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Ubuntu May Be Killing Your Laptop's Hard Drive

Posted by kdawson on from the saving-power-at-what-cost dept.

wwrmn writes "There's a debate going on over at bugs.launchpad.net on whether it's the Ubuntu, BIOS, hard-drive manufacturer, or pick-any-player's fault, but Ubuntu (and perhaps any OS) may be dramatically shortening the life of your laptop's hard drive due to an aggressive power-saving feature / acpi bug / OS configuration. Regardless of where the fault lies or how it's fixed, you might want to take some actions now to try to prevent the damage."

4 of 419 comments (clear)

  1. Ubuntu? by keithjr · · Score: 5, Insightful

    If perhaps it could be "any OS" then why headline this as "Ubuntu" killing laptops? I can't find much in TFA that makes a compelling case that it isn't APCI. I'd read more but that page hurts my eyes.

  2. Isn't this what is supposed to happen? by zappepcs · · Score: 5, Insightful
    I mean, the OSS community at large finds a problem, and sets about to fix it... from the link:

    Ralf Nieuwenhuijsen wrote on 2007-10-25: (permalink)

    May i just warn ya all to NOT play the blame-game?

    It does sound like it's the fault of the BIOS (and somebody should contact them).

    To rescue a hard-drive in distress sounds like something that should have a high-priority (critical?).
    Not because it's ubuntu's fault or the bios fault. But because Ubuntu can solve this issue _now_. Doesn't sound like it is NOT being dealt with, it just isn't listed everywhere as critical and in the news all over the intarweb tubes.
    --
    Support NYCountryLawyer RIAA vs People
  3. Not Entirely Accurate by marcantonio · · Score: 5, Insightful

    It's important to note that this only occurs if ENABLE_LAPTOP_MODE is enabled. By default it is NOT set. From /etc/default/acpi-support:

    # Switch to laptop-mode on battery power - off by default as it causes odd
    # hangs on some machines
    ENABLE_LAPTOP_MODE=false

  4. Re:The Ubuntu by PhilipMckrack · · Score: 5, Insightful

    I think the answer is they should both fix the problem. Drive manufacturers should issue a sane value and operating systems should check that the value is sane before using it. Same rule as accepting any data from an outside source, you tell them what they are supposed to do, but then you double check it to make sure they did. Pointing fingers at each other while customers hardware fries doesn't help anyone.