hdparm seemed to be exactly what I was looking for, but the -y (put in standby) -C (current power status) and -S (set sleep-when-idle timeout) all give this error: /dev/sde: Operation not permitted on a scsi drive. Any more suggestions? I tried the newly- learned 'apropos' looking for sleep or spin or power (even 'down') and nothing apropriate came up. Is it possible to setup up apmd to shut down a drive at a specific time? Walt -~ ************ [EMAIL PROTECTED] http://www.linuxchix.org