Windows 10: How can I prevent Windows from waking my secondary storage HDD up when the computer is idle?

Hi, I have an SSD that I'm using for primary storage where Windows is installed and I also have an HDD.


Windows keeps waking up the HDD whenever my PC is idle.


It does happen sometimes when I'm actively using it(it gets triggered by random things that have nothing to do with the disk) but mostly when I'm not using the PC, I can hear the HDD start running for absolutely no reason.


Can I prevent Windows from waking up the disk unless if I actually use the disk? I would like the minimize the amount it gets turned on as much as possible.


Thanks.

:)

 

Can I prevent a secondary HDD from spinning up when waking my computer?

I have a SSD as my booting hard drive. I also have a spinning HDD for large files and backups that does not need to run all the time. I have it on a timer, such that it spins down after being idle for 20 minutes. My issue is that it spins up each time I wake my computer, and each time I turn it on. I am using Windows 10 and my HDD is a Seagate Barracuda.

Is it possible to prevent my internal HDD from spinning up when I wake my computer from sleep?

 

How to prevent Windows 10 from waking HDD just because I move the mouse?

Hardware:

• Intel Core i7-6700
  
• ASUS H170M-PLUS motherboard (i.e. Intel H170 chipset)
  
• Boot partition and user profiles on Intel SSDPEKKW25 NVMe (256 GB SSD)
  
• Toshiba DT01ACA300 HDD (3TB SATA hard disk for bulk storage)
  

OS: Windows 10 Pro 64-bit

Problem:
Windows puts the Toshiba HDD to sleep after idle timeout, which is nice. However, as soon as I move the mouse, Windows wakes up the Toshiba HDD, even though I don't think anything immediately needs to use that HDD.

I have some programs installed on that HDD, mostly modern games that take up lots of space.

Is there a way to prevent Windows from immediately waking up that HDD when I move the mouse?

 

Utililizing secondary drive as storage

I recently got a new computer, and decided to switch back from Apple to Windows for the first time in a decade or so, as such I'm floundering a bit and need some help.

Following advice online I went ahead and bought a new SSD and replaced the HDD in my new laptop, and then using a CD caddy placed my HDD in the optical drive slot in order to use it as a secondary storage drive. I did an install of Windows 10 onto the SSD
using the creation tool and a USB drive, and then installed all the updates and drivers for everything. The issue is that I can't seem to access the HDD through file explorer or set it as a save location in the storage section of system settings. It is listed
under disk drives in the device manager, and the status there claims it to be working properly. It's just functionally useless at this point. Any help would be appreciated.