[zombieswontgetme]

Hi there,

I have a couple external Hard Drives and while they're connected to my computer (G5 powermac, if it matters) they power up and down whenever the computer goes to sleep. I've heard this isn't a good thing so - Is there a device (like a usb hub?) that I can plug my hard drives into, and turn on and off at my discretion?

Any ideas are welcome, thanks!

[Cold Warrior]

Your drives spin up and down all day long on top of the hundreds of thousands (at least) of rotations they do in daily operation. A couple more at sleep and wake up aren't going to hurt anything.

[BLAZE_MkIV]

Leave them turned off when you don't need them. Turn them on and they mount. Eject them and turn them off when your done.

[tooki]

Originally Posted by Cold Warrior 

Your drives spin up and down all day long on top of the hundreds of thousands (at least) of rotations they do in daily operation. A couple more at sleep and wake up aren't going to hurt anything.

On a laptop drive, no. On a desktop drive, theoretically it could. They have a limited number of spinup cycles. (I find it annoying that most FireWire/USB drive spin down all the time, and there's no way to control it, as the Energy Saver setting affects only internal drives. It wastes a TON of time, and it wears out the drives.)