From: Simon L. S. <si...@gr...> - 2006-06-23 17:57:20
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To whom it may concern, I upgraded my Powerbook G4 to a 120G Samsung HM120JC notebook drive a month ago. I installed smartctl and started playing with it. I noticed "Load Cycle Count" (attribute 225) going up every few seconds. Some searching indicated controversy in this area, with some OSs trashing the drive by writing every few seconds. This causes constant park-unpark cycles. At my rate of 37K cycles / 225 hours, this would extrapolate to a drive lifetime of 3650 hours (6 months @ 24 hours/day). I noticed that running "smartctl" seemed to reset some counter in the drive and avoid it parking. So I wrote an app that runs "smartctl -H disk0" every N seconds (I use 2). It also runs "smartctl -a disk0" much less often for logging reasons. This seems to have halted the increase of load cycle count. Now my question, before I start advertising what I've done -- is this harmful to the drive? Does the health check cause any physical activity in the drive? (CPU usage seems minimal, and the OS isn't reporting any bytes/transactions to the drive). -Simon |
From: Martin S. <Ma...@li...> - 2006-06-26 10:54:56
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Am Freitag 23 Juni 2006 19:59 schrieb Simon L. Sabato: > I noticed that running "smartctl" seemed to reset some counter in the > drive and avoid it parking. So I wrote an app that runs "smartctl -H > disk0" every N seconds (I use 2). It also runs "smartctl -a disk0" > much less often for logging reasons. This seems to have halted the > increase of load cycle count. Hello Siumon, Maybe this will help you archieving a similar effect without starting smartctl every two seconds ;): http://blog.philkern.de/archives/173-Load-Cycle-Fix-for-Toshiba-HDDs.html I chose a aggressive power saving value on my IBM ThinkPad T23 cause I didn't know about its impact and I could watch it doing load cycles... now I use a medium apm = 128 and all seems fine again. I just wonder how long my drive will be well given this load cycle count: root@deepdance:~ -> smartctl -a /dev/hda | awk '/Load_Cycle_Count/ {print $10}' 175589 Regards, -- Martin 'Helios' Steigerwald - http://www.Lichtvoll.de GPG: 03B0 0D6C 0040 0710 4AFA B82F 991B EAAC A599 84C7 |
From: Bruce A. <ba...@gr...> - 2006-07-03 18:53:58
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I think that there is no physical activity associated with '-H'. It just checks the attribute values against the pre-programmed thresholds. So I think you can advertise your script without worries. Bruce On Fri, 23 Jun 2006, Simon L. Sabato wrote: > > To whom it may concern, > > I upgraded my Powerbook G4 to a 120G Samsung HM120JC notebook drive a > month ago. I installed smartctl and started playing with it. > > I noticed "Load Cycle Count" (attribute 225) going up every few > seconds. Some searching indicated controversy in this area, with some > OSs trashing the drive by writing every few seconds. This causes > constant park-unpark cycles. At my rate of 37K cycles / 225 hours, this > would extrapolate to a drive lifetime of 3650 hours (6 months @ 24 > hours/day). > > I noticed that running "smartctl" seemed to reset some counter in the > drive and avoid it parking. So I wrote an app that runs "smartctl -H > disk0" every N seconds (I use 2). It also runs "smartctl -a disk0" much > less often for logging reasons. This seems to have halted the increase > of load cycle count. > > Now my question, before I start advertising what I've done -- is this > harmful to the drive? Does the health check cause any physical activity > in the drive? (CPU usage seems minimal, and the OS isn't reporting any > bytes/transactions to the drive). > > -Simon > > > > > > Using Tomcat but need to do more? Need to support web services, security? > Get stuff done quickly with pre-integrated technology to make your job easier > Download IBM WebSphere Application Server v.1.0.1 based on Apache Geronimo > http://sel.as-us.falkag.net/sel?cmd=lnk&kid=120709&bid=263057&dat=121642 > _______________________________________________ > Smartmontools-support mailing list > Sma...@li... > https://lists.sourceforge.net/lists/listinfo/smartmontools-support > |
From: Simon L. S. <si...@gr...> - 2006-07-06 18:40:38
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The thing is, I can hear SOMETHING when I run "smartctl -H". But it's so faint sometimes I wonder if it's "electrical buzz" as the interface is powered up, accessed, powered down. There is some fair amount of electrical buzz from my Powerbook when you rest your ear on it (as I have been, to hear this). Whatever "smartctl -H" is doing, it's much quieter than the "load cycle" that happens every ~30 seconds. The noise produced by that operation is several times louder. I had stopped using my "fix" for a while, but noticed my load cycle count go from 37K@225 hours (97/100) to 49K@320 hours (95/100). Meanwhile the guy working next to me lost a 12-month old drive in a laptop running a recent Redhat build. I re-enabled my fix. :) -Simon Bruce Allen wrote: > I think that there is no physical activity associated with '-H'. It > just checks the attribute values against the pre-programmed > thresholds. So I think you can advertise your script without worries. > > Bruce > > On Fri, 23 Jun 2006, Simon L. Sabato wrote: > >> >> To whom it may concern, >> >> I upgraded my Powerbook G4 to a 120G Samsung HM120JC notebook drive a >> month ago. I installed smartctl and started playing with it. >> >> I noticed "Load Cycle Count" (attribute 225) going up every few >> seconds. Some searching indicated controversy in this area, with some >> OSs trashing the drive by writing every few seconds. This causes >> constant park-unpark cycles. At my rate of 37K cycles / 225 hours, this >> would extrapolate to a drive lifetime of 3650 hours (6 months @ 24 >> hours/day). >> >> I noticed that running "smartctl" seemed to reset some counter in the >> drive and avoid it parking. So I wrote an app that runs "smartctl -H >> disk0" every N seconds (I use 2). It also runs "smartctl -a disk0" much >> less often for logging reasons. This seems to have halted the increase >> of load cycle count. >> >> Now my question, before I start advertising what I've done -- is this >> harmful to the drive? Does the health check cause any physical activity >> in the drive? (CPU usage seems minimal, and the OS isn't reporting any >> bytes/transactions to the drive). >> >> -Simon >> >> >> >> >> >> Using Tomcat but need to do more? Need to support web services, >> security? >> Get stuff done quickly with pre-integrated technology to make your >> job easier >> Download IBM WebSphere Application Server v.1.0.1 based on Apache >> Geronimo >> http://sel.as-us.falkag.net/sel?cmd=lnk&kid=120709&bid=263057&dat=121642 >> _______________________________________________ >> Smartmontools-support mailing list >> Sma...@li... >> https://lists.sourceforge.net/lists/listinfo/smartmontools-support >> |