NAME¶
smartctl - Control and Monitor Utility for SMART Disks
SYNOPSIS¶
smartctl [options] device
FULL PATH¶
/usr/sbin/smartctl
PACKAGE VERSION¶
smartmontools-5.41 2011-06-09 r3365
DESCRIPTION¶
smartctl controls the Self-Monitoring, Analysis and Reporting Technology
(SMART) system built into many ATA-3 and later ATA, IDE and SCSI-3 hard
drives. The purpose of SMART is to monitor the reliability of the hard drive
and predict drive failures, and to carry out different types of drive
self-tests. This version of
smartctl is compatible with ATA/ATAPI-7 and
earlier standards (see REFERENCES below)
smartctl is a command line utility designed to perform SMART tasks such
as printing the SMART self-test and error logs, enabling and disabling SMART
automatic testing, and initiating device self-tests. Note: if the user issues
a SMART command that is (apparently) not implemented by the device,
smartctl will print a warning message but issue the command anyway (see
the
-T, --tolerance option below). This should not cause
problems: on most devices, unimplemented SMART commands issued to a drive are
ignored and/or return an error.
smartctl also provides support for polling TapeAlert messages from SCSI
tape drives and changers.
The user must specify the device to be controlled or interrogated as the final
argument to
smartctl. The command set used by the device is often
derived from the device path but may need help with the ´-d´ option
(for more information see the section on "ATA, SCSI command sets and
SAT" below). Device paths are as follows:
- LINUX:
- Use the forms "/dev/hd[a-t]" for IDE/ATA
devices, and "/dev/sd[a-z]" for SCSI devices. For SCSI
Tape Drives and Changers with TapeAlert support use the devices
"/dev/nst*" and "/dev/sg*". For SATA
disks accessed with libata, use "/dev/sd[a-z]" and append
"-d ata". For disks behind 3ware controllers you may need
"/dev/sd[a-z]" or "/dev/twe[0-9]",
"/dev/twa[0-9]" or "/dev/twl[0-9]": see
details below. For disks behind HighPoint RocketRAID controllers you may
need "/dev/sd[a-z]". For disks behind Areca SATA RAID
controllers, you need "/dev/sg[2-9]" (note that
smartmontools interacts with the Areca controllers via a SCSI generic
device which is different than the SCSI device used for reading and
writing data)!
- DARWIN:
- Use the forms /dev/disk[0-9] or equivalently
disk[0-9] or equivalently /dev/rdisk[0-9]. Long forms are
also available: please use ´-h´ to see some examples. Note that
there is currently no Darwin SCSI support.
- FREEBSD:
- Use the forms "/dev/ad[0-9]+" for IDE/ATA
devices and "/dev/da[0-9]+" or
"/dev/pass[0-9]+" for SCSI devices. For SATA devices on
AHCI bus use "/dev/ada[0-9]+" format.
- NETBSD/OPENBSD:
- Use the form "/dev/wd[0-9]+c" for IDE/ATA
devices. For SCSI disk and tape devices, use the device names
"/dev/sd[0-9]+c" and "/dev/st[0-9]+c"
respectively. Be sure to specify the correct "whole disk"
partition letter for your architecture.
- SOLARIS:
- Use the forms "/dev/rdsk/c?t?d?s?" for
IDE/ATA and SCSI disk devices, and "/dev/rmt/*" for SCSI
tape devices.
- WINDOWS 9x/ME:
- Use the forms "/dev/hd[a-d]" for standard
IDE/ATA devices accessed via SMARTVSD.VXD, and
"/dev/hd[e-h]" for additional devices accessed via a
patched SMARTVSE.VXD (see INSTALL file for details). Use the form
"/dev/scsi[0-9][0-f]" for SCSI devices via an aspi dll on
ASPI adapter 0-9, ID 0-15. The prefix "/dev/" is
optional.
- WINDOWS NT4/2000/XP/2003/Vista/Win7/2008:
- Use the forms "/dev/sd[a-z]" for
IDE/(S)ATA and SCSI disks "\\.\PhysicalDrive[0-25]" (where
"a" maps to "0"). These disks can also be referred to
as "/dev/pd[0-255]" for
"\\.\PhysicalDrive[0-255]". ATA disks can also be referred to as
"/dev/hd[a-z]" for "\\.\PhysicalDrive[0-25]".
Use one the forms "/dev/tape[0-255]",
"/dev/st[0-255]", or "/dev/nst[0-255]"
for SCSI tape drives "\\.\Tape[0-255]".
Alternatively, drive letters "X:" or "X:\"
may be used to specify the (´basic´) disk behind a mounted
partition. This does not work with ´dynamic´ disks.
For disks behind 3ware 9000 controllers use
"/dev/sd[a-z],N" where N specifies the disk number (3ware
´port´) behind the controller providing the logical drive
(´unit´) specified by "/dev/sd[a-z]".
Alternatively, use "/dev/tw_cli/cx/py" for controller x,
port y to run the ´tw_cli´ tool and parse the output. This
provides limited monitoring (´-i´, ´-c´,
´-A´ below) if SMART support is missing in the driver. Use
"/dev/tw_cli/stdin" or
"/dev/tw_cli/clip" to parse CLI or 3DM output from
standard input or clipboard. The option ´-d 3ware,N´ is not
necessary on Windows.
[NEW EXPERIMENTAL SMARTCTL FEATURE] For disks behind Intel Matrix RAID
driver use "/dev/csmi[0-9],N" where N specifies the port
behind the logical scsi controller "\\.\Scsi[0-9]:". The prefix
"/dev/" is optional.
- CYGWIN:
- See "WINDOWS NT4/2000/XP/2003/Vista/Win7/2008"
above.
- OS/2,eComStation:
- Use the form "/dev/hd[a-z]" for IDE/ATA
devices.
if ´-´ is specified as the device path,
smartctl reads and
interprets it's own debug output from standard input. See ´-r
ataioctl´ below for details.
Based on the device path,
smartctl will guess the device type (ATA or
SCSI). If necessary, the ´-d´ option can be used to over-ride this
guess
Note that the printed output of
smartctl displays most numerical values
in base 10 (decimal), but some values are displayed in base 16 (hexadecimal).
To distinguish them, the base 16 values are always displayed with a leading
"0x", for example: "0xff". This man page follows
the same convention.
OPTIONS¶
The options are grouped below into several categories.
smartctl will
execute the corresponding commands in the order: INFORMATION, ENABLE/DISABLE,
DISPLAY DATA, RUN/ABORT TESTS.
- SHOW INFORMATION OPTIONS:
- -h, --help, --usage
- Prints a usage message to STDOUT and exits.
- -V, --version, --copyright, --license
- Prints version, copyright, license, home page and SVN
revision information for your copy of smartctl to STDOUT and then
exits. Please include this information if you are reporting bugs or
problems.
- -i, --info
- Prints the device model number, serial number, firmware
version, and ATA Standard version/revision information. Says if the device
supports SMART, and if so, whether SMART support is currently enabled or
disabled. If the device supports Logical Block Address mode (LBA mode)
print current user drive capacity in bytes. (If drive is has a user
protected area reserved, or is "clipped", this may be smaller
than the potential maximum drive capacity.) Indicates if the drive is in
the smartmontools database (see ´-v´ options below). If so, the
drive model family may also be printed. If ´-n´ (see below) is
specified, the power mode of the drive is printed.
- -a, --all
- Prints all SMART information about the disk, or TapeAlert
information about the tape drive or changer. For ATA devices this is
equivalent to
´-H -i -c -A -l error -l selftest -l selective´
and for SCSI, this is equivalent to
´-H -i -A -l error -l selftest´.
Note that for ATA disks this does not enable the non-SMART options
and the SMART options which require support for 48-bit ATA commands.
- -x, --xall
- Prints all SMART and non-SMART information about the
device. For ATA devices this is equivalent to
´-H -i -c -A -f brief -l xerror,error -l xselftest,selftest
-l selective -l directory -l scttemp -l scterc -l sataphy´.
and for SCSI, this is equivalent to
´-H -i -A -l error -l selftest -l background -l sasphy´.
