[plug] Failing disk drive

[Paul Antoine]

As far as I'm aware you can't reclaim them even with the manufacturer's 
tools - the drive's decision to re-map them is probably accurate!

If the drives are the same make/model and were bought at the same time 
then it's quite likely they are from the same batch and will fail around 
the same time, especially if these have been high-use drives (e.g. 
spinning 24x7)

I have had multiple drives in a RAID5 array fail within a very short 
period of one another.

Regards,
Paul

Richard Meyer wrote:
> OK, so if it says it's allocated all the alternate
> blocks/tracks/whatever, they're still gone afterwards, and cannot be
> reclaimed (except by manufacturer's tools)?
> 
> 
> 
> 
> On Mon, 2008-04-14 at 19:05 -0700, Fred Janon wrote:
>> Nope, the stats are stored in the drive by the drive firmware. Some are
>> resettable by commands and some aren't if I remember correctly. The
>> issue is that there is no real 100% standard for SMART and you need the
>> manufacturer tools for the specific drives most likely.
>>
>> Fred
>>
>> --- Richard Meyer <meyerri at westnet.com.au> wrote:
>>
>>> They were both moved out of a system that was mysteriously locking up
>>> solid, so I wasn't too surprised when I got the first message,
>>> because
>>> there had been "relay" noises coming from the machine all day, but
>>> after
>>> moving the data to the second drive (and the relay sounds went away).
>>> Getting the same message 2 days later seemed an unlikely coincidence.
>>>
>>> I did play with Smartctl, but the numbers don't mean terribly much to
>>> me, unfortunately.
>>>
>>> I think I'll try new cables. Will a new set of cables "magically"
>>> reset
>>> the SMART stats?
>>>
>>> Thanks
>>> RM
>>>
>>> On Mon, 2008-04-14 at 18:48 -0700, Fred Janon wrote:
>>>> Or cables...
>>>>
>>>> --- Denis Brown <dsbrown at cyllene.uwa.edu.au> wrote:
>>>>
>>>>> Hello Richard.
>>>>>
>>>>> I suspect this is too simplistic an answer but smartctl is the
>>> tool
>>>>> to 
>>>>> use.   smartctl --help for example or this 
>>>>> page:    http://smartmontools.sourceforge.net/man/smartctl.8.html
>>>>>
>>>>> As to simultaneous drive failure...  Possible I guess (bad batch)
>>> but
>>>>> I 
>>>>> would probably be looking for more of a common factor such as
>>> power
>>>>> supply 
>>>>> or cooling.  ???
>>>>>
>>>>> HTH,
>>>>> Denis
>>>>>
>>>>>
>>>>>   At 09:11 PM 14/04/2008, you wrote:
>>>>>> Hi all,
>>>>>>
>>>>>> I've been having fun with my system hanging, and so just to get
>>> it
>>>>> over
>>>>>> with, I bought a new motherboard and memory and installed the
>>> old
>>>>> disk
>>>>>> drives.
>>>>>>
>>>>>> Now I' getting the following:
>>>>>>> Apr 14 21:04:36 Selous smartd[4162]: Device: /dev/sda, FAILED
>>>>> SMART 
>>>>>> self-check. BACK UP DATA NOW!
>>>>>>> Apr 14 21:04:36 Selous smartd[4162]: Device: /dev/sdb, FAILED
>>>>> SMART 
>>>>>> self-check. BACK UP DATA NOW!
>>>>>>> Apr 14 21:04:36 Selous smartd[4162]: Device: /dev/sdb, SMART
>>>>> Prefailure 
>>>>>> Attribute: 5 Reallocated_Sector_Ct changed from 137 to 135
>>>>>>> Apr 14 21:04:36 Selous smartd[4162]: Device: /dev/sdb, SMART
>>>>> Usage 
>>>>>> Attribute: 196 Reallocated_Event_Count changed from 93 to 90
>>>>>>
>>>>>> How do I see the SMART stats, and how likely is it that 2 disks
>>>>> would
>>>>>> fail "at the same time"? OK, sda failed a couple of days ago,
>>> and I
>>>>>> moved the data off of it.
>>>>>>
>>>>>>
>>>>>> --
>>>>>> Richard Meyer
>>>>>> Necessity is the plea for every infringement of human freedom.
>>>>>> It is the argument of tyrants; it is the creed of slaves.
>>>>>> William Pitt, 1783
>>>>>>
>>>>>> Linux Counter user #306629
>>>>>>
>>>>>> _______________________________________________
>>>>>> PLUG discussion list: plug at plug.org.au
>>>>>> http://www.plug.org.au/mailman/listinfo/plug
>>>>>> Committee e-mail: committee at plug.linux.org.au
>>>>>
>>>>> _______________________________________________
>>>>> PLUG discussion list: plug at plug.org.au
>>>>> http://www.plug.org.au/mailman/listinfo/plug
>>>>> Committee e-mail: committee at plug.linux.org.au
>>>>>
>>>> _______________________________________________
>>>> PLUG discussion list: plug at plug.org.au
>>>> http://www.plug.org.au/mailman/listinfo/plug
>>>> Committee e-mail: committee at plug.linux.org.au
>>> -- 
>>> Richard Meyer
>>> Necessity is the plea for every infringement of human freedom.
>>> It is the argument of tyrants; it is the creed of slaves. 
>>> William Pitt, 1783
>>>
>>> Linux Counter user #306629
>>>
>>> _______________________________________________
>>> PLUG discussion list: plug at plug.org.au
>>> http://www.plug.org.au/mailman/listinfo/plug
>>> Committee e-mail: committee at plug.linux.org.au
>>>
>> _______________________________________________
>> PLUG discussion list: plug at plug.org.au
>> http://www.plug.org.au/mailman/listinfo/plug
>> Committee e-mail: committee at plug.linux.org.au