I have a portable Seagate hdd Backup Plus Slim. No matter how long it’s connected without being used it never spins down and sleeps. It doesn’t matter what device it’s connected to. Even when it’s connected to a laptop that’s in sleep mode, the drive stays spinning forever. Only turning off the laptop completely or physically disconnecting the drive causes it to stop.
I think the drive must come configured to never sleep, ever. I don’t know why a manufacturer would do this. From what I know that will reduce the lifespan of the drive. Plus because of it always spinning sometimes it sounds like it powers down harshly (there’s a very audible sound of it suddenly shutting off, like the drive was spinning full speed when power cut off).
Is there a way to change this for a Seagate drive and make it so it sleeps? I think sleep after five minutes might be ideal for the way I use it.
The only question I found which was similar to this was for a Western Digital drive and the recommendation there was to use WD Drive Utilities. I don’t imagine that tool from another manufacturer could be used on a Seagate drive. That sounds like a risk of messing up the drive, or that it just wouldn’t work in the first place.