- --scan
- Scans for devices and prints each device name, device type
and protocol ([ATA] or [SCSI]) info. May be used in conjunction with
´-d TYPE´ to restrict the scan to a specific TYPE. See also info
about platform specific device scan and the DEVICESCAN directive on
smartd(8) man page.
- --scan-open
- Same as --scan, but also tries to open each device before
printing device info. The device open may change the device type due to
autodetection (see also ´-d test´).
This option can be used to create a draft smartd.conf file. All
options after ´--´ are appended to each output line. For
example:
smartctl --scan-open -- -a -W 4,45,50 -m admin@work > smartd.conf
- RUN-TIME BEHAVIOR OPTIONS:
- -q TYPE, --quietmode=TYPE
- Specifies that smartctl should run in one of the two
quiet modes described here. The valid arguments to this option are:
errorsonly - only print: For the ´-l error´ option, if
nonzero, the number of errors recorded in the SMART error log and the
power-on time when they occurred; For the ´-l selftest´ option,
errors recorded in the device self-test log; For the ´-H´
option, SMART "disk failing" status or device Attributes
(pre-failure or usage) which failed either now or in the past; For the
´-A´ option, device Attributes (pre-failure or usage) which
failed either now or in the past.
silent - print no output. The only way to learn about what was found
is to use the exit status of smartctl (see RETURN VALUES below).
noserial - Do not print the serial number of the device.
- -d TYPE, --device=TYPE
- Specifies the type of the device. The valid arguments to
this option are:
auto - attempt to guess the device type from the device name or from
controller type info provided by the operating system or from a matching
USB ID entry in the drive database. This is the default.
test - prints the guessed type, then opens the device and prints the
(possibly changed) TYPE name and then exists without performing any
further commands.
ata - the device type is ATA. This prevents smartctl from
issuing SCSI commands to an ATA device.
scsi - the device type is SCSI. This prevents smartctl from
issuing ATA commands to a SCSI device.
sat - the device type is SCSI to ATA Translation (SAT). This is for
ATA disks that have a SCSI to ATA Translation (SAT) Layer (SATL) between
the disk and the operating system. SAT defines two ATA PASS THROUGH SCSI
commands, one 12 bytes long and the other 16 bytes long. The default is
the 16 byte variant which can be overridden with either ´-d
sat,12´ or ´-d sat,16´.
usbcypress - this device type is for ATA disks that are behind a
Cypress USB to PATA bridge. This will use the ATACB proprietary scsi pass
through command. The default SCSI operation code is 0x24, but although it
can be overridden with ´-d usbcypress,0xN´, where N is the scsi
operation code, you're running the risk of damage to the device or
filesystems on it.
usbjmicron - this device type is for SATA disks that are behind a
JMicron USB to PATA/SATA bridge. The 48-bit ATA commands (required e.g.
for ´-l xerror´, see below) do not work with all of these
bridges and are therefore disabled by default. These commands can be
enabled by ´-d usbjmicron,x´. If two disks are connected to a
bridge with two ports, an error message is printed if no PORT is
specified. The port can be specified by ´-d usbjmicron[,x],PORT´
where PORT is 0 (master) or 1 (slave). This is not necessary if the device
uses a port multiplier to connect multiple disks to one port. The disks
appear under separate /dev/ice names then. CAUTION: Specifying
´,x´ for a device which does not support it results in I/O
errors and may disconnect the drive. The same applies if the specified
PORT does not exist or is not connected to a disk.
usbsunplus - this device type is for SATA disks that are behind a
SunplusIT USB to SATA bridge.
marvell - [Linux only] interact with SATA disks behind Marvell
chip-set controllers (using the Marvell rather than libata driver).
megaraid,N - [Linux only] the device consists of one or more SCSI/SAS
disks connected to a MegaRAID controller. The non-negative integer N (in
the range of 0 to 127 inclusive) denotes which disk on the controller is
monitored. Use syntax such as:
smartctl -a -d megaraid,2 /dev/sda
smartctl -a -d megaraid,0 /dev/sdb
This interface will also work for Dell PERC controllers. The following
/dev/XXX entry must exist:
For PERC2/3/4 controllers: /dev/megadev0
For PERC5/6 controllers: /dev/megaraid_sas_ioctl_node
3ware,N - [FreeBSD and Linux only] the device consists of one or more
ATA disks connected to a 3ware RAID controller. The non-negative integer N
(in the range from 0 to 127 inclusive) denotes which disk on the
controller is monitored. Use syntax such as:
smartctl -a -d 3ware,2 /dev/sda
smartctl -a -d 3ware,0 /dev/twe0
smartctl -a -d 3ware,1 /dev/twa0
smartctl -a -d 3ware,1 /dev/twl0
The first two forms, which refer to devices /dev/sda-z and /dev/twe0-15, may
be used with 3ware series 6000, 7000, and 8000 series controllers that use
the 3x-xxxx driver. Note that the /dev/sda-z form is deprecated
starting with the Linux 2.6 kernel series and may not be supported by the
Linux kernel in the near future. The final form, which refers to devices
/dev/twa0-15, must be used with 3ware 9000 series controllers, which use
the 3w-9xxx driver.
The devices /dev/twl0-15 must be used with the 3ware/LSI 9750 series
controllers which use the 3w-sas driver.
Note that if the special character device nodes /dev/twl?, /dev/twa? and
/dev/twe? do not exist, or exist with the incorrect major or minor
numbers, smartctl will recreate them on the fly. Typically /dev/twa0
refers to the first 9000-series controller, /dev/twa1 refers to the second
9000 series controller, and so on. The /dev/twl0 devices refers to the
first 9750 series controller, /dev/twl1 resfers to the second 9750 series
controller, and so on. Likewise /dev/twe0 refers to the first
6/7/8000-series controller, /dev/twe1 refers to the second 6/7/8000 series
controller, and so on.
Note that for the 6/7/8000 controllers, any of the physical disks can
be queried or examined using any of the 3ware's SCSI logical device
/dev/sd? entries. Thus, if logical device /dev/sda is made up of two
physical disks (3ware ports zero and one) and logical device /dev/sdb is
made up of two other physical disks (3ware ports two and three) then you
can examine the SMART data on any of the four physical disks using
either SCSI device /dev/sda or /dev/sdb. If you need to know
which logical SCSI device a particular physical disk (3ware port) is
associated with, use the dmesg or SYSLOG output to show which SCSI ID
corresponds to a particular 3ware unit, and then use the 3ware CLI or 3dm
tool to determine which ports (physical disks) correspond to particular
3ware units.
If the value of N corresponds to a port that does not exist on the
3ware controller, or to a port that does not physically have a disk
attached to it, the behavior of smartctl depends upon the specific
controller model, firmware, Linux kernel and platform. In some cases you
will get a warning message that the device does not exist. In other cases
you will be presented with ´void´ data for a non-existent
device.
Note that if the /dev/sd? addressing form is used, then older 3w-xxxx
drivers do not pass the "Enable Autosave" (´ -S
on´) and "Enable Automatic Offline" (´ -o
on´) commands to the disk, and produce these types of harmless
syslog error messages instead: " 3w-xxxx: tw_ioctl(): Passthru
size (123392) too big". This can be fixed by upgrading to
version 1.02.00.037 or later of the 3w-xxxx driver, or by applying a patch
to older versions. Alternatively, use the character device /dev/twe0-15
interface.
The selective self-test functions (´-t select,A-B´) are only
supported using the character device interface /dev/twl0-15, /dev/twa0-15
and /dev/twe0-15. The necessary WRITE LOG commands can not be passed
through the SCSI interface.
areca,N - [Linux only] the device consists of one or more SATA disks
connected to an Areca SATA RAID controller. The positive integer N (in the
range from 1 to 24 inclusive) denotes which disk on the controller is
monitored. Use syntax such as:
smartctl -a -d areca,2 /dev/sg2
smartctl -a -d areca,3 /dev/sg3
The first line above addresses the second disk on the first Areca RAID
controller. The second line addresses the third disk on the second Areca
RAID controller. To help identify the correct device, use the command:
cat /proc/scsi/sg/device_hdr /proc/scsi/sg/devices
to show the SCSI generic devices (one per line, starting with /dev/sg0). The
correct SCSI generic devices to address for smartmontools are the ones
with the type field equal to 3. If the incorrect device is addressed,
please read the warning/error messages carefully. They should provide
hints about what devices to use.
