[gentoo-user] External hard drive and idle activity

[Dale]

Howdy,

As some may recall, I have a 8TB external SATA hard drive that I do back
ups on.  Usually, I back up once a day, more often if needed.  Usually I
turn the power on, mount it, do the back ups, unmount and turn the power
back off.  Usually it is powered up for 5 minutes or so.  When I unmount
it tho, I sometimes notice it is still doing something.  I can feel the
mechanism for the heads moving.  It has a slight vibration to it. 
Questions are, what is it doing and should I let it finish before
powering it off?  I'd assume that once it in unmounted, the copy process
is done so the files are safe.  I guess it is doing some sort of
internal checks or something but I'm not sure. 

Is it safe to turn it off even tho it is doing whatever it is doing? 
Should I wait?  Does it matter? 

Thanks.

Dale

:-)  :-) 

P. S. Down to last router that was discussed in another thread so I
bought it while they had it.  Price may go up if I didn't.  Did more
research on old modem, it is risky to try to convert to AT&T.  Some say
not possible.