HDD Power Disable Feature (Pin 3)

Hardware
1

Hi, does the HL-15 backplane and/or fully built HL-15 support both HDDs with and without the power disable feature?

Thank you for your time.

---- from https://www.disctech.com/powerdisable —
The “Power Disable” feature (PWDIS) is a new industry standard for enterprise SATA hard drives. This allows the host system to save power or perform a remote power reset to the hard drive (HDD) . This feature is found on many new enterprise SATA HDDs.

Most modern [data storage arrays] and hot swap servers already support Power Disable. However legacy storage systems, older [SATA & SAS controllers & HBAs ] or cabled hard drive systems may not support (PWDIS).

If your new HDD is not spinning up, or will not recognize or initialize in your system, you most likely need an adapter that bypasses (PWDIS) so your system can use HDDs with this feature.

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2

Excellent ask, I forgot that was a thing. Definitely would prefer to not have to rip pins out of the backplane if at all possible (for obvious reasons).

@Hutch-45Drives @Ashley-45Drives Do you guys happen to know if the backplane was designed with this in mind or if newer drives may endlessly power cycle?

3

Hi @tyneskj and @LostFate, Our backplanes support both HDDs with and without PWDIS.

The backplanes do not supply Pin3 (P3) with 3.3V power to the first three pins of the HDD power connector. Therefore avoiding the permanent hard reset condition.

Although both drives can be used, the “Power Disable” feature will be ignored by the system if your drive supports it.

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