load and power cycle

[Tom Del Rosso]

How is this possible? It's a new WD black.

power cycle count = 11
load cycle count = 3

 

[Rod Speed]

How is this possible? It's a new WD black.

power cycle count = 11
load cycle count = 3

I've always assumed that the load cycle count
is in addition to the load cycles that happen
as a result of the power cycles with drives that
give results like that.

 

[VanguardLH]

How is this possible? It's a new WD black.

That's a whole family line of products. What's the model number?

power cycle count = 11
load cycle count = 3

So, for context that is missing, I'm guessing you're asking about some
S.M.A.R.T. attributes. I'm also guessing that is the raw values for
those attributes.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/S.M.A.R.T.

ID: 12
Hex: 0x0C
Attribute name: Power Cycle Count
Description: This attribute indicates the count of full hard disk power
on/off cycles.

ID: 193
Hex: 0xC1
Attribute name: Load Cycle Count
Description: Count of load/unload cycles into head landing zone
position.

The heads moving into the landing zone doesn't necessitate a power down.
They may get moved there, for example, in preparation for a power down
as the result of a power scheme; i.e., you configure the hard disks to
spin down (but not power off) after some number of minutes to conserve
power but the computer is still powered up and ready. After the disks
spin down, you return to the computer whose monitor is still up and the
desktop responds (because that's in memory) but as soon as you do
something that accesses the hard disk, like using Windows Explorer, then
you hear the whine of the hard disks spinning up. As noted in the wiki
article, some laptop drives are programmed to put the heads into the
landing zone when there has been no activity for awhile (IntelliPark).

http://kb.acronis.com/content/9128

Load Cycle Count is worthless for failure prediction.

 

[Arno]

How is this possible? It's a new WD black.

power cycle count = 11
load cycle count = 3

This is standard. The disks do self-certify today (after servo-writing),
that takes time. If you are asking why more power-cycles than load-cycles,
that is likely because there may be power-cycles before the mechanics
is initialized. And you can bring disks up in standbty-hence no load
cycles.

Why do you even care?

Arno

 

[Tom Del Rosso]

This is standard. The disks do self-certify today (after
servo-writing), that takes time. If you are asking why more
power-cycles than load-cycles, that is likely because there may be
power-cycles before the mechanics
is initialized. And you can bring disks up in standbty-hence no load
cycles.

I did mean why more power cycles. I've powered it about 3 times so maybe it
was 8 and 0 originally.

Power cycles during manufacture makes sense (if that's what you meant by
'before the mechanics are initialized') especially if they don't count the
first load cycles because those are done under external control.

Why do you even care?

Because it brings into question the meaning of the stats.