Important: the Areca controller must have firmware version 1.46 or later.
Lower-numbered firmware versions will give (harmless) SCSI error messages
and no SMART information.
cciss,N - [FreeBSD and Linux only] the device consists of one or more
SCSI/SAS disks connected to a cciss RAID controller. The non-negative
integer N (in the range from 0 to 15 inclusive) denotes which disk on the
controller is monitored.
If the controller firmware or driver provides a SAT Layer it may be possible
to monitor also SATA disks by specifiying ´-d sat+cciss,N´.
hpt,L/M/N - [FreeBSD and Linux only] the device consists of one or
more ATA disks connected to a HighPoint RocketRAID controller. The integer
L is the controller id, the integer M is the channel number, and the
integer N is the PMPort number if it is available. The allowed values of L
are from 1 to 4 inclusive, M are from 1 to 8 inclusive and N from 1 to 4
if PMPort available. And also these values are limited by the model of the
HighPoint RocketRAID controller. Use syntax such as:
smartctl -a -d hpt,1/3 /dev/sda (under Linux)
smartctl -a -d hpt,1/2/3 /dev/sda (under Linux)
smartctl -a -d hpt,1/3 /dev/hptrr (under FreeBSD)
smartctl -a -d hpt,1/2/3 /dev/hptrr (under FreeBSD)
Note that the /dev/sda-z form should be the device node which stands for the
disks derived from the HighPoint RocketRAID controllers under Linux and
under FreeBSD, it is the character device which the driver registered (eg,
/dev/hptrr, /dev/hptmv6).
- -T TYPE, --tolerance=TYPE
- [ATA only] Specifies how tolerant smartctl should be
of ATA and SMART command failures.
The behavior of smartctl depends upon whether the command is "
optional" or "mandatory". Here
"mandatory" means "required by the ATA/ATAPI-5
Specification if the device implements the SMART command set" and
" optional" means "not required by the ATA/ATAPI-5
Specification even if the device implements the SMART command set."
The " mandatory" ATA and SMART commands are: (1) ATA
IDENTIFY DEVICE, (2) SMART ENABLE/DISABLE ATTRIBUTE AUTOSAVE, (3) SMART
ENABLE/DISABLE, and (4) SMART RETURN STATUS.
The valid arguments to this option are:
normal - exit on failure of any mandatory SMART command, and
ignore all failures of optional SMART commands. This is the
default. Note that on some devices, issuing unimplemented optional SMART
commands doesn´t cause an error. This can result in misleading
smartctl messages such as "Feature X not implemented",
followed shortly by "Feature X: enabled". In most such cases,
contrary to the final message, Feature X is not enabled.
conservative - exit on failure of any optional SMART command.
permissive - ignore failure(s) of mandatory SMART commands.
This option may be given more than once. Each additional use of this
option will cause one more additional failure to be ignored. Note that the
use of this option can lead to messages like "Feature X not
implemented", followed shortly by "Error: unable to enable
Feature X". In a few such cases, contrary to the final message,
Feature X is enabled.
verypermissive - equivalent to giving a large number of ´-T
permissive´ options: ignore failures of any number of
mandatory SMART commands. Please see the note above.
- -b TYPE, --badsum=TYPE
- [ATA only] Specifies the action smartctl should take
if a checksum error is detected in the: (1) Device Identity Structure, (2)
SMART Self-Test Log Structure, (3) SMART Attribute Value Structure, (4)
SMART Attribute Threshold Structure, or (5) ATA Error Log Structure.
The valid arguments to this option are:
warn - report the incorrect checksum but carry on in spite of it.
This is the default.
exit - exit smartctl.
ignore - continue silently without issuing a warning.
- -r TYPE, --report=TYPE
- Intended primarily to help smartmontools developers
understand the behavior of smartmontools on non-conforming or
poorly conforming hardware. This option reports details of smartctl
transactions with the device. The option can be used multiple times. When
used just once, it shows a record of the ioctl() transactions with the
device. When used more than once, the detail of these ioctl() transactions
are reported in greater detail. The valid arguments to this option are:
ioctl - report all ioctl() transactions.
ataioctl - report only ioctl() transactions with ATA devices.
scsiioctl - report only ioctl() transactions with SCSI devices.
Invoking this once shows the SCSI commands in hex and the corresponding
status. Invoking it a second time adds a hex listing of the first 64 bytes
of data send to, or received from the device.
Any argument may include a positive integer to specify the level of detail
that should be reported. The argument should be followed by a comma then
the integer with no spaces. For example, ataioctl,2 The default
level is 1, so ´-r ataioctl,1´ and ´-r ataioctl´ are
equivalent.
For testing purposes, the output of ´-r ataioctl,2´ can later be
parsed by smartctl itself if ´-´ is used as device path
argument. The ATA command input parameters, sector data and return values
are reconstructed from the debug report read from stdin. Then
smartctl internally simulates an ATA device with the same
behaviour. This is does not work for SCSI devices yet.
- -n POWERMODE, --nocheck=POWERMODE
- [ATA only] Specifies if smartctl should exit before
performing any checks when the device is in a low-power mode. It may be
used to prevent a disk from being spun-up by smartctl. The power
mode is ignored by default. A nonzero exit status is returned if the
device is in one of the specified low-power modes (see RETURN VALUES
below).
Note: If this option is used it may also be necessary to specify the device
type with the ´-d´ option. Otherwise the device may spin up due
to commands issued during device type autodetection.
The valid arguments to this option are:
never - check the device always, but print the power mode if
´-i´ is specified.
sleep - check the device unless it is in SLEEP mode.
standby - check the device unless it is in SLEEP or STANDBY mode. In
these modes most disks are not spinning, so if you want to prevent a disk
from spinning up, this is probably what you want.
idle - check the device unless it is in SLEEP, STANDBY or IDLE mode.
In the IDLE state, most disks are still spinning, so this is probably not
what you want.
- SMART FEATURE ENABLE/DISABLE COMMANDS:
- Note: if multiple options are used to both enable
and disable a feature, then both the enable and disable commands
will be issued. The enable command will always be issued before the
corresponding disable command.
- -s VALUE, --smart=VALUE
- Enables or disables SMART on device. The valid arguments to
this option are on and off. Note that the command ´-s
on´ (perhaps used with with the ´-o on´ and ´-S
on´ options) should be placed in a start-up script for your machine,
for example in rc.local or rc.sysinit. In principle the SMART feature
settings are preserved over power-cycling, but it doesn´t hurt to be
sure. It is not necessary (or useful) to enable SMART to see the TapeAlert
messages.
- -o VALUE, --offlineauto=VALUE
- [ATA only] Enables or disables SMART automatic offline
test, which scans the drive every four hours for disk defects. This
command can be given during normal system operation. The valid arguments
to this option are on and off.
Note that the SMART automatic offline test command is listed as
"Obsolete" in every version of the ATA and ATA/ATAPI
Specifications. It was originally part of the SFF-8035i Revision 2.0
specification, but was never part of any ATA specification. However it is
implemented and used by many vendors. [Good documentation can be found in
IBM´s Official Published Disk Specifications. For example the IBM
Travelstar 40GNX Hard Disk Drive Specifications (Revision 1.1, 22 April
2002, Publication # 1541, Document S07N-7715-02) page 164. You can also
read the SFF-8035i Specification -- see REFERENCES below.] You can tell if
automatic offline testing is supported by seeing if this command enables
and disables it, as indicated by the ´Auto Offline Data
Collection´ part of the SMART capabilities report (displayed with
´-c´).
SMART provides three basic categories of testing. The first
category, called "online" testing, has no effect on the
performance of the device. It is turned on by the ´-s on´
option.
