1. Forum
  2. tqwNet
  3. TQW DOCKER

  • Preventative Wear Leveling

    From poindexter FORTRAN@1337:3/178 to All on Sun Aug 17 07:58:03 2025
    My Synology NAS has made an annoying clunk every 5 seconds, associated
    with all of the drive activity lights flickering. I thought cache writes
    were causing it, but after disabling write caching, it still happens.

    Doing some research, it sounds like WD drives and some other brands to something called PWL, or preventative wear leveling.

    Apparently, when the drives are idle, the firmware moves the head across
    the disk to keep the lubrication spread and avoid a stiction issue.

    That's an admirable effort, but every 5 seconds? Come on...



    --- MultiMail/Win v0.52
    * Origin: realitycheckBBS.org -- information is power. (1337:3/178)
  • From MeaTLoTioN@1337:1/101 to poindexter FORTRAN on Sat Aug 23 18:51:54 2025
    On 17 Aug 2025, poindexter FORTRAN said the following...

    My Synology NAS has made an annoying clunk every 5 seconds, associated with all of the drive activity lights flickering. I thought cache writes were causing it, but after disabling write caching, it still happens.

    Doing some research, it sounds like WD drives and some other brands to something called PWL, or preventative wear leveling.

    Apparently, when the drives are idle, the firmware moves the head across the disk to keep the lubrication spread and avoid a stiction issue.

    That's an admirable effort, but every 5 seconds? Come on...

    If it's every 5 seconds I would say that's less likely PWL and more likely that one (or more) of the disks has developed a bad sector/block and the heads are retrying to read and reread said sector/block, I don't think PWL would be initiated every 5 seconds, would it?

    ---
    |14Best regards,
    |11Ch|03rist|11ia|15n |11a|03ka |11Me|03aTLoT|11io|15N // @meatlotion:erb.pw

    |07ÄÄ |08[|10eml|08] |15ml@erb.pw |07ÄÄ |08[|10web|08] |15www.erb.pw |07ÄÄÄ¿ |07ÄÄ |08[|09fsx|08] |1521:1/158 |07ÄÄ |08[|11tqw|08] |151337:1/101 |07ÂÄÄÙ |07ÄÄ |08[|12rtn|08] |1580:774/81 |07ÄÂ |08[|14fdn|08] |152:250/5 |07ÄÄÄÙ
    |07ÄÄ |08[|10ark|08] |1510:104/2 |07ÄÙ

    ... What was the best thing before sliced bread?

    --- Mystic BBS v1.12 A49 2023/04/30 (Linux/64)
    * Origin: thE qUAntUm wOrmhOlE, rAmsgAtE, uK. bbs.erb.pw (1337:1/101)
  • From poindexter FORTRAN@1337:3/178 to MeaTLoTioN on Sun Aug 24 10:18:50 2025
    MeaTLoTioN wrote to poindexter FORTRAN <=-

    That's an admirable effort, but every 5 seconds? Come on...

    If it's every 5 seconds I would say that's less likely PWL and more
    likely that one (or more) of the disks has developed a bad sector/block and the heads are retrying to read and reread said sector/block, I
    don't think PWL would be initiated every 5 seconds, would it?

    It does seem excessive. Smart tests have been inconclusive at thia
    point, and I replaced the disks with new-ish (approximately 7000 hours)
    disks a while back.

    Well, 7000 hours back, to be exact. :)

    Weird that all of the activity lights light up when it makes that noise.

    What I really need to do is make a server space in my storage area. It's
    a little humid in the winter, but cool. I have shelving in there, power
    - just need ethernet to there. that'll let me move the NAS somewhere
    where I can't hear it, allow me to get a proper server, and do video
    calls from my office without background noise.




    --- MultiMail/Win v0.52
    * Origin: realitycheckBBS.org -- information is power. (1337:3/178)