hdparm -B 255 /dev/sdb

/dev/sdb:
 setting Advanced Power Management level to disabled
 HDIO_DRIVE_CMD failed: Input/output error
 

The one thing you can do though is to set hdparm spindown time lower (it doesn't seem to work that well).

 -S   set standby (spindown) timeout
 

hdparm -S 251 /dev/sda

/dev/sda:
 setting standby to 251 (5 hours + 30 minutes)
 

I still found the "Load_Cycle_Count" from SMART to increase but at a much lower rate.  The head was definitely still parking itself quite frequently and not the 5.5 hours that the above command implies since nothing but WD's utility can disable that stupid feature.

The only real solution since WD doesn't support industry standard commands found in utilties such as HDPARM is to run their propietary utility that works only from an ancient DOS boot disk.

http://support.wdc.com/product/download.asp?groupid=609&sid=113

hdparm -S 251 /dev/sda

/dev/sda:
 setting standby to 251 (5 hours + 30 minutes)
hdparm -S 251 /dev/sdb

/dev/sdb:
 setting standby to 251 (5 hours + 30 minutes)



 hdparm -S 255 /dev/sda

/dev/sda:
 setting standby to 255 (21 minutes + 15 seconds)

hdparm -S 255 /dev/sdb

/dev/sdb:
 setting standby to 255 (21 minutes + 15 seconds

sda
-------
193 Load_Cycle_Count        0x0032   164   164   000    Old_age   Always       -       109580

sdb
--------
193 Load_Cycle_Count        0x0032   099   099   000    Old_age   Always       -       303040

-----------

[root@server10 ~]# smartctl -a /dev/sda|grep Load
193 Load_Cycle_Count        0x0032   164   164   000    Old_age   Always       -       109580
[root@server10 ~]# smartctl -a /dev/sdb|grep Load
193 Load_Cycle_Count        0x0032   099   099   000    Old_age   Always       -       303051

=======================

***Other server

[root@server09 ~]# hdparm -S 251 /dev/sda

/dev/sda:
 setting standby to 251 (5 hours + 30 minutes)
[root@server09 ~]# hdparm -S 251 /dev/sdb

/dev/sdb:
 setting standby to 251 (5 hours + 30 minutes)

193 Load_Cycle_Count        0x0032   158   158   000    Old_age   Always       -       127195
[root@server09 ~]# smartctl -a /dev/sdb|grep Load
193 Load_Cycle_Count        0x0032   091   091   000    Old_age   Always       -       328090

--------
[root@server09 ~]# smartctl -a /dev/sda|grep Load
193 Load_Cycle_Count        0x0032   158   158   000    Old_age   Always       -       127195
[root@server09 ~]# smartctl -a /dev/sdb|grep Load
193 Load_Cycle_Count        0x0032   091   091   000    Old_age   Always       -       328096

 

*Update the above doesn't seem to be helping at all.  It seems the drive is accepting but not using the values hdparm is passing to it:

193 Load_Cycle_Count        0x0032   156   156   000    Old_age   Always       -       133604
193 Load_Cycle_Count        0x0032   085   085   000    Old_age   Always       -       347417
 

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