Hacking Guide: WD Passport Spindown Fix

[Bladexdsl]

odd i have a wd passbook 320gb and never had this problem?

 

[hdhacker]

odd i have a wd passbook 320gb and never had this problem?

You were probably just fortunate. I experienced it with Wii Fit doing the 10 min boxing.

 

[SonyUSA]

Try it and let us know dimmujed! It won't hurt it if it doesn't work. Just follow my steps and try it by USB first.

I'm only finding one hard drive? I have two internal connected and 2 external...?

When you do the command again you have to change the letter to b then c then d, etc. to see the other drives. So:

hdparm -I hda
hdparm -I hdb
hdparm -I hdc
hdparm -I hdd

etc. to see all your different drives!

 

[dimmujed]

Try it and let us know dimmujed! It won't hurt it if it doesn't work. Just follow my steps and try it by USB first.

I'm only finding one hard drive? I have two internal connected and 2 external...?

When you do the command again you have to change the letter to b then c then d, etc. to see the other drives. So:

hdparm -I hda
hdparm -I hdb
hdparm -I hdc
hdparm -I hdd

etc. to see all your different drives!

I did that, all the way to hdz and i only fround one drive on hda.....?

 

[SonyUSA]

Then you will need to open it and see if you can plug it in with SATA cables directly

 

[dimmujed]

Then you will need to open it and see if you can plug it in with SATA cables directly

Guess i have a project for this weekend. sigh.

 

[SonyUSA]

Testing Mario Kart Wii (PAL, but NTSC console) now because that seems to be a popular test.

 

[jm9843]

Testing Mario Kart Wii (PAL, but NTSC console) now because that seems to be a popular test.

Is there a game to test that is guaranteed to expose the spin-down problem if you've got it with your drive? Mario Kart perhaps?

I was just about to order a WD Passport but now I'm starting to have second thoughts...


*Edit* - never mind. I don't know how I missed the earlier post about Mario Kart. I may still go with a Seagate FreeAgent Go now instead of the WD.

 

[hdhacker]

Then you will need to open it and see if you can plug it in with SATA cables directly

Guess i have a project for this weekend. sigh.

Use this video as a guide:



It's extremely easy to do. Don't sweat it. Just make sure you have one that has a SATA drive inside before you open it up.

 

[SonyUSA]

Testing Mario Kart Wii (PAL, but NTSC console) now because that seems to be a popular test.

Is there a game to test that is guaranteed to expose the spin-down problem if you've got it with your drive? Mario Kart perhaps?

I was just about to order a WD Passport but now I'm starting to have second thoughts...

I am testing Mario Kart right now, it has 5 minutes left (im waiting 20+ minutes instead of 15 just to be sure) It's guarantee'd to crash you if your hdd has spindown problems if you pause before the end of the race and wait 15 minutes.

 

[SonyUSA]

Success! Everything is working 100% -- even Mario Kart!!!

 

[twig123]

Another thread (http://gbatemp.net/index.php?showtopic=146211&st=0) suggested using -S 0 (which is supposed to disable standby, but didn't on mine) or -B 255 (which failed to even change the setting on my drive)

My drive is a Internal WD 80GB IDE (WD800JB) that I placed in an aftermarked enclosure.
I just tested using the -S 251 as you suggested and here are my results:

Tested with Mario Kart, played till just before the finish on 3rd lap.
I paused for 30min (previously had issues after 25min, so I left it longer to make sure)
I finished race and was able to continue with no problems!!!!!!!!!!!

(It would be logical that I would have to power-cycle the if it was left on overnight... but that is a test for another time)

 

[Bladexdsl]

so what is supposed to happen when it fucks up?

 

[twig123]

so what is supposed to happen when it fucks up?

the game freezes, screen goes black and locks up or freezes and has screeching sound from audio... and requires a hard reset on the wii to bring it back to a working state

 

[evvil]

I have a 400GB WD Passport Essential that I picked up less then a week ago. I haven't had any of the issues some of you are reporting. I just finished the mario kart test twice, first for 20 min and again for over an hour to be sure. When I unpaused the game and finished the race it didn't crash, but it did hang for a second before going through the end of race sequence. I was able to continue playing the game just fine and ran another race to be sure.

