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Hard disk always busy (although there's nothing to do...)
Thread poster: Doron Greenspan MITI
Doron Greenspan MITI
Doron Greenspan MITI  Identity Verified
Israel
Local time: 13:39
Member (2005)
English to Hebrew
+ ...
Jan 25, 2007

Here's an irritating problem.
My ExcelStor J680 hard disk is constantly busy (normal working noise and disk's red indicator on), even when there are no open applications and the CPU has around 0% usage.

I’m running a 3GHz pc with Windows XP Pro. No gaming or graphic work at all, just translation stuff.

The memory is large enough at 1MB, and I’m normally using about a third of that normally.

I tried to remove all file paging (down to 0MB), and i... See more
Here's an irritating problem.
My ExcelStor J680 hard disk is constantly busy (normal working noise and disk's red indicator on), even when there are no open applications and the CPU has around 0% usage.

I’m running a 3GHz pc with Windows XP Pro. No gaming or graphic work at all, just translation stuff.

The memory is large enough at 1MB, and I’m normally using about a third of that normally.

I tried to remove all file paging (down to 0MB), and it still doesn’t seem to be the problem.
I run a disk cleanup, a checkdisk and defragmentation.

Any idea will be appreciated on how I can:

1. monitor why it’s doing this, and
2. solve the problem?

Thanks in advance, Doron ▲ Collapse
 
Jaroslaw Michalak
Jaroslaw Michalak  Identity Verified
Poland
Local time: 12:39
Member (2004)
English to Polish
SITE LOCALIZER
Monitoring Jan 25, 2007

Use a file access monitoring software, for example:

http://www.microsoft.com/technet/sysinternals/utilities/filemon.mspx

This should tell you which application accesses the HD and deal with it accordingly.

I had a similar problem some time ago, it turned out that one of my security programs was writing entries to a log file (every... See more
Use a file access monitoring software, for example:

http://www.microsoft.com/technet/sysinternals/utilities/filemon.mspx

This should tell you which application accesses the HD and deal with it accordingly.

I had a similar problem some time ago, it turned out that one of my security programs was writing entries to a log file (every 30 seconds!). ▲ Collapse
 
Doron Greenspan MITI
Doron Greenspan MITI  Identity Verified
Israel
Local time: 13:39
Member (2005)
English to Hebrew
+ ...
TOPIC STARTER
Monitorin as we speak.. Jan 25, 2007

Thanks for this great idea.
I've just loaded Process Monitor (the new version for XP SP2) and am watching it carefully.

As Murphy will have it, the hard disk got scared and stopped munching...
 
Brandis (X)
Brandis (X)
Local time: 12:39
English to German
+ ...
what a wonder Jan 25, 2007

Hi! A perfect syllogism. We are all active even when there are no projects, just keep doing something and keep active. I know this does not solve your problem, but generally hard discs need to swap the content command sets etc., when the comp. is on. Best Brandis
 
Abdul Wahab (X)
Abdul Wahab (X)
Pakistan
Local time: 16:39
English to Urdu
+ ...
Indexing Jan 25, 2007

Dear

When your PC is idle, under Windows XP it start indexing hard drive contents for future search.
 
Doron Greenspan MITI
Doron Greenspan MITI  Identity Verified
Israel
Local time: 13:39
Member (2005)
English to Hebrew
+ ...
TOPIC STARTER
There's a difference though, Brandis Jan 26, 2007

When we humans are constantly over-busy, it may generally lead to one of two things:
either we get healthier, and keep living longer (if we're busy with a healthy sort of life, exercise etc.), or
we get heart attacks (if we're busy worrying too much...).

With hard disks, I guess they simply get worn out quickly whatever the reason for their hyper-activities.

Abdul Wahab, thanks for your suggestion - indeed, I neutralized this function in XP and turned inste... See more
When we humans are constantly over-busy, it may generally lead to one of two things:
either we get healthier, and keep living longer (if we're busy with a healthy sort of life, exercise etc.), or
we get heart attacks (if we're busy worrying too much...).

With hard disks, I guess they simply get worn out quickly whatever the reason for their hyper-activities.

Abdul Wahab, thanks for your suggestion - indeed, I neutralized this function in XP and turned instead to Google Desktop for my pc searches - highly recommended and much faster. ▲ Collapse
 
Doron Greenspan MITI
Doron Greenspan MITI  Identity Verified
Israel
Local time: 13:39
Member (2005)
English to Hebrew
+ ...
TOPIC STARTER
Problem solved somehow Jan 26, 2007

and like many other computer-related things, I don't have a clue how...

Thanks all. Doron
 


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Hard disk always busy (although there's nothing to do...)






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