Hard Disk keeps spinning down.

[mastermind247]

Dear member(s) of the macosx.com tech team, for some reason my internal hard disk keeps spinning down (and back up always immediately) at what seems random times for no apparent reason, which results in a rather long pause in system response.

For instance in the loading screen, when i hear what i believe to be my hard drive spinning down the loading bar (which would normally increase steadily) will stand still for about a minute or two and continue normally afterwards. This is the case for anything that needs to load, like when i'm starting itunes or any other program, if the hard disk spins down while starting up the program it will take a minute or two then start afterwards. Same goes for watching or listening to media, a slight pause will occur.

I've also noticed that any commands given while in this "idle" state are stored and will execute afterwards. Like typeing a sentence.

The problem started occuring after i got my used hard disk space over ±100GB. The system suddenly started going really slow and with hitches, even tough the total capacity is 148,92GB. Simply deleting some data to put it under 100GB again resolved the speed and hitches, but then the the spin downs started to occur.

I've searched the internet for people having similar problems who've already gotten help but without luck. Since i think it's the hard drive i've used Onyx and Disk Utility to repair the permissions on my hard disk, which held the same results : the spin-downs cease after i do it, but every time i restart the spin-downs would simply occur again. Is there any way to solve this permanently?

Thanks in advance.

Here are some further details :

Repair report of Disk Utility :

Bevoegdheden voor 'Macintosh HD' worden hersteld
(Permissions for volume 'Macintosh HD' will be repaired.)
Determining correct file permissions.
We are using special permissions for the file or directory ./Library/ColorSync/Profiles/Displays. New permissions are 16893
We are using special permissions for the file or directory ./Library/ColorSync/Profiles. New permissions are 16893
We are using special permissions for the file or directory ./System/Library/Filesystems/cd9660.fs/cd9660.util. New permissions are 33261
We are using a special uid for the file or directory ./private/var/at/jobs. New uid is 1
We are using a special uid for the file or directory ./private/var/at/spool. New uid is 1
The privileges have been verified or repaired on the selected volume

Het herstellen van de bevoegdheden is voltooid
(Repair of permissions has been completed)


Hard Disk Details :
(I'm from belgium so i will try to translate into the right terms, the obvious ones as well, for comfort's sake)


ATA-bus:

Naam(Name): k2-sata

WDC WD1600JD-40GBB2:

Capaciteit: (Capacity) 149.05 GB
Model: (Model) WDC WD1600JD-40GBB2
Revisie: (Revision) 09.05M09
Serienummer: (Serial Number) WD-WMAES4103855
Verwijderbare media: (Disposable Media) Nee (No)
Externe eenheid: (External unit) Nee (No)
BSD-naam: (BSD-name) disk0
Protocol: (Protocol) ATA
Eenheidnummer: (Unit number) 0
Sockettype: (Socket type) Seriële ATA
OS 9-besturingsbestanden: (OS 9-operatingfiles) Nee (No)

Macintosh HD:

Capaciteit: (Capacity) 148.92 GB
Beschikbaar: (Available) 59.44 GB
Beschrijfbaar: (Writable) Ja (Yes)
Bestandssysteem: (File System) Journaled HFS+
BSD-naam: (BSD-name) disk0s3
Activeringspunt: (Activating point) /

 

[Satcomer]

Check System Preferences (in the Dock)->Energy Saver and make sure there is no check mark in "Put the hard disk(s) to sleep when possible".

Plus to stop your Mac from sleeping consider the free program Caffeine.

 

[mastermind247]

Well it really looks a lot like my hard disk goes to sleep but it also happens during activities and the box is unecked.
I've already tried Disk Repair with disk utility and DiskWarrior (booting from respective CD's) Disk Utility reports it failed to repair and DiskWarrior reports it completed repairs and altough it does help the system to run smooth, it doesn't repair the issue permanently (only the first time i start the computer after running the repair).