# Is hald effecting wear on SSD?



## je33 (Dec 4, 2011)

I have a 9.0-PRERELEASE system:

```
tsunami# uname -a
FreeBSD tsunami.lan 9.0-PRERELEASE FreeBSD 9.0-PRERELEASE #0: Fri Dec  2 07:25:19 PST 2011     root@tsunami.lan:/usr/obj/usr/src/sys/TSUNAMI  amd64
```
Running on a pair of SSDs in zfs root mirror:

```
tsunami# zpool status
  pool: zroot
 state: ONLINE
 scan: none requested
config:

        NAME        STATE     READ WRITE CKSUM
        zroot       ONLINE       0     0     0
          mirror-0  ONLINE       0     0     0
            ada0p2  ONLINE       0     0     0
            ada2p2  ONLINE       0     0     0

errors: No known data errors
```
That indicates disk activity at about 1 second intervals that I have traced to hald. When I kill hald, activity stops. 
I'm wondering if hald activity writes to disk causing wear on SSDs and what I might do to prevent it if so?


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## wblock@ (Dec 4, 2011)

Is it writing, or just polling?  Consider removing HAL altogether.  It's not required for xorg or xfce any more, don't know about Gnome or KDE.


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## je33 (Dec 4, 2011)

I don't know if it is writing or just polling. At this point I'm not sure how to tell one way or the other.

hald not required? I'll have a go at disabling it. I did the standard enable of dbus and hald when my mouse and keyboard would not work when I brought up X.

Should I leave dbus running?


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## wblock@ (Dec 4, 2011)

dbus is useful for inter-program communication.

To stop xorg-server from using HAL, turn it off in the ServerLayout section of xorg.conf:

```
Option "AutoAddDevices" "Off"
```

x11-servers/xorg-server can also be compiled with the HALD option disabled.

If the mouse has a PS/2 interface, moused(8) might be needed:
/etc/rc.conf

```
moused_enable="YES"
```


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## je33 (Dec 4, 2011)

Thank you Warren, works perfectly. No more "periodic" disk activity. Is this another conflict with the Handbook?


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## je33 (Dec 4, 2011)

To answer my own question: Nope, not in conflict. Upon review, it became clear that I have not visited that section of the handbook in some time. Sorry for that last bit of noise.


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## wblock@ (Dec 5, 2011)

If you find mistakes in the Handbook, man pages, or other FreeBSD documentation, submit a PR or at least send a message to the freebsd-doc mailing list.  It may not get fixed immediately, but hopefully before the next time you see it.


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