The second category of testing is called "offline" testing.
This type of test can, in principle, degrade the device performance. The
´-o on´ option causes this offline testing to be carried out,
automatically, on a regular scheduled basis. Normally, the disk will
suspend offline testing while disk accesses are taking place, and then
automatically resume it when the disk would otherwise be idle, so in
practice it has little effect. Note that a one-time offline test can also
be carried out immediately upon receipt of a user command. See the
´-t offline´ option below, which causes a one-time offline test
to be carried out immediately.
The choice (made by the SFF-8035i and ATA specification authors) of the word
testing for these first two categories is unfortunate, and often
leads to confusion. In fact these first two categories of online and
offline testing could have been more accurately described as online and
offline data collection.
The results of this automatic or immediate offline testing (data collection)
are reflected in the values of the SMART Attributes. Thus, if problems or
errors are detected, the values of these Attributes will go below their
failure thresholds; some types of errors may also appear in the SMART
error log. These are visible with the ´-A´ and ´-l
error´ options respectively.
Some SMART attribute values are updated only during off-line data collection
activities; the rest are updated during normal operation of the device or
during both normal operation and off-line testing. The Attribute value
table produced by the ´-A´ option indicates this in the UPDATED
column. Attributes of the first type are labeled "Offline" and
Attributes of the second type are labeled "Always".
The third category of testing (and the only category for which
the word ´testing´ is really an appropriate choice) is
"self" testing. This third type of test is only performed
(immediately) when a command to run it is issued. The ´-t´ and
´-X´ options can be used to carry out and abort such self-tests;
please see below for further details.
Any errors detected in the self testing will be shown in the SMART self-test
log, which can be examined using the ´-l selftest´ option.
Note: in this manual page, the word "Test" is used
in connection with the second category just described, e.g. for the
"offline" testing. The words "Self-test" are
used in connection with the third category.
- -S VALUE, --saveauto=VALUE
- [ATA] Enables or disables SMART autosave of device
vendor-specific Attributes. The valid arguments to this option are
on and off. Note that this feature is preserved across disk
power cycles, so you should only need to issue it once.
The ATA standard does not specify a method to check whether SMART autosave
is enabled. Unlike SCSI (below), smartctl is unable to print a warning if
autosave is disabled.
[SCSI] For SCSI devices this toggles the value of the Global Logging Target
Save Disabled (GLTSD) bit in the Control Mode Page. Some disk
manufacturers set this bit by default. This prevents error counters,
power-up hours and other useful data from being placed in non-volatile
storage, so these values may be reset to zero the next time the device is
power-cycled. If the GLTSD bit is set then ´smartctl -a´ will
issue a warning. Use on to clear the GLTSD bit and thus enable
saving counters to non-volatile storage. For extreme streaming-video type
applications you might consider using off to set the GLTSD bit.
- SMART READ AND DISPLAY DATA OPTIONS:
- -H, --health
- Check: Ask the device to report its SMART health status or
pending TapeAlert messages. SMART status is based on information that it
has gathered from online and offline tests, which were used to
determine/update its SMART vendor-specific Attribute values. TapeAlert
status is obtained by reading the TapeAlert log page.
If the device reports failing health status, this means either that
the device has already failed, or that it is predicting its own
failure within the next 24 hours. If this happens, use the ´-a´
option to get more information, and get your data off the disk and to
someplace safe as soon as you can.
- -c, --capabilities
- [ATA only] Prints only the generic SMART capabilities.
These show what SMART features are implemented and how the device will
respond to some of the different SMART commands. For example it shows if
the device logs errors, if it supports offline surface scanning, and so
on. If the device can carry out self-tests, this option also shows the
estimated time required to run those tests.
Note that the time required to run the Self-tests (listed in minutes) are
fixed. However the time required to run the Immediate Offline Test (listed
in seconds) is variable. This means that if you issue a command to perform
an Immediate Offline test with the ´-t offline´ option, then the
time may jump to a larger value and then count down as the Immediate
Offline Test is carried out. Please see REFERENCES below for further
information about the the flags and capabilities described by this
option.
- -A, --attributes
- [ATA] Prints only the vendor specific SMART Attributes. The
Attributes are numbered from 1 to 253 and have specific names and ID
numbers. For example Attribute 12 is "power cycle count": how
many times has the disk been powered up.
Each Attribute has a "Raw" value, printed under the heading
"RAW_VALUE", and a "Normalized" value printed under
the heading "VALUE". [Note: smartctl prints these values
in base-10.] In the example just given, the "Raw Value" for
Attribute 12 would be the actual number of times that the disk has been
power-cycled, for example 365 if the disk has been turned on once per day
for exactly one year. Each vendor uses their own algorithm to convert this
"Raw" value to a "Normalized" value in the range from
1 to 254. Please keep in mind that smartctl only reports the
different Attribute types, values, and thresholds as read from the device.
It does not carry out the conversion between "Raw" and
"Normalized" values: this is done by the disk´s firmware.
The conversion from Raw value to a quantity with physical units is not
specified by the SMART standard. In most cases, the values printed by
smartctl are sensible. For example the temperature Attribute
generally has its raw value equal to the temperature in Celsius. However
in some cases vendors use unusual conventions. For example the Hitachi
disk on my laptop reports its power-on hours in minutes, not hours. Some
IBM disks track three temperatures rather than one, in their raw values.
And so on.
Each Attribute also has a Threshold value (whose range is 0 to 255) which is
printed under the heading "THRESH". If the Normalized value is
less than or equal to the Threshold value, then the Attribute is
said to have failed. If the Attribute is a pre-failure Attribute, then
disk failure is imminent.
Each Attribute also has a "Worst" value shown under the heading
"WORST". This is the smallest (closest to failure) value that
the disk has recorded at any time during its lifetime when SMART was
enabled. [Note however that some vendors firmware may actually
increase the "Worst" value for some "rate-type"
Attributes.]
The Attribute table printed out by smartctl also shows the
"TYPE" of the Attribute. Attributes are one of two possible
types: Pre-failure or Old age. Pre-failure Attributes are ones which, if
less than or equal to their threshold values, indicate pending disk
failure. Old age, or usage Attributes, are ones which indicate
end-of-product life from old-age or normal aging and wearout, if the
Attribute value is less than or equal to the threshold. Please
note: the fact that an Attribute is of type 'Pre-fail' does
not mean that your disk is about to fail! It only has this meaning
if the Attribute´s current Normalized value is less than or equal to
the threshold value.
If the Attribute´s current Normalized value is less than or equal to
the threshold value, then the "WHEN_FAILED" column will display
"FAILING_NOW". If not, but the worst recorded value is less than
or equal to the threshold value, then this column will display
"In_the_past". If the "WHEN_FAILED" column has no
entry (indicated by a dash: ´-´) then this Attribute is OK now
(not failing) and has also never failed in the past.
The table column labeled "UPDATED" shows if the SMART Attribute
values are updated during both normal operation and off-line testing, or
only during offline testing. The former are labeled "Always" and
the latter are labeled "Offline".
So to summarize: the Raw Attribute values are the ones that might have a
real physical interpretation, such as "Temperature Celsius",
"Hours", or "Start-Stop Cycles". Each manufacturer
converts these, using their detailed knowledge of the disk´s
operations and failure modes, to Normalized Attribute values in the range
1-254. The current and worst (lowest measured) of these Normalized
Attribute values are stored on the disk, along with a Threshold value that
the manufacturer has determined will indicate that the disk is going to
fail, or that it has exceeded its design age or aging limit.
smartctl does not calculate any of the Attribute values,
thresholds, or types, it merely reports them from the SMART data on the
device.
Note that starting with ATA/ATAPI-4, revision 4, the meaning of these
Attribute fields has been made entirely vendor-specific. However most
ATA/ATAPI-5 disks seem to respect their meaning, so we have retained the
option of printing the Attribute values.
[SCSI] For SCSI devices the "attributes" are obtained from the
temperature and start-stop cycle counter log pages. Certain vendor
specific attributes are listed if recognised. The attributes are output in
a relatively free format (compared with ATA disk attributes).
