hd-idle-systemd

Starting/stopping hd-idle on Raspberry Pi via systemd, to keep your external hard drives from spinning 24/7.

A typical application of hd-idle would be to spin down an external hard drive that is attached to a Raspberry Pi and used for storing backup data. Since that hard drive is not in use most of the time, it can be safely spun down.

Determine UUID

It is best to use hd-idle via UUIDs, especially if you have multiple hard drives attached to the Pi (and it is not guaranteed which drive will get /dev/sda assigned).

You can determine the UUID of the partition on the hard drive that you want to spin down using lsblk:

lsblk -o PATH,UUID

Installation

• download and install hd-idle release

  https://github.com/adelolmo/hd-idle/releases

• copy hd-idle.sh into:

  /usr/local/bin
  

• edit hd-idle.sh, adjusting the parameters (variable PARAMS) passed to hd-idle executable to suit your needs:

• copy hd-idle.service into:

  /etc/systemd/system
  

• enable service

  sudo systemctl enable hd-idle