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jdcineaste Author

Level 1

0 points

Western Digital Scorpio Blue 640 Drive draws too much power in a MacBookPro

I just received a Western Digital 640 gb (WD6400BEVT) Scorpio Blue Drive for my MacBookPro. I've noticed that the drives "Throttles" a lot, i.e. seems to accelerate/spin and slow down/stop in a way I've never seen in any other drive, and I've been through lots. It wouldn't be a problem if the computer didn't seem to be sluggish in response, much more sluggish than with the 200G Hitachi drive I had before. I will sometimes start typing something and the computer will be slow to react; I also see the spinning ball much more often.
I contacted WD and was told that "It is quite possible that the computer cannot manage the capacity and energy demand of this drive. If the previous drive was under 250 GB, a 640 GB drive will encounter these issues."
I'd never hear of this problem, and I'm really confused since the new drive has a lower rated energy requirement (it's a 5400 rpm vs 7200) than the previous drive. Has anyone else had these problems? Can someone tell me whether this is reality or obfuscation on the part of Western Digital?

Message was edited by: jdcineaste

MacBookPro Core 2 duo 2.33 MHz (late 2006), Mac OS X (10.6.2), Western Digital scorpio blue drive 640 GB

Posted on Nov 30, 2009 6:19 PM

211 replies

Apr 8, 2010 9:15 AM in response to KevinWK

Please try my solution posted on page 5.

Also just to put some data to all. With EFI version 1.6, The 640 WD drive, the 640 Samsung drive and now the 640 Segate drive I have tested and confirm that they work flawlessly. I have checked SMART and it confirms the drive is not powering down extensively.

KevinWK

Level 1

5 points

Apr 8, 2010 2:40 PM in response to jdcineaste

Two hours after doing the firmware change suggested by Brian, my Load Cycle count hasn't changed at all (I was at 11967 after 117 hours, and now at 119 hours the count hasn't changed). It looks like I have success! Thank you, Brian.

Now my question is, do I need to worry about any of the other tweaks I attempted (using 'hdamp' to set the energy use to 'max' and disabling the sudden motion sensor in particular). And are there any concerns I should be aware of after doing this firmware change?

After all these hours of fiddling with this, I'd love to just enjoy my MBP again, and I don't want to have to think about this anymore!

Message was edited by: KevinWK

Apr 8, 2010 3:46 PM in response to KevinWK

I dont know too much about the hdamp, If I recall you can really remove the files and that should be all you have to do as for the motion sensor, I dont think it actually works on 3rd party hard drives. (I could be wrong) anyway most hard drives today come with a g-sensor.

As for the firmware, the only thing you have to worry about is the software update, it will prompt you to upgrade. just go into the software update and run the check update, when it tells you there are updates click details and click on the EFI firmware and hit the delete key. This will prevent it from trying to install again

Apr 8, 2010 4:40 PM in response to brianmay27

The EFI 1.6 fix was working until I updated to 10.6.3. Now the load cycle is climbing steadily again and Console won't even show hdapm as running anymore. Suggestions for 10.6.3?

Apr 8, 2010 4:45 PM in response to Daniel Kern

Did you accidentally let the software updater update it to 1.7?

Apr 8, 2010 5:49 PM in response to brianmay27

Still on EFI 1.6. Software Update offers 1.7 but I've set it to ignore.

Model Identifier: MacBookPro5,5
Boot ROM Version: MBP55.00AC.B00
SMC Version (system): 1.47f2

Apr 9, 2010 10:20 AM in response to Daniel Kern

Hmm thats really weird. I can confirm that I am running 10.6.3 and am not having any of the issues. Maybe the fact that hdamp is not responding may be a reason somethings going wrong. Im not sure tho.

Apr 9, 2010 9:53 PM in response to SSOSX

Your welcome. I am just glad you have caught it before it really racked up the numbers. 🙂

I caught mine at 16,000 but some have caught it at 500,000! I don't even want to think what those numbers mean for those HD's.

Apr 12, 2010 7:54 AM in response to jdcineaste

I've tried to run hdapm with, e.g. "sudo hdapm disk0 max" on my pre-Unibody MBP but I got the message

dyld: uinknown required load command 0x80000022
Trace/BPT trap

Is this an error ? It doesn't seem to change the rate of growth of my load count at all (nor does doing "sudo pmset -a sms 0". This is driving me CRAZY.

Apr 12, 2010 10:57 AM in response to NuggyBuggy

Try the post I posted on page 5. It has been confirmed by many to work

KevinWK

Level 1

5 points

Apr 12, 2010 2:15 PM in response to jdcineaste

Well, the load cycle is climbing like crazy again. It's jumped from 11967 a couple of days ago to 14221. I checked because the drive got noisy again. I don't think I updated the firmware, and I haven't done anything else. Where do I confirm that I'm still at EFI 1.6? Is it the SMC Version (system) item on Hardware Overview? For me that shows as 1.16f11.

I's so tired of this . . .

Apr 12, 2010 5:27 PM in response to KevinWK

EFI 1.6 worked great for me in 10.6.2 but stopped working when I updated to 10.6.3. My MacBook wouldn't let me reflash the EFI 1.6 firmware since it was already installed.

So I updated to EFI 1.7 and then downgraded to EFI 1.6 again. Seems to have fixed it. Load cycle count has stopped going up and the computer is much snappier.

Apr 12, 2010 5:30 PM in response to Daniel Kern

i wish they has that downgrade "fix" for the Macbooks (uni) and not just the pro

Apr 12, 2010 5:58 PM in response to Merged Content 1

BTW: how can we email Apple about this,,, is it just simply support@apple.com?

Apr 12, 2010 6:08 PM in response to Merged Content 1

I used their bug reporter https://bugreport.apple.com

Western Digital Scorpio Blue 640 Drive draws too much power in a MacBookPro