- -f FORMAT, --format=FORMAT
- [ATA only] Selects the output format of the attributes to
one of:
old - Old smartctl format. This is the default unless the
´-x´ option is specified.
brief - New format which fits into 80 colums (except in some rare
cases). This format also decodes four additional attribute flags. This is
the default if the '-x´ option is specified.
- -l TYPE, --log=TYPE
- Prints either the SMART Error Log, the SMART Self-Test Log,
the SMART Selective Self-Test Log [ATA only], the Log Directory [ATA
only], or the Background Scan Results Log [SCSI only]. The valid arguments
to this option are:
error - [ATA] prints the Summary SMART error log. SMART disks
maintain a log of the most recent five non-trivial errors. For each of
these errors, the disk power-on lifetime at which the error occurred is
recorded, as is the device status (idle, standby, etc) at the time of the
error. For some common types of errors, the Error Register (ER) and Status
Register (SR) values are decoded and printed as text. The meanings of
these are:
ABRT: Command ABoRTed
AMNF: Address Mark Not Found
CCTO: Command Completion Timed Out
EOM: End Of Media
ICRC: Interface Cyclic Redundancy Code (CRC) error
IDNF: IDentity Not Found
ILI: (packet command-set specific)
MC: Media Changed
MCR: Media Change Request
NM: No Media
obs: obsolete
TK0NF: TracK 0 Not Found
UNC: UNCorrectable Error in Data
WP: Media is Write Protected
In addition, up to the last five commands that preceded the error are
listed, along with a timestamp measured from the start of the
corresponding power cycle. This is displayed in the form Dd+HH:MM:SS.msec
where D is the number of days, HH is hours, MM is minutes, SS is seconds
and msec is milliseconds. [Note: this time stamp wraps after 2^32
milliseconds, or 49 days 17 hours 2 minutes and 47.296 seconds.] The key
ATA disk registers are also recorded in the log. The final column of the
error log is a text-string description of the ATA command defined by the
Command Register (CR) and Feature Register (FR) values. Commands that are
obsolete in the most current (ATA-7) spec are listed like this: READ
LONG (w/ retry) [OBS-4], indicating that the command became obsolete
with or in the ATA-4 specification. Similarly, the notation
[RET-N] is used to indicate that a command was
retired in the ATA- N specification. Some commands are not defined
in any version of the ATA specification but are in common use nonetheless;
these are marked [NS], meaning non-standard.
The ATA Specification (ATA-5 Revision 1c, Section 8.41.6.8.2) says:
"Error log structures shall include UNC errors, IDNF errors
for which the address requested was valid, servo errors, write
fault errors, etc. Error log data structures shall not include
errors attributed to the receipt of faulty commands such as command
codes not implemented by the device or requests with invalid
parameters or invalid addresses." The definitions of these
terms are:
UNC (UNCorrectable): data is uncorrectable. This refers to
data which has been read from the disk, but for which the Error Checking
and Correction (ECC) codes are inconsistent. In effect, this means that
the data can not be read.
IDNF (ID Not Found): user-accessible address could not
be found. For READ LOG type commands, IDNF can also indicate that a
device data log structure checksum was incorrect.
If the command that caused the error was a READ or WRITE command, then the
Logical Block Address (LBA) at which the error occurred will be printed in
base 10 and base 16. The LBA is a linear address, which counts 512-byte
sectors on the disk, starting from zero. (Because of the limitations of
the SMART error log, if the LBA is greater than 0xfffffff, then either no
error log entry will be made, or the error log entry will have an
incorrect LBA. This may happen for drives with a capacity greater than 128
GiB or 137 GB.) On Linux systems the smartmontools web page has
instructions about how to convert the LBA address to the name of the disk
file containing the erroneous disk sector.
Please note that some manufacturers ignore the ATA specifications,
and make entries in the error log if the device receives a command which
is not implemented or is not valid.
error - [SCSI] prints the error counter log pages for reads, write
and verifies. The verify row is only output if it has an element other
than zero.
xerror[,NUM][,error] - [ATA only] prints the Extended Comprehensive
SMART error log (General Purpose Log address 0x03). Unlike the Summary
SMART error log (see ´-l error´ above), it provides sufficient
space to log the contents of the 48-bit LBA register set introduced with
ATA-6. It also supports logs with more than one sector. Each sector holds
up to 4 log entries. The actual number of log sectors is vendor specific,
typical values for HDD are 2 (Samsung), 5 (Seagate) or 6 (WD). Some recent
SSD devices have much larger error logs.
Only the 8 most recent error log entries are printed by default. This number
can be changed by the optional parameter NUM.
If ',error' is appended and the Extended Comprehensive SMART error log is
not supported, the Summary SMART self-test log is printed.
Please note that some recent (e.g. Samsung) drives report errors only in the
Extended Comprehensive SMART error log. The Summary SMART error log can be
read but is always empty.
selftest - [ATA] prints the SMART self-test log. The disk maintains a
self-test log showing the results of the self tests, which can be run
using the ´-t´ option described below. For each of the most
recent twenty-one self-tests, the log shows the type of test (short or
extended, off-line or captive) and the final status of the test. If the
test did not complete successfully, then the percentage of the test
remaining is shown. The time at which the test took place, measured in
hours of disk lifetime, is also printed. [Note: this time stamp wraps
after 2^16 hours, or 2730 days and 16 hours, or about 7.5 years.] If any
errors were detected, the Logical Block Address (LBA) of the first error
is printed in decimal notation. On Linux systems the smartmontools web
page has instructions about how to convert this LBA address to the name of
the disk file containing the erroneous block.
selftest - [SCSI] the self-test log for a SCSI device has a slightly
different format than for an ATA device. For each of the most recent
twenty self-tests, it shows the type of test and the status (final or in
progress) of the test. SCSI standards use the terms "foreground"
and "background" (rather than ATA´s corresponding
"captive" and "off-line") and "short" and
"long" (rather than ATA´s corresponding "short"
and "extended") to describe the type of the test. The printed
segment number is only relevant when a test fails in the third or later
test segment. It identifies the test that failed and consists of either
the number of the segment that failed during the test, or the number of
the test that failed and the number of the segment in which the test was
run, using a vendor-specific method of putting both numbers into a single
byte. The Logical Block Address (LBA) of the first error is printed in
hexadecimal notation. On Linux systems the smartmontools web page has
instructions about how to convert this LBA address to the name of the disk
file containing the erroneous block. If provided, the SCSI Sense Key (SK),
Additional Sense Code (ASC) and Additional Sense Code Qualifier (ASQ) are
also printed. The self tests can be run using the ´-t´ option
described below (using the ATA test terminology).
xselftest[,NUM][,selftest] - [ATA only] prints the Extended SMART
self-test log (General Purpose Log address 0x07). Unlike the SMART
self-test log (see ´-l selftest´ above), it supports 48-bit LBA
and logs with more than one sector. Each sector holds up to 19 log
entries. The actual number of log sectors is vendor specific, typical
values are 1 (Seagate) or 2 (Samsung).
Only the 25 most recent log entries are printed by default. This number can
be changed by the optional parameter NUM.
