Path: utzoo!attcan!uunet!husc6!purdue!iuvax!bkliewer
From: bkliewer@iuvax.cs.indiana.edu (Bradley Dyck Kliewer)
Newsgroups: comp.sys.ibm.pc
Subject: Re: Leaving the hard disk on continuously
Keywords: hard disk park
Message-ID: <10773@iuvax.cs.indiana.edu>
Date: 18 Jul 88 16:39:51 GMT
References: <12184@agate.BERKELEY.EDU>
Reply-To: bkliewer@iuvax.UUCP (Bradley Dyck Kliewer)
Organization: Indiana University CSCI, Bloomington
Lines: 32

In article <12184@agate.BERKELEY.EDU> cotner@bosco.berkeley.edu.UUCP (Carl Cotne
>
>As far as I know, I have to turn off the PC and turn it back on
>in order to bring up the hard disk.  However this this seems to defeat the 
>purpose of leaving the computer on continuously to save wear and tear on 
>the hard disk.  Can anyone set me straight?  Is there a utility to unpark a 
>
>PS:  I'm also leaving my monitor on 24 hours a day, but with the brightness
>switch dimmed to pitch black, operating under the same assumption that
>transients during power on is not good for the monitor either.  Is this

>a reasonable assumption, or should I just switch the monitor off?

Simply accessing the disk will unpark it (unless your park program hangs the
computer).  I have seen a park utility which locks out the keyboard so the
power must be turned off (although Alt-Ctrl-Del might work).  All a park
program usually does is move the head to the very last cylinder (which is
not supposed to used).  Any disk access (such as DIR, reading or writing)
will move the head off the park track.

As far as monitors are concerned, turning them on and off seems to put
quite a bit of strain on the circuitry (my EGA monitor just fried itself
this weekend).  However, because of the strong, rapidly oscillating electric
and magnetic fields, there is also a lot of stress during operation.  My
preference is to turn monitors off for the night, but never during the day.
Note:  I knew my monitor was going bad -- it had problems starting up, so
I kept it running continously.  I suspect this extended the life very 
slightly, but it burned up anyway (leaving quite a bad smell in the house).

Bradley Dyck Kliewer                Hacking...
bkliewer@iuvax.cs.indiana.edu       It's not just an adventure
                                    It's my job!