[A515-54G] Power to USB ports cut when resuming.

aphanic

I am running into an issue, but I don't know if it's something that could be fixed with a firmware update or if it's something derived from the design of the machine (I hope not).

It happens as follows:
- External hard drive(s) connected to the USB 3.0 ports on the left of the unit, they're 2.5'' drives so energy is drawn from the port.
- Windows suspends after X minutes of inactivity, you can set it to 1 minute to check it out.
- When the system suspends, the drives go into sleep mode, but they remain powered.

Up to that point all is going as expected, however when the machine is powered on again, for example by pressing a key, the drives seem to be deprived from energy for a moment. As far as I can tell they begin powering up (they're mechanical, so I can hear the motor spinning up) but there's a sudden noise from it stopping and spinning up again. It all happens in a jiffy and I can't really pinpoint the reason.

If the drives are 3.5'' that require external power, they're unaffected apparently, but because I have smaller drives around and usually a couple of them connected to the machine I see how this can be detrimental to their health.

I wonder if anyone with the same machine could test it as well, I'm running Windows 10 2004 on the latest UEFI firmware at the moment, 1.18. If anyone has an idea on what to look for or how to troubleshoot this I'm open to trying it out (however please don't ask me to let the system suspend repeatedly haha, I'd like my drives to live a while longer).

(by the way, if a mod or Acer member comes across this, I'd appreciate it being forwarded to the appropriate team.)

JackE

>>>If the drives are 3.5'' that require external power, they're unaffected apparently, but because I have smaller drives around and usually a couple of them connected to the machine I see how this can be detrimental to their health.>>>

I'm not sure why you feel this is detrimental. If the USB connected 2.5" mechanical drives continued to spin/rotate in sleep mode they would quickly drain the battery if not plugged in. When the laptop wakes up, the drives momentarily spin up again and are then ready to read/write again.

You can however enable or disable USB suspend settings when plugged in by editing your ControlPanel power plan by clicking on the 'change advanced power setting' option near the bottom of the plan. In the box that pops up, click on the USB settings folder to enable/disable on battery alone or plugged in.

Jack E/NJ

aphanic

JackE said:

I'm not sure why you feel this is detrimental. If the USB connected 2.5" mechanical drives continued to spin/rotate in sleep mode they would quickly drain the battery if not plugged in. When the laptop wakes up, the drives momentarily spin up again and are then ready to read/write again.

I think you didn't get what's happening, the energy seems to be cut while the motor is spinning up (the system is to be awaken) and then restored again so it begins spinning up again. Motors are turned off when the system is suspended or hibernated, as usual.

The sound that's produced is kind of like the one you'd here if you were to unplug a spinning hard drive directly without the OS telling it to spin down first, only less abrupt because the drive wasn't spinning at full speed yet. It all happens quickly, I'll try to record a video about it next time I see the machine suspended, I think that may help explain the problem better.

SMART attribute #192 gets incremented every time it happens, it's the one known as Power-off Retract Count, Emergency Retract Cycle Count or Head Retract Cycle Count.

JackE

Only one of the two USB3 ports is designed to supply power at all the times, whether the machine is off, hibernating or sleeping. The other ports can be kept on by Windows in suspend mode as noted above in the advanced power settings in your power plan. I think the momentary spinup-spindown-spinup you describe on awakening is a Windows OS/driver wakeup characteristic, not a hardware or firmware characteristic. If it was my HDDs, I still wouldn't fret over it since it's not constantly cycling like this every few seconds.  Maybe someone else will chime in with their experience. If you're concerned about it that much, you can switch to the always powered USB3 port, or change the Windows settings for the other ports, or get an active USB-to-2.5" HDD adapter that uses it's own power supply instead of the USB port's.  Jack E/NJ

aphanic

I think the power share feature of one of the USBs is not related, I get the same behavior in spite of the USB port the drive is connected to (save for the type C, I have yet to see if it happens in that one as well). Besides, because the machine is suspended all of the USB ports have power, even the 2.0 on the right.

It's not spin up - spin down - spin up, there's not enough time for it, it's rather spin up - power cut - spin up; I'll get a recording tomorrow. I've had several machines over the years and it's the first time I notice this, I haven't tested but I'll try other laptops I have around tomorrow to see what happens.

But replacing HDD adapters is like using sledgehammers to crack nuts , it's works, but doesn't fix the problem. I've been preventing the machine from suspending for now, but today I decided to write a post about the problem because it's impractical. If there's a better channel to communicate this issue to Acer, do let me know, I'll give it a shot if it only happens in this machine; I hope it's not by phone because I'd be close to impossible to get any meaningful outcome trying to explain this to the other person haha.