If ',selftest' is appended and the Extended SMART self-test log is not
supported, the old SMART self-test log is printed.
selective - [ATA only] Please see the ´-t select´ option
below for a description of selective self-tests. The selective self-test
log shows the start/end Logical Block Addresses (LBA) of each of the five
test spans, and their current test status. If the span is being tested or
the remainder of the disk is being read-scanned, the current 65536-sector
block of LBAs being tested is also displayed. The selective self-test log
also shows if a read-scan of the remainder of the disk will be carried out
after the selective self-test has completed (see ´-t
afterselect´ option) and the time delay before restarting this
read-scan if it is interrupted (see ´-t pending´ option). This
is a new smartmontools feature; please report unusual or incorrect
behavior to the smartmontools-support mailing list.
directory[,gs] - [ATA only] if the device supports the General
Purpose Logging feature set (ATA-6 and above) then this prints the Log
Directory (the log at address 0). The Log Directory shows what logs are
available and their length in sectors (512 bytes). The contents of the
logs at address 1 [Summary SMART error log] and at address 6 [SMART
self-test log] may be printed using the previously-described error
and selftest arguments to this option. If your version of smartctl
supports 48-bit ATA commands, both the General Purpose Log (GPL) and SMART
Log (SL) directories are printed in one combined table. The output can be
restricted to the GPL directory or SL directory by ´-l
directory,q´ or ´-l directory,s´ respectively.
background - [SCSI only] the background scan results log outputs
information derived from Background Media Scans (BMS) done after power up
and/or periodocally (e.g. every 24 hours) on recent SCSI disks. If
supported, the BMS status is output first, indicating whether a background
scan is currently underway (and if so a progress percentage), the amount
of time the disk has been powered up and the number of scans already
completed. Then there is a header and a line for each background scan
"event". These will typically be either recovered or
unrecoverable errors. That latter group may need some attention. There is
a description of the background scan mechansim in section 4.18 of SBC-3
revision 6 (see www.t10.org ).
scttemp, scttempsts, scttemphist - [ATA only] prints the disk
temperature information provided by the SMART Command Transport (SCT)
commands. The option ´scttempsts´ prints current temperature and
temperature ranges returned by the SCT Status command,
´scttemphist´ prints temperature limits and the temperature
history table returned by the SCT Data Table command, and
´scttemp´ prints both. The temperature values are preserved
across power cycles. The default temperature logging interval is 1 minute
and can be configured with the ´-t scttempint,N[,p]´ option, see
below. The SCT commands are specified in the proposed ATA-8 Command Set
(ACS), and are already implemented in some recent ATA-7 disks.
scterc[,READTIME,WRITETIME] - [ATA only] [NEW EXPERIMENTAL SMARTCTL
FEATURE] prints values and descriptions of the SCT Error Recovery Control
settings. These are equivalent to TLER (as used by Western Digital), CCTL
(as used by Samsung and Hitachi) and ERC (as used by Seagate). READTIME
and WRITETIME arguments (deciseconds) set the specified values. Values of
0 disable the feature, other values less than 65 are probably not
supported. For RAID configurations, this is typically set to 70,70
deciseconds.
sataphy[,reset] - [SATA only] prints values and descriptions of the
SATA Phy Event Counters (General Purpose Log address 0x11). If ´-l
sataphy,reset´ is specified, all counters are reset after reading the
values.
sasphy[,reset] - [SAS (SCSI) only] prints values and descriptions of
the SAS (SSP) Protocol Specific log page (log page 0x18). If ´-l
sasphy,reset´ is specified, all counters are reset after reading the
values.
gplog,ADDR[,FIRST[-LAST|+SIZE]] - [ATA only] prints a hex dump of any
log accessible via General Purpose Logging (GPL) feature. The log address
ADDR is the hex address listed in the log directory (see ´-l
directory´ above). The range of log sectors (pages) can be specified
by decimal values FIRST-LAST or FIRST+SIZE. FIRST defaults to 0, SIZE
defaults to 1. LAST can be set to ´max´ to specify the last page
of the log.
smartlog,ADDR[,FIRST[-LAST|+SIZE]] - [ATA only] prints a hex dump of
any log accessible via SMART Read Log command. See ´-l
gplog,...´ above for parameter syntax.
For example, all these commands:
smartctl -l gplog,0x80,10-15 /dev/sda
smartctl -l gplog,0x80,10+6 /dev/sda
smartctl -l smartlog,0x80,10-15 /dev/sda
print pages 10-15 of log 0x80 (first host vendor specific log).
The hex dump format is compatible with the ´xxd -r´ command. This
command:
smartctl -l gplog,0x11 /dev/sda | grep ^0 | xxd -r >log.bin
writes a binary representation of the one sector log 0x11 (SATA Phy Event
Counters) to file log.bin.
- -v ID,FORMAT[:BYTEORDER][,NAME],
--vendorattribute=ID,FORMAT[:BYTEORDER][,NAME]
- [ATA only] Sets a vendor-specific raw value print FORMAT,
an optional BYTEORDER and an optional NAME for Attribute ID. This option
may be used multiple times.
The Attribute ID can be in the range 1 to 255. If ´N´ is specified
as ID, the settings for all Attributes are changed.
The optional BYTEORDER consists of 1 to 8 characters from the set
´012345rvwz´. The characters ´0´ to ´5´
select the byte 0 to 5 from the 48-bit raw value, ´r´ selects
the reserved byte of the attribute data block, ´v´ selects the
normalized value, ´w´ selects the worst value and ´z´
inserts a zero byte. The default BYTEORDER is ´543210´ for all
48-bit formats, ´r543210´ for the 54-bit formats, and
´543210wv´ for the 64-bit formats. For example, ´-v
5,raw48:012345´ prints the raw value of attribute 5 with big endian
instead of little endian byte ordering.
The NAME is a string of letters, digits and underscore.
-v help - Prints (to STDOUT) a list of all valid arguments to this
option, then exits.
Valid arguments for FORMAT are:
raw8 - Print the Raw value as six 8-bit unsigned base-10 integers.
This may be useful for decoding the meaning of the Raw value.
raw16 - Print the Raw value as three 16-bit unsigned base-10
integers. This may be useful for decoding the meaning of the Raw value.
raw48 - Print the Raw value as a 48-bit unsigned base-10 integer.
This is the default for most attributes.
hex48 - Print the Raw value as a 12 digit hexadecimal number. This
may be useful for decoding the meaning of the Raw value.
raw64 - Print the Raw value as a 64-bit unsigned base-10 integer.
This includes two bytes from the normalized and worst attribute value.
This new raw format is used by some recent SSD devices.
hex64 - Print the Raw value as a 16 digit hexadecimal number. This
includes two bytes from the normalized and worst attribute value. This new
raw format is used by some recent SSD devices.
min2hour - Raw Attribute is power-on time in minutes. Its raw value
will be displayed in the form "Xh+Ym". Here X is hours, and Y is
minutes in the range 0-59 inclusive. Y is always printed with two digits,
for example "06" or "31" or "00".
sec2hour - Raw Attribute is power-on time in seconds. Its raw value
will be displayed in the form "Xh+Ym+Zs". Here X is hours, Y is
minutes in the range 0-59 inclusive, and Z is seconds in the range 0-59
inclusive. Y and Z are always printed with two digits, for example
"06" or "31" or "00".
halfmin2hour - Raw Attribute is power-on time, measured in units of
30 seconds. This format is used by some Samsung disks. Its raw value will
be displayed in the form "Xh+Ym". Here X is hours, and Y is
minutes in the range 0-59 inclusive. Y is always printed with two digits,
for example "06" or "31" or "00".
msec24hour32 - Raw Attribute is power-on time measured in 32-bit
hours and 24-bit milliseconds since last hour update. It will be displayed
in the form "Xh+Ym+Z.Ms". Here X is hours, Y is minutes, Z is
seconds and M is milliseconds.
tempminmax - Raw Attribute is the disk temperature in Celsius. Info
about Min/Max temperature is printed if available. This is the default for
Attributes 190 and 194. The recording interval (lifetime, last power
cycle, last soft reset) of the min/max values is device specific.
temp10x - Raw Attribute is ten times the disk temperature in Celsius.
raw16(raw16) - Print the raw attribute as a 16-bit value and two
optional 16-bit values if these words are nonzero. This is the default for
Attributes 5 and 196.
raw16(avg16) - Raw attribute is spin-up time. It is printed as a
16-bit value and an optional "Average" 16-bit value if the word
is nonzero. This is the default for Attribute 3.
raw24/raw24 - Raw Attribute contains two 24-bit values. The first is
the number of load cycles. The second is the number of unload cycles. The
difference between these two values is the number of times that the drive
was unexpectedly powered off (also called an emergency unload). As a rule
of thumb, the mechanical stress created by one emergency unload is
equivalent to that created by one hundred normal unloads.
raw24/raw32 - Raw attribute is an error rate which consists of a
24-bit error count and a 32-bit total count.
