Hard-drives are constantly churning. How can I get them to just stop already?

[Mateo1041]

I own the following hard-drives and two of the three won't stop churning (from what I can tell):

* Maxtor OneTouch 4 Plus (churns)
* Seagate FreeAgent (churns)
* SimpleTech something or another

I recently upgraded to Windows 7, although this has been happening since Vista. I'm on the Home 64 bit edition.

What's worse is how my keyboard and mouse are mostly non-responsive and jerky. I'm struggling to determine if this is a laptop issue (I own a Sager NP8662), hard-drive(s) issue, or some kind of weird hub issue. The hard-drives were all purchased within the last 3 years (approximately 1 per year). The rest of the hardware is brand new.

My NZXT Cryo LX notebook cooler includes a built-in hub. I have this connected to one of my laptop USB ports (only laptop USB port in use). I then also have a Belkin 4-port hub connected to the notebook cooler. My three external hard-drives, printer, mouse, and keyboard are connected to either the notebook cooler or Belkin hub.

I've had the mouse/keyboard issue with Vista, but it seemed to go away after a few days when I first got my laptop and didn't make a reappearance until the Windows 7 upgrade.

I've tried Process Monitor, but that didn't really seem to help much. I've restricted indexing for all three external hard-drives. I've tried uninstalling the mouse driver and then plugging it into a different port.

Anyone know what might be wrong? :-( I'm so fed up.

 

[The_Other_One]

Since around Windows XP, Windows has been notorious for "optimizing" hard drives while the computer is idle or trying to setup the indexing service.

http://www.technipages.com/enabledisable-optimize-hard-drive-when-idle.html (might just be for XP)

Indexing can be disabled per drive by going through Computer/My Computer, right-click on the drive, properties, and uncheck "Index this drive for faster searches"

If these don't help, I'd check into the programs you have running and confirm it's not some type of virus scan or something you installed.

 

[Mateo1041]

Thanks. It happens while I'm actively using it, unfortunately. It seems to correspond to the mouse being jerky. I also tried disabling Avast. :-(

 

[The_Other_One]

Try these anyway... I know that the optimization tends to continue when you're active.

Also, have you checked task manager to see if any processes are hogging resources?

 

[Mateo1041]

Try these anyway... I know that the optimization tends to continue when you're active.

Also, have you checked task manager to see if any processes are hogging resources?

Check and check. Earlier today and unchecked the index box for each external hard-drive. I did check task manager and nothing seems to really jump out. Everything is near 0%.

I'm more than willing to work with anyone's suggestions as long as they're not a really bad hack.

 

[linkin]

when in task manager click on resource monitor. look at disk usage... it could be anywhere from 0 kB/s to 900 kB/s. if it is fluctuating (going high and low) that is normal. if it's always high then something is eating your hdd up.

Do you know how to use msconfig?

 

[Mateo1041]

Checked that earlier. It fluctuated, but nothing all that high. This laptop's a beast and should be able to take care of anything. :-/

Yep. Anything in particular I should be checking for in msconfig?

Really appreciate the help everyone.

 

[Mateo1041]

Anyone else have any ideas?

 

[linkin]

okay in msconfig, go to startup and disable things you don't use. I only leave my antivirus and catalyst control centre able to start up (you've probably already done this)

The next step is in services:

Things to disable (be sure to check you don't use any of these services!) :

DFS Replication
Windows Media Center Reciever Service
Windows Media Player Scheduler Service
Windows Media Player Service Launcher
ReadyBoost (optional)
Windows Presentation Foundation Font Cache
Windows CardSpace
Windows Firewall (only disable if you have another antivirus that has a firewall)
Network Access Protection Agent
Performance Logs & Alerts
Quality Windows Audio Video Experience
Remote Access Auto Connection Manager (trojans use these services to attack your pc)
Remote Access Connection Manager
Remote Registry (allows hackers/trojans to access your registry)
Windows Backup (unless you use it)
Windows Image Acquisition (WIA)
Tablet PC Input Service
Volume Shadow Copy (this is system restore, you may want to leave this checked. I don't use system restore at all)
Windows Connect Now - Config Registrar
Windows Defender (if you use your own A/V you can safely disable this)
Windows Media Player Network Sharing Service
Parental Controls
Security Center
Windows Search

These services enable or disable windows functions. You may want to be careful with what you disable, but i have disabled all of the above (plus program entries, like Nero) and i have only seen improvement. It's up to you.

 

[Mateo1041]

Well, I switched USB ports for some things and now all is working just fine. One of the hard-drives wasn't recognized when booting before. Now it shows ok. Who knows. The issue seemed to go away by itself when I first purchased the laptop, too.