WD originally spec'd the head-parking mechanics at 300,000 cycles (minimum). When they heard that their screwed-up firmware was causing that count to be hit in mere months, they changed the spec to 1,000,000 cycles (minimum).

I wouldn't want any of my drives to be even in the ballpark of either spec.

The WDIDLE3.EXE-1.05 program is the official way to tweak the drives, and is the way one should use if they can. But if you're really stuck, "hdparm -J" also works (latest version -- sourceforge).

Cheers