The following old arguments to ´-v´ are also still valid:
9,minutes - same as: 9,min2hour,Power_On_Minutes.
9,seconds - same as: 9,sec2hour,Power_On_Seconds.
9,halfminutes - same as: 9,halfmin2hour,Power_On_Half_Minutes.
9,temp - same as: 9,tempminmax,Temperature_Celsius.
192,emergencyretractcyclect - same as:
192,raw48,Emerg_Retract_Cycle_Ct
193,loadunload - same as: 193,raw24/raw24.
194,10xCelsius - same as: 194,temp10x,Temperature_Celsius_x10.
194,unknown - same as: 194,raw48,Unknown_Attribute.
197,increasing - same as: 197,raw48,Total_Pending_Sectors.
Also means that Attribute number 197 (Current Pending Sector Count) is not
reset if uncorrectable sectors are reallocated (see smartd.conf(5)
man page).
198,increasing - same as: 198,raw48,Total_Offl_Uncorrectabl.
Also means that Attribute number 198 (Offline Uncorrectable Sector Count)
is not reset if uncorrectable sectors are reallocated (see
smartd.conf(5) man page).
198,offlinescanuncsectorct - same as:
198,raw48,Offline_Scan_UNC_SectCt.
200,writeerrorcount - same as: 200,raw48,Write_Error_Count.
201,detectedtacount - same as: 201,raw48,Detected_TA_Count.
220,temp - same as: 220,raw48,Temperature_Celsius.
Note: a table of hard drive models, listing which Attribute corresponds to
temperature, can be found at:
http://www.guzu.net/linux/hddtemp.db
- -F TYPE, --firmwarebug=TYPE
- [ATA only] Modifies the behavior of smartctl to
compensate for some known and understood device firmware or driver bug.
Except ´swapid´, the arguments to this option are exclusive, so
that only the final option given is used. The valid values are:
none - Assume that the device firmware obeys the ATA specifications.
This is the default, unless the device has presets for ´-F´ in
the device database (see note below).
samsung - In some Samsung disks (example: model SV4012H Firmware
Version: RM100-08) some of the two- and four-byte quantities in the SMART
data structures are byte-swapped (relative to the ATA specification).
Enabling this option tells smartctl to evaluate these quantities in
byte-reversed order. Some signs that your disk needs this option are (1)
no self-test log printed, even though you have run self-tests; (2) very
large numbers of ATA errors reported in the ATA error log; (3) strange and
impossible values for the ATA error log timestamps.
samsung2 - In some Samsung disks the number of ATA errors reported is
byte swapped. Enabling this option tells smartctl to evaluate this
quantity in byte-reversed order. An indication that your Samsung disk
needs this option is that the self-test log is printed correctly, but
there are a very large number of errors in the SMART error log. This is
because the error count is byte swapped. Thus a disk with five errors
(0x0005) will appear to have 20480 errors (0x5000).
samsung3 - Some Samsung disks (at least SP2514N with Firmware
VF100-37) report a self-test still in progress with 0% remaining when the
test was already completed. Enabling this option modifies the output of
the self-test execution status (see options ´-c´ or
´-a´ above) accordingly.
Note that an explicit ´-F´ option on the command line will
over-ride any preset values for ´-F´ (see the ´-P´
option below).
swapid - Fixes byte swapped ATA identify strings (device name, serial
number, firmware version) returned by some buggy device drivers.
- -P TYPE, --presets=TYPE
- [ATA only] Specifies whether smartctl should use any
preset options that are available for this drive. By default, if the drive
is recognized in the smartmontools database, then the presets are
used.
smartctl can automatically set appropriate options for known drives.
For example, the Maxtor 4D080H4 uses Attribute 9 to stores power-on time
in minutes whereas most drives use that Attribute to store the power-on
time in hours. The command-line option ´-v 9,minutes´ ensures
that smartctl correctly interprets Attribute 9 in this case, but
that option is preset for the Maxtor 4D080H4 and so need not be specified
by the user on the smartctl command line.
The argument show will show any preset options for your drive and the
argument showall will show all known drives in the
smartmontools database, along with their preset options. If there
are no presets for your drive and you think there should be (for example,
a -v or -F option is needed to get smartctl to display correct
values) then please contact the smartmontools developers so that
this information can be added to the smartmontools database.
Contact information is at the end of this man page.
The valid arguments to this option are:
use - if a drive is recognized, then use the stored presets for it.
This is the default. Note that presets will NOT over-ride additional
Attribute interpretation (´-v N,something´) command-line options
or explicit ´-F´ command-line options..
ignore - do not use presets.
show - show if the drive is recognized in the database, and if so,
its presets, then exit.
showall - list all recognized drives, and the presets that are set
for them, then exit.
The ´-P showall´ option takes up to two optional arguments to
match a specific drive type and firmware version. The command:
smartctl -P showall
lists all entries, the command:
smartctl -P showall ´MODEL´
lists all entries matching MODEL, and the command:
smartctl -P showall ´MODEL´ ´FIRMWARE´
lists all entries for this MODEL and a specific FIRMWARE version.
- -B [+]FILE, --drivedb=[+]FILE
- [ATA only] Read the drive database from FILE. The new
database replaces the built in database by default. If ´+´ is
specified, then the new entries prepend the built in entries.
If this option is not specified, optional entries are read from the file
/etc/smart_drivedb.h (Windows: EXEDIR/drivedb-add.h). If
/usr/share/smartmontools/drivedb.h (Windows:
EXEDIR/drivedb.h) is present, the contents of this file is used
instead of the built in table.
Run the script /usr/sbin/update-smart-drivedb to update this file
from the smartmontools SVN repository.
The database files use the same C/C++ syntax that is used to initialize the
built in database array. C/C++ style comments are allowed. Example:
/* Full entry: */
{
"Model family", // Info about model family/series.
"MODEL1.*REGEX", // Regular expression to match model of device.
"VERSION.*REGEX", // Regular expression to match firmware version(s).
"Some warning", // Warning message.
"-v 9,minutes" // String of preset -v and -F options.
},
/* Minimal entry: */
{
"", // No model family/series info.
"MODEL2.*REGEX", // Regular expression to match model of device.
"", // All firmware versions.
"", // No warning.
"" // No options preset.
},
/* USB ID entry: */
{
"USB: Device; Bridge", // Info about USB device and bridge name.
"0x1234:0xabcd", // Regular expression to match vendor:product ID.
"0x0101", // Regular expression to match bcdDevice.
"", // Not used.
"-d sat" // String with device type option.
},
/* ... */
- SMART RUN/ABORT OFFLINE TEST AND SELF-TEST
OPTIONS:
- -t TEST, --test=TEST
- Executes TEST immediately. The ´-C´ option can be
used in conjunction with this option to run the short or long (and also
for ATA devices, selective or conveyance) self-tests in captive mode
(known as "foreground mode" for SCSI devices). Note that only
one test type can be run at a time, so only one test type should be
specified per command line. Note also that if a computer is shutdown or
power cycled during a self-test, no harm should result. The self-test will
either be aborted or will resume automatically.
The valid arguments to this option are:
offline - [ATA] runs SMART Immediate Offline Test. This immediately
starts the test described above. This command can be given during normal
system operation. The effects of this test are visible only in that it
updates the SMART Attribute values, and if errors are found they will
appear in the SMART error log, visible with the ´-l error´
option.
If the ´-c´ option to smartctl shows that the device has
the "Suspend Offline collection upon new command" capability
then you can track the progress of the Immediate Offline test using the
´-c´ option to smartctl. If the ´-c´ option
show that the device has the "Abort Offline collection upon new
command" capability then most commands will abort the Immediate
Offline Test, so you should not try to track the progress of the test with
´-c´, as it will abort the test.
offline - [SCSI] runs the default self test in foreground. No entry
is placed in the self test log.
short - [ATA] runs SMART Short Self Test (usually under ten minutes).
