After some time spent researching I found a permanent solution. It’s a Linux utility called APMtimer. All my attempts to get help from WD Support were useless. They just don’t care, and it’s very sad. Also one more note, this may or may not void your warranty. Do it at your own risk.
Here’s the link
http://apmtimer.sourceforge.net/
The utility sets the spin down timer to your desired setting. The default timer setting is 20s, I set mine to 300s (5 minutes) and it works, the setting is kept after power cycle. The disk has also been to other laptops, but the setting is kept. I’m still testing it, but so far all 3 of my drives respond well. I will also post instructions. Now I must note that Linux is completely unknown to me, so all suggestions or further explanations to my ‘steps’ are more than welcome. I was basically relaying on trial and error method, but somehow I got it to work. I used Ubuntu, but Ubuntu didn’t well work on my newer laptop, it froze, so I started it on my older laptop and it worked like a charm. I must say it’s a delightful OS, and I will come back to it to poke around when I have more time.
Link to Ubuntu download:
http://www.ubuntu.com/download/desktop
Link to USB mounting application and instructions:
http://www.ubuntu.com/download/desktop/create-a-usb-stick-on-windows
Steps
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instert drive into laptop (that supports Ubuntu)
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start Ubuntu from USB (allow storage space)
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unzip and copy apmtimer-1.0 files to Desktop using Ubuntu
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start terminal (upper left icon, type terminal)
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type cd Desktop (case sensitive)
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type make (this is not clear to me)
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type sudo ./apmtimer -g /dev/sda to get APM value
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type sudo ./apmtimer -s 300 /dev/sda to set APM to 5min (300sec)
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shut down and restart again in Ubuntu
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type sudo ./apmtimer -g /dev/sda to verify APM value
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finished
Until a better/offical soultion is given I will mark this as a ‘solves the problem’.