How would I tell if it is one of the USB only drives? Perhaps some of the newer drives initialize faster or have some sort of new caching system, just a thought. If I'm not mistaken the 400GB came out after the 500GB (at least I saw the 500 available first). Anyways just wanted to let you guys know my results as this seems to be one of the more popular drives for the usb loader.

 

[SonyUSA]

I have a 400GB WD Passport Essential that I picked up less then a week ago. I haven't had any of the issues some of you are reporting. I just finished the mario kart test twice, first for 20 min and again for over an hour to be sure. When I unpaused the game and finished the race it didn't crash, but it did hang for a second before going through the end of race sequence. I was able to continue playing the game just fine and ran another race to be sure.

How would I tell if it is one of the USB only drives? Perhaps some of the newer drives initialize faster or have some sort of new caching system, just a thought. If I'm not mistaken the 400GB came out after the 500GB (at least I saw the 500 available first). Anyways just wanted to let you guys know my results as this seems to be one of the more popular drives for the usb loader.

Maybe google the serial/revision and see or just pop the thing open, it's pretty easy to open. Some people have hiccups like that and so far it seems that some drives just spin back up faster... possibly because they are less fragged and can jump to the right data quicker. I've used my usb hdd a lot and yours is fairly new, as you've said... so I dunno?

P.S. Cate West seems to randomly crash when played from USB Loader -- in far less than 15 minute load time intervals I might add, so I'm sure any leftover problems in some games are just USBLoader issues.

 

[Bladexdsl]

so what is supposed to happen when it fucks up?

the game freezes, screen goes black and locks up or freezes and has screeching sound from audio... and requires a hard reset on the wii to bring it back to a working state

that happened to me once when i was watching the opening cut scene from ssbb. also on rune factory the music went off and back on after 1 second but it hasn't done it ever since.

 

[evvil]

Maybe google the serial/revision and see or just pop the thing open, it's pretty easy to open. Some people have hiccups like that and so far it seems that some drives just spin back up faster... possibly because they are less fragged and can jump to the right data quicker. I've used my usb hdd a lot and yours is fairly new, as you've said... so I dunno?

P.S. Cate West seems to randomly crash when played from USB Loader -- in far less than 15 minute load time intervals I might add, so I'm sure any leftover problems in some games are just USBLoader issues.

That would make sense, although I do have about 45 games on it now (not sure if that would make a difference). Anyways I have a R/N:A7B which seems to have it's sata plug intact. I think I'm gonna just use it as is for now and refer back to your guide if I have any troubles (no point in voiding the warranty if I don't have to). Thanks for your help and this guide, now if I ever do have issues I'll know what to do

*edit* just thought of something, I have my drive fully partitioned for wbfs, are you guys having problems using multiple partitions?

 

[Mark McDonut]

so what is supposed to happen when it fucks up?

the game freezes, screen goes black and locks up or freezes and has screeching sound from audio... and requires a hard reset on the wii to bring it back to a working state

that happened to me once when i was watching the opening cut scene from ssbb. also on rune factory the music went off and back on after 1 second but it hasn't done it ever since.

Happened to me with house of the dead overkill, I re-ripped and dumped it and had no problems but I also had problems dumping a few games and mixed around between dumping from wii and using iso's i had already dumped and had also deleted a few games along the line too. i think deleting a small game then installing a big game could appear to be causing problems as well, as i have a feeling it's splitting the iso's up if they aren;t all added contiguously. I could be crazy but it makes sense, like how a hard drive gets fragmented in windows.

 

[wiiztec]

I have a 400GB WD Passport Essential that I picked up less then a week ago. I haven't had any of the issues some of you are reporting. I just finished the mario kart test twice, first for 20 min and again for over an hour to be sure. When I unpaused the game and finished the race it didn't crash, but it did hang for a second before going through the end of race sequence. I was able to continue playing the game just fine and ran another race to be sure.

How would I tell if it is one of the USB only drives? Perhaps some of the newer drives initialize faster or have some sort of new caching system, just a thought. If I'm not mistaken the 400GB came out after the 500GB (at least I saw the 500 available first). Anyways just wanted to let you guys know my results as this seems to be one of the more popular drives for the usb loader.

I have the exact same harddrive and results as you