This command can be given during normal system operation (unless run in
captive mode - see the ´-C´ option below). This is a test in a
different category than the immediate or automatic offline tests. The
"Self" tests check the electrical and mechanical performance as
well as the read performance of the disk. Their results are reported in
the Self Test Error Log, readable with the ´-l selftest´ option.
Note that on some disks the progress of the self-test can be monitored by
watching this log during the self-test; with other disks use the
´-c´ option to monitor progress.
short - [SCSI] runs the "Background short" self-test.
long - [ATA] runs SMART Extended Self Test (tens of minutes). This is
a longer and more thorough version of the Short Self Test described above.
Note that this command can be given during normal system operation (unless
run in captive mode - see the ´-C´ option below).
long - [SCSI] runs the "Background long" self-test.
conveyance - [ATA only] runs a SMART Conveyance Self Test (minutes).
This self-test routine is intended to identify damage incurred during
transporting of the device. This self-test routine should take on the
order of minutes to complete. Note that this command can be given during
normal system operation (unless run in captive mode - see the
´-C´ option below).
select,N-M, select,N+SIZE - [ATA only] runs a SMART Selective Self
Test, to test a range of disk Logical Block Addresses (LBAs),
rather than the entire disk. Each range of LBAs that is checked is called
a "span" and is specified by a starting LBA (N) and an ending
LBA (M) with N less than or equal to M. The range can also be specified as
N+SIZE. A span at the end of a disk can be specified by N- max.
For example the commands:
smartctl -t select,10-20 /dev/hda
smartctl -t select,10+11 /dev/hda
both runs a self test on one span consisting of LBAs ten to twenty
(inclusive). The command:
smartctl -t select,100000000-max /dev/hda
run a self test from LBA 100000000 up to the end of the disk. The
´-t´ option can be given up to five times, to test up to five
spans. For example the command:
smartctl -t select,0-100 -t select,1000-2000 /dev/hda
runs a self test on two spans. The first span consists of 101 LBAs and the
second span consists of 1001 LBAs. Note that the spans can overlap
partially or completely, for example:
smartctl -t select,0-10 -t select,5-15 -t select,10-20 /dev/hda
The results of the selective self-test can be obtained (both during and
after the test) by printing the SMART self-test log, using the ´-l
selftest´ option to smartctl.
Selective self tests are particularly useful as disk capacities increase: an
extended self test (smartctl -t long) can take several hours. Selective
self-tests are helpful if (based on SYSLOG error messages, previous failed
self-tests, or SMART error log entries) you suspect that a disk is having
problems at a particular range of Logical Block Addresses (LBAs).
Selective self-tests can be run during normal system operation (unless done
in captive mode - see the ´-C´ option below).
The following variants of the selective self-test command use spans based on
the ranges from past tests already stored on the disk:
select,redo[+SIZE] - [ATA only] redo the last SMART Selective Self
Test using the same LBA range. The starting LBA is identical to the LBA
used by last test, same for ending LBA unless a new span size is specified
by optional +SIZE argument.
For example the commands:
smartctl -t select,10-20 /dev/hda
smartctl -t select,redo /dev/hda
smartctl -t select,redo+20 /dev/hda
have the same effect as:
smartctl -t select,10-20 /dev/hda
smartctl -t select,10-20 /dev/hda
smartctl -t select,10-29 /dev/hda
select,next[+SIZE] - [ATA only] runs a SMART Selective Self Test on
the LBA range which follows the range of the last test. The starting LBA
is set to (ending LBA +1) of the last test. A new span size may be
specified by the optional +SIZE argument.
For example the commands:
smartctl -t select,0-999 /dev/hda
smartctl -t select,next /dev/hda
smartctl -t select,next+2000 /dev/hda
have the same effect as:
smartctl -t select,0-999 /dev/hda
smartctl -t select,1000-1999 /dev/hda
smartctl -t select,2000-3999 /dev/hda
If the last test ended at the last LBA of the disk, the new range starts at
LBA 0. The span size of the last span of a disk is adjusted such that the
total number of spans to check the full disk will not be changed by future
uses of ´-t select,next´.
select,cont[+SIZE] - [ATA only] performs a ´redo´ (above)
if the self test status reports that the last test was aborted by the
host. Otherwise it run the ´next´ (above) test.
afterselect,on - [ATA only] perform an offline read scan after a
Selective Self-test has completed. This option must be used together with
one or more of the select,N-M options above. If the LBAs that have
been specified in the Selective self-test pass the test with no errors
found, then read scan the remainder of the disk. If the device is
powered-cycled while this read scan is in progress, the read scan will be
automatically resumed after a time specified by the pending timer (see
below). The value of this option is preserved between selective
self-tests.
afterselect,off - [ATA only] do not read scan the remainder of the
disk after a Selective self-test has completed. This option must be use
together with one or more of the select,N-M options above. The
value of this option is preserved between selective self-tests.
pending,N - [ATA only] set the pending offline read scan timer to N
minutes. Here N is an integer in the range from 0 to 65535 inclusive. If
the device is powered off during a read scan after a Selective self-test,
then resume the test automatically N minutes after power-up. This option
must be use together with one or more of the select,N-M options
above. The value of this option is preserved between selective self-tests.
scttempint,N[,p] - [ATA only] set the time interval for SCT
temperature logging to N minutes. If ´,p´ is specified, the
setting is preserved across power cycles. Otherwise, the setting is
volatile and will be reverted to default (1 minute), or last non-volatile
setting by the next hard reset. This command also clears the temperature
history table. See ´-l scttemp´ above for more information about
SCT temperature logging.
vendor,N - [ATA only] issues the ATA command SMART EXECUTE OFF-LINE
IMMEDIATE with subcommand N in LBA LOW register. The subcommand is
specified as a hex value in the range 0x00 to 0xff. Subcommands 0x40-0x7e
and 0x90-0xff are reserved for vendor specific use, see table 61 of
T13/1699-D Revision 6a (ATA8-ACS). Note that the subcommands
0x00-0x04,0x7f,0x81-0x84 are supported by other smartctl options (e.g.
0x01: ´-t short´, 0x7f: ´-X´, 0x82: ´-C -t
long´).
WARNING: Only run subcommands documented by the vendor of the
device.
Example for Intel (X18-M/X25-M G2 and 320 Series) SSDs only: The subcommand
0x40 (´-t vendor,0x40´) clears the timed workload related SMART
attributes (226, 227, 228). Note that the raw values of these attributes
are held at 65535 (0xffff) until the workload timer reaches 60
minutes.
- -C, --captive
- [ATA] Runs self-tests in captive mode. This has no effect
with ´-t offline´ or if the ´-t´ option is not used.
WARNING: Tests run in captive mode may busy out the drive for the
length of the test. Only run captive tests on drives without any
mounted partitions!
[SCSI] Runs the self-test in "Foreground" mode.
- -X, --abort
- Aborts non-captive SMART Self Tests. Note that this command
will abort the Offline Immediate Test routine only if your disk has the
"Abort Offline collection upon new command" capability.
ATA, SCSI command sets and SAT¶
In the past there has been a clear distinction between storage devices that used
the ATA and SCSI command sets. This distinction was often reflected in their
device naming and hardware. Now various SCSI transports (e.g. SAS, FC and
iSCSI) can interconnect to both SCSI disks (e.g. FC and SAS) and ATA disks
(especially SATA). USB and IEEE 1394 storage devices use the SCSI command set
externally but almost always contain ATA or SATA disks (or flash). The storage
subsystems in some operating systems have started to remove the distinction
between ATA and SCSI in their device naming policies.
99% of operations that an OS performs on a disk involve the SCSI INQUIRY, READ
CAPACITY, READ and WRITE commands, or their ATA equivalents. Since the SCSI
commands are slightly more general than their ATA equivalents, many OSes are
generating SCSI commands (mainly READ and WRITE) and letting a lower level
translate them to their ATA equivalents as the need arises. An important note
here is that "lower level" may be in external equipment and hence
outside the control of an OS.
SCSI to ATA Translation (SAT) is a standard (ANSI INCITS 431-2007) that
specifies how this translation is done. For the other 1% of operations that an
OS performs on a disk, