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What could cause a HDD to "freeze" for a few seconds?

OhhPaigeyOhhPaigey Member RarePosts: 1,517
in Hardware
Hi, I use a SSD with windows installed on it, and that's it pretty much. Then I have a HDD I put all my random games and things on. I've had this issue for awhile and I've always just ignored it. But I'm curious what could be causing it as I'm debating on what to do with my current PC.

So basically, I'll open up a folder and I'll hear the HDD speed up, and the folder I'm trying to open will freeze for a couple of seconds, then it will eventually open.

What could be causing this issue?

Thanks!
When all is said and done, more is always said than done.

Comments

  • SomethingUnusualSomethingUnusual Member UncommonPosts: 546
    edited October 2016
    Hard disk spin down. When not in use, Windows will by default put the drive "to sleep" as to not create excessive wear to the disk and shorten its lifespan. This can be disabled in your power options. "Put Hard-disk to sleep: never"

    There's no issue, functioning as intended.
  • OhhPaigeyOhhPaigey Member RarePosts: 1,517
    SomethingUnusual said:
    Hard disk spin down. When not in use, Windows will by default put the drive "to sleep" as to not create excessive wear to the disk and shorten its lifespan. This can be disabled in your power options. "Put Hard-disk to sleep: never"

    There's no issue, functioning as intended.
    Wow, idk how I've never heard of that. Thanks a lot. :)
    When all is said and done, more is always said than done.
  • SomethingUnusualSomethingUnusual Member UncommonPosts: 546
    No problem, thanks for asking.
  • GladDogGladDog Member RarePosts: 1,097
    @SomethingUnusual is correct that if the hard discs spin down, it takes a couple of seconds to spin back up.  But if you are already accessing data on the disc, and open another folder on the same disc, you should not be seeing any slowdowns.

    Another thing to consider is that you may have a dying HDD.  Check the cheap and easy stuff first though.  Most of the time these types of problems are cheap (or even free) and easy to fix.

    Open a folder and as soon as you get past the freeze, try and open another folder.  If it still needs to spin up, either the HDD stinks or it is failing.  Either way consider replacing it with an HDD with at least 64mb of cache and 7200RPM.

    Another thing; unless your SSD is small, put your favorite 2-3 games on it.  Well worth it for the performance increase.


    The world is going to the dogs, which is just how I planned it!


  • CleffyCleffy Member RarePosts: 6,414
    Windows 10 itself has a few periods where it freezes while doing some maintenance tasks.
  • VrikaVrika Member LegendaryPosts: 7,993
    edited October 2016
    GladDog said:
    if you are already accessing data on the disc, and open another folder on the same disc, you should not be seeing any slowdowns.
    Some of the data may already be in memory, so that you can access it without the hard disk ever spinning up.

    I don't really know what the computer decides to load in memory, and how, but at least file list of root directory (e.g. d:\ ) is usually accessible without waiting for the disk to spin up.


    If the room is quiet, you're probably able to determine when the hard disk is doing its spin-up by listening. It depends on how noisy the rest of your computer is, though.
     
  • SomethingUnusualSomethingUnusual Member UncommonPosts: 546
    Vrika said:
    GladDog said:
    if you are already accessing data on the disc, and open another folder on the same disc, you should not be seeing any slowdowns.
    Some of the data may already be in memory, so that you can access it without the hard disk ever spinning up.

    I don't really know what the computer decides to load in memory, and how, but at least file list of root directory (e.g. d:\ ) is usually accessible without waiting for the disk to spin up.


    If the room is quiet, you're probably able to determine when the hard disk is doing its spin-up by listening. It depends on how noisy the rest of your computer is, though.
    Loads basic information about what is contained on the drive, such as file and folder pointers. Giving the appearance of loading faster on wake up. Drive Indexing must be enabled. (Right click drive from "Computer" and click properties, very bottom check box on General tab) and is enabled by default.
  • QuizzicalQuizzical Member LegendaryPosts: 25,524
    While your computer is idle, Windows will try to guess what you're going to load later and load it into memory ahead of time for you.  Microsoft calls this "superfetch", or more generically, it would be called prefetching.  Vista was stupidly aggressive about this and would sometimes make your computer feel slower because it was trying to prefetch other data and making the programs you're actively using wait on this.  Windows 7 fixed that to really make sure the computer is idle before it would try to prefetch data.

    If the memory holding prefetched data is later needed for something else, it's no problem to simply drop the prefetched data to free up memory without ever having used it.  So in Windows 7 or later, this doesn't hurt you but can sometimes help you.  It does, however, make it much harder to guess what a hard drive or SSD is doing.  If you run the same browser every day, for example, then unless you launch it immediately after booting the computer (so that Windows hasn't had time to prefetch it), it might well already be loaded into memory before you try to launch it.  So things might sometimes involve less hard drive reading than you expect.

    The answer to the original question is probably what SomethingUnusual said:  hard drive spinning down.  That's sensible in a laptop running on battery where saving a couple of watts matters, but not so much in a desktop.

    It's also possible for a hard drive's catch to fill up and suddenly become slower, but that has more to do with writes than reads.  If you do small file writes, then the a hard drive will quickly put them in a small DRAM cache, then let the computer carry on.  It will commit the data to a platter later when it has time.  But if you do too many writes for too long, the cache can fill up, forcing things to stop and wait.

    You do want to put programs on the SSD, not just Windows.  Web browsers especially benefit from an SSD, but having games from an SSD is nice, too.
  • GruntyGrunty Member EpicPosts: 8,657
    If this is a desktop PC then the power saving settings are probably set too conservatively for the way you use the system.  Windows button > type in 'power saving' and select 'Select a power saving setting'.  If it's on 'Power saver' or even 'Balanced' then that's the issue.  Setting it to High Performance will prevent all system hardware from shutting down.

    You can also change various power saving settings individually under 'advanced power settings' for each of the 'power saver', 'balanced' and 'high performance' power plans that Windows is set up with. Or you can create your own plan. 

    If this is a portable PC that is rarely used off the power cord you may also want to do this.  The primary use for these power settings is to conserve battery power in order for the system to run longer between recharges.

    I think there are also default key combination macros to change between the different power plans on the fly.  You may have pressed one of those key combos by accident. 
    "I used to think the worst thing in life was to be all alone.  It's not.  The worst thing in life is to end up with people who make you feel all alone."  Robin Williams
  • CleffyCleffy Member RarePosts: 6,414
    you have to go into advanced settings and change the power savings for a hard drive. Even on maximum power, it uses a power savings mode on hard drives.
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