Big problem with new WD Caviar Green HDD, please advise!

Question

I bought a new Western Digital Caviar Green HDD 1TB, ( WD10EADS ) it is a SATA 3Gb/s interface HDD, 3.5-inch form factor. the RPM = IntelliPower (NOT 7200 RPM or 5400 RPM which means Rotate automatically depends on the needs of fetching data I suppose?)
I acknowledged that this series of HDD which three of 6 have the same Power Management which Read/Write = 4.9W / Idle = 2.8W / Standby = 0.4 W / Sleep = 0.4W
They are differ from the other 3, which 500GB one is 4.1W / 2.2W / 0.8W / 0.8W and 1.5TB is 4.73W 2.75W / 0.72W / 0.72W; 2TB is 6W 3.7W 0.8W 0.8W
Which mean the Standby and Sleep mode are the same state.
Now my big problem is, I bought an external dock SI-7908UI for this WD Caviar Green HDD.
( http://www.ssi.com.tw/product_content.aspx?id=92 )
So I first put the HDD into the SI-7908UI Dock ( USB 2.0 / eSATA / Firewire 400 /800 )
I tried many way of sequence of who power on first? WD Caviar Power on first? or Mac mini Power on first? I found that the best way is Mac mini Power on first, then Power on the external HDD.
OK, before I address my big problem, I should let you know, I found that there is NO S.M.A.R.T. working when you put a S.M.A.R.T. HDD outside the Mac or PC. In Dock, the S.M.A.R.T. won't work, That's how I saw in System Profiler, the FireWire tab says " S.M.A.R.T. status: Not Supported "
and I did test a Non-Green Maxtor HDD, the S.M.A.R.T. doesn't show either. You'll need this info before the real problem I'm gonna say in the following.
NOW, about 10~15 minutes after my Mac mini boot, if I didn't fetch anything from my external HDD, it would goes to sleep itself, that confirmed that the Specification Sheet was true, the Idle = 2.8W and I believe it goes to Idle, NOT Standby or Sleep, which I also believe the Standby or Sleep signal is supposed to be given by Mac OS, but it sounds like Standby or Sleep, BECAUSE the WD HDD suddenly not rotate and the sound it appears that it goes to SLEEP, am I right? I keep Mac awake by browsing the web so Mac mini won't go to sleep (I set 10 minutes in Energy Saver and I checked Put the HDD to sleep when possible)
Well, That is my big problem when WD Green HDD goes to sleep, because I CAN'T wake it up, NOT eject or Shut down the Mac mini. (OK, I'm NOT sure if it goes to Sleep or Idle)
First I thought it freezes the whole Mac OS, then I found I still can move many things, such as I am doing right now, post this big problem here. but I am sure the others are freeze! and no matter how many time I click Shut Down or Restart or Force Quit, the Mac mini didn't respond.
I tried to figure it out because I don't want to Shut Down by force.(5 seconds Press the Power button)
then I found that if I power down the external dock 7908-UI when Mac fail to shut down/restart/or eject the external HDD, It worked.
And the Mac OS will appear a window says that "I shouldn't unplug an external device without Ejecting it first" something like that. and suddenly it shuts down very quickly, everything back to normal, it shut down successfully.
What am I gonna do with this? Am I going to power down my external HDD first every time I want to shut down/eject/restart? Because the Eject the external HDD will cause freeze too! Freeze Finder I suppose.
Is it caused by 7908-UI ? or Caused by WD Caviar's Green Power management?
Because I don't trust 7908-UI, it doesn't look like a trusted brand, I've never heard of this SSI company anyway.
What am I gonna do? Please advise.
Thanks in advance.

Answer 1

Please realise that I am not the right person to be asking. I pointed you to a thread where, as a Moderator at the Bombich forums, I felt the need to warn users of CCC that a WD drive might cause problems. The thread mainly just copies what WD have said.
Obviously your drive will respond/awake/spin up when you access it manually. Some of the problems are...
•  Most users want to be in control of whether and/or when a drive sleeps -- WD's auto-sleep cannot be disabled and so precludes that.
•  Most users want their drive to obey settings in Energy Saver -- the WD auto-sleep mechanism doesn't allow that.
•  Most users want a scheduled cloning/backup to take place during the night. The cloning app starting the backup process should cause the target drive, if sleeping, to wake/spin up so that the process can take place -- it does for all drives except WD drives where the auto-sleep mechanism used doesn't allow it. LaCie drives, for instance, have auto-sleep +as an option+, during which the drive will respond to Energy Saver settings and to software such as a cloning app.
Please, Mauricette, put you questions/concerns/problems to the reseller or to WD, both of whom took your money without warning you. I am NOT a WD expert! ...or lover! ( )   I became more than disenchanted when I saw that a) WD do not point out the limitations of their external drives at point of sale, and b) WD put the blame for these inadequacies/problems/limitations onto Apple, ignoring the fact that no drives other than WD drives have them. 
Andreas