HDDBlinker (formerly HDDActivity) is a simple hdd activity indicator docklet for ObjectDock 1.9 (free/plus). I sometimes can’t make out if an app is doing anything or not when there hasn’t been any change on the screen in a while and I can’t be bothered to look at the led on my computer case because it’s obscured by a cover (a kind of door, if you will). So I made this little thing to ease my frustration.

It’s a custom configured SysStats docklet so you’re going to have to download SysStats first to make it work (you’ll find it here: www.deviantart.com/deviation/15790729/ ; read the instructions on how to install on the same page). Once SS is set up properly, you should see it under Docklets in ObjectDock properties. If you don’t, you probably haven’t unloaded OD before you installed SS.


How to install HDDBlinker:

STEP 1
Unzip HDDBlinkerver001b.zip to a preferred folder (e.g. C:\Program Files\Stardock\ObjectDock\Docklets\HDDBlinker). You’ll get two files, HDDBlinker.ini and Meter.png (thanks to the author of this pic, whoever you are).

STEP 2
At this point you have two options. 1 you can copy Meter.png to the root of your drive C:\ (C:\Meter.png) and be done with it, or 2 you can specify your own location for Meter.png by editing HDDBlinker.ini in notepad, which isn’t that hard to do either. Let’s say you want both HDDBlinker.ini and Meter.png in the same location. Simply open HDDBlinker.ini with notepad and search (press ctrl+f) for Meter.png (there are 3 entries so search for all of them). The default location is the root of drive C:\ (path=C:\Meter.png). The alternative would look something like this: path=C:\Program Files\Stardock\ObjectDock\Docklets\
HDDBlinker\Meter.png. Make sure you have the paths down exactly right, otherwise HDDBlinker won’t work the way it’s supposed to.

STEP 3
Once you have both files in place and SS working, go ahead and make a new SS docklet. A new icon in the form of a question mark should appear. Right-click the question mark and select Load. Navigate to HDDBlinker.ini and open it. If all went well, you now should see the grey circle turning orange every now and then. That’s your hdd(s) grinding away!

You can change the color of the image if you wish. You can even put you own image in place of Meter.png if you want, but you’ll have to resize the new image to fit the dock correctly. You can make all these adjustments by right-clicking the HDDBlinker image and selecting Configure from the menu. In the new window click the Overlays tab. On the right hand side you’ll see a list of entries: “hdd active [img]” (twice. change color/image in both cases, when attempting changes) and “hdd inactive [img]”. If you select one and click Configure you’ll get a new window with all sorts of things to adjust, like the color (hue) of the image, it’s scale, location and a few other things.

There’s one last thing that needs mentioning. HDDBlinker does take a slight toll on the cpu, depending on hdd activity, since it’s constantly updating and reporting the hdd states. It’s not that taxing and personally I couldn’t tell the difference when running it, but it might be more noticeable when running any kind of cpu/hdd intensive software. I don’t think there’s any way around this. There is a way to raise/lower the update interval, meaning you can adjust how often SysStats checks for hdd activity. To do this go to the SysStats configuration window (right-click the HDDBlinker image, then Configure) and this time select the Meters tab. You’ll see two entries on the right side of the window, "Logical Disk" and "Physical Disk". Select both and type a new numerical value in the Update interval line (currently at 0.05 seconds). Lower values will give more accurate blinking, but take up more cpu resources and vice versa. Click OK.

Hope you get it working (didn’t go too smooth first time around).