....

Sorry, i don't understand what you're trying to tell here.

My Noxon is also very slow in getting an ip-address from the Asus, and it never does with a stopped HD. So i changed the radio script a bit to make it start the HD if it starts WLAN.
But i also have configured the wireless interface to never start by itself. Now the web interface doesn't show the wireless associations (in staid it tells me that Wireless is disabled), and god knows what else it has disabled by default, which the radio script does not handle. So my whole setup is a bit experimental.
If I change something that makes the router reconfigure itself, it will stop WLAN in my case. But if i had wlan on by default, the same behaviour would start it without doubt.
AES is a nogo for the little Asus. I tried it with my computer and got very much lost packets. TKIP is the most you can get.

Actually I don't know why I tell you this. Never mind.

Love from Holland (we will be visiting Italy in september)
Marc

[Michele Spinolo]

Actually I don't know why I tell you this. Never mind.

Love from Holland (we will be visiting Italy in september)
Marc

ciao marc,

we are a little OT here but maybe we can provide useful infos.

My previous sentence meant the HD was not spinning up because it is possible at that time PS3 was not connected to the router (or trying to connect) even if it was switched on.

A good point is what you stated about encryption: maybe I could find a better trade off between performance and security level with a lower encryption setting...it worths to try! I will also try with a wiring connection an WLAN off.

So are you from Holland? I have a lot of Dutch friends I worked with here in Italy, most of them from Delft University!
What are you going to visit in Italy?

[mumsoft]

ciao marc,

we are a little OT here but maybe we can provide useful infos.

My previous sentence meant the HD was not spinning up because it is possible at that time PS3 was not connected to the router (or trying to connect) even if it was switched on.

A good point is what you stated about encryption: maybe I could find a better trade off between performance and security level with a lower encryption setting...it worths to try! I will also try with a wiring connection an WLAN off.

So are you from Holland? I have a lot of Dutch friends I worked with here in Italy, most of them from Delft University!
What are you going to visit in Italy?

I must have missed this message. Instead I thought that you stopped posting. Err! We have been in Sorrento in september...

Marc

[XYZ]

So, to avoid this, you have to choose a new SSID and keep (i said KEEP) it hidden from the start. Then no other device will see it, nor has it's name in his list of former engagements.

I tried exactly what you described, but unfortunately nothing is happening - disk is still spinning all the time. I am using original 1.0.4.6 firmware. Do I need to install KC Furge for this? Should I type SSID on my PC every time when I want to use WiFi or could I choose Yes when MS Vista is asking me if I want to remember it?

[mumsoft]

I tried exactly what you described, but unfortunately nothing is happening - disk is still spinning all the time. I am using original 1.0.4.6 firmware. Do I need to install KC Furge for this? Should I type SSID on my PC every time when I want to use WiFi or could I choose Yes when MS Vista is asking me if I want to remember it?

You are using verrrrryyyy old firmware. Even the newest (1.0.7.8) is old nowadays.
And yes, yous should upgrade to KC Furge modified firmware (WL700gE_kc_1078_02.nas). So please read what is said here http://wl700g.homelinux.net/drupal/?q=node/134.
You can skip section 2.2.

Asus did not provide anything to stop the disk, but with the KC Furge version it is rather easy.

As you already have a super secret SSID, you can answer your question about MS Vista yourself, I presume.
At least, with this setup, not one of my wifi-clients has trouble accessing the Asus router once it knows the SSID, which they all can remember. I assume that Vista is not more dumb than say my humble Palm Pilot or my tiny Linux netbook.

Good luck.

Marc

[XYZ]

You are using verrrrryyyy old firmware. Even the newest (1.0.7.8) is old nowadays.

Yes, I know that, but old version worked fine for me and I didn't want to broke something which isn't broken, especially because I read that new version opened security hole with the telnet.

Anyway, I upgraded firmware to 1.0.7.8 KC Furge as you suggested and after many hours which I spend trying, I finally managed to get my HDD spinning down. It was not enough just to upgrade firmware, but I needed to modify rc.local and to add hdparm -S 60 ${internal_hdd} as you suggested in one another thread. I don't know why KC Furge didn't modify his firmware according to your suggestion when it is obvious that his settings don't work as it should.

So please read what is said here http://wl700g.homelinux.net/drupal/?q=node/134.

Yes, I read that tutorial many times, but honestly it is not very well written for dumb Windows users like me.

I assume that Vista is not more dumb than say my humble Palm Pilot or my tiny Linux netbook.

Well, seems to me that it is semi-dumb - I need to click on the Refresh button whenever I restart Asus router which is not a big deal. However, Vista could resume connection automatically after its restart or hibernation.

Now, it works great. Thank you very much for your advices and suggestions, I really appreciate them.

[mumsoft]

I don't know why KC Furge didn't modify his firmware according to your suggestion when it is obvious that his settings don't work as it should.

Well, I know. He has told that in some post here. You might know that constantly starting and stopping a disk isn't so good for it's health, and at the time that KC wrote his version, he knew that the disk now and then started to spin up even if no-one seemed to urge it do so.
So he has provided the code to let it spin, but with minimal fuss.

I did not like that, and changed the hdparm parameters, only to find out that it did not keep the disk quiet all the time.
After that, I found out that this was caused by the wlan-interface with a not-so-secret SSID.
For people like me, that seldom use the disk, it's a nice trick, but for others, that use it as a streamer it isn't.

I have some pictures on it, and just one movie, that I seldom need. I think that I will wipe off my backups and my music from it, and use the HD for pictures only.
My music is nowadays better served by a Olive Opus No.4

Goodbye
Marc

[pooz]

So he has provided the code to let it spin, but with minimal fuss.

Hi Marc,
may you have the instruction/link how and where to configure the WL700gE with lower Spinning tempo?

I would like to use the Asus for making backups via W-LAN. Maybe every hour (with Time Machine on OS X).

Thanks!
pooz

[mumsoft]

Hi Marc,
may you have the instruction/link how and where to configure the WL700gE with lower Spinning tempo?

I would like to use the Asus for making backups via W-LAN. Maybe every hour (with Time Machine on OS X).

Thanks!
pooz

Pooz,

Sorry for my low spinning up...
I discarded making backups to the NAS, because it found it too slow for that.
But, if you like to do that, no problem.
With KFurge's code:

# Do the necessary steps so the internal HDD will enter low power
# idle after 5 minutes and low RPM idle after 1 hour
if [ "$kc_spin_down_hdd" != "No" ]; then
mount -o remount,noatime,nodiratime /shares/${pool}
hdparm -B 164 ${internal_hdd}
hdparm -B 114 ${internal_hdd}
smartctl -dT ${internal_hdd}
fi

My code:
hdparm -S 60 ${internal_hdd}
will stop the disk spinning after 60 minutes (or seconds?). Just google for it to make sure.

Marc