Question External SSD enclosure going to sleep pretty often, does it affect SSD?

[goguvarra]

Hello,
As the title says I would like to know if frecquent sleep states for an SSD shorten its lifespan.
I bought this ssd usb 3.2 gen 2x2 enclosure https://icybox.de/product/externe_speicherloesungen/IB-1922MF-C32 and put it to use 2 days ago and already Crystal disk info shows 133 power on counts.
It enters some kind of sleep mode in about 2 3 mins of not accessing the drive. I can hear the little cooling fan turning of. Sometimes it stops and turns back on instantly.
My other external ssd enclosure, an Asus rog strix arion, does not do this, so I think it is the way the enclosure is built?
Can I turn it off? I already checked the the power management tab in Device Manager for the Universal Serial Bus controllers and all of them are turned off.

Thanks.

 

[CountMike]

Hello,
As the title says I would like to know if frecquent sleep states for an SSD shorten its lifespan.
I bought this ssd usb 3.2 gen 2x2 enclosure https://icybox.de/product/externe_speicherloesungen/IB-1922MF-C32 and put it to use 2 days ago and already Crystal disk info shows 133 power on counts.
It enters some kind of sleep mode in about 2 3 mins of not accessing the drive. I can hear the little cooling fan turning of. Sometimes it stops and turns back on instantly.
My other external ssd enclosure, an Asus rog strix arion, does not do this, so I think it is the way the enclosure is built?
Can I turn it off? I already checked the the power management tab in Device Manager for the Universal Serial Bus controllers and all of them are turned off.

Thanks.

Sleep is not a problem for SSDs. no moving or motor. No performance hit either because it starts up instantly. It may even be good thing if in plastic housing to keep it cool

 

[goguvarra]

Thanks, that's what I was thinking.
But i've heard that starting and stopping part for any electronics is bad because of the potential voltage spikes that occur when current first passes through it.
Now i'm not sure if sleep is the same as no current passing through or if there is actually a small amount of electricity to keep it in standby.
Also i've read that SSDs also have to make a small check up of their internals every time they start, does it have time to do this if I put it out of sleep by a copy/paste command for example? Where it starts up and begins writing stuff immediately?

 

[CountMike]

Thanks, that's what I was thinking.
But i've heard that starting and stopping part for any electronics is bad because of the potential voltage spikes that occur when current first passes through it.
Now i'm not sure if sleep is the same as no current passing through or if there is actually a small amount of electricity to keep it in standby.
Also i've read that SSDs also have to make a small check up of their internals every time they start, does it have time to do this if I put it out of sleep by a copy/paste command for example? Where it starts up and begins writing stuff immediately?

All disks have check routine at startup but HDDs have to wait for motor and disk(s) to wind up to speed and head to search for,find and read file allocation table. During that time motor uses few times more power and heats up more, heads arm makes several passes. Those actions are reason for HDD's supposed wear and tear.SSDs don't have to do all that mechanical part while logical part is practically instant.
As for current, electro magnetic devices like transformers, motor and head positioning take several times higher current at startup while solid state devices next to nothing.

 

[Misgar]

Instead of worrying about the effect of power on/off cycles, wouldn't it be better to stop the external drive from going to sleep? .

If you're running Microsoft Windows, dive into Device Manager, Universal Serial Bus Controllers, open each USB Root Hub in turn, select Power Management and disable "Allow the computer to turn off this device to save power".

The polar ice caps will melt slightly faster, but your USB SSD should stay powered up.

I agree that unnecessary disk drive power cycles should be avoided when possible. I have several old hard disks from decommissioned servers with fewer than 80 start/stop events, but over 1750 days of use (nearly 5 years running). They could die at any time, but they've probably had an easier life than drives with tens of thousands of on/off counts.

 

[Bob.B]

Hello,
As the title says I would like to know if frecquent sleep states for an SSD shorten its lifespan.
I bought this ssd usb 3.2 gen 2x2 enclosure https://icybox.de/product/externe_speicherloesungen/IB-1922MF-C32 and put it to use 2 days ago and already Crystal disk info shows 133 power on counts.
It enters some kind of sleep mode in about 2 3 mins of not accessing the drive. I can hear the little cooling fan turning of. Sometimes it stops and turns back on instantly.
My other external ssd enclosure, an Asus rog strix arion, does not do this, so I think it is the way the enclosure is built?
Can I turn it off? I already checked the the power management tab in Device Manager for the Universal Serial Bus controllers and all of them are turned off.

Thanks.

Look in the power plan set usb/selective suspend to off see if it makes a diff.

 

[goguvarra]

Thank you @CountMike so nothing happens to ssd s when powered on and off, just what I wanted to hear

If you're running Microsoft Windows, dive into Device Manager, Universal Serial Bus Controllers, open each USB Root Hub in turn, select Power Management and disable "Allow the computer to turn off this device to save power".

As I've said in my original message I had already checked this and they are all turned off. If you have any other suggestions I'd be happy to try them out.

And as a matter of fact yes, if this will damage my brand new SSD I would have it powered on all the time regardless of the condition of the polar ice caps since the aren't paying for a new one if this one fails prematurely. But it seems this is not the case with SSDs.
Though you also agree that power cycles are not the best things for hard drives. But as i've said above SSDs it seems are not affected.

Look in the power plan set usb/selective suspend to off see if it makes a diff.

Also tried this, doesn't make a difference. Can't understand why neither of these settings will make a difference.
It is possible that it is the way this enclosure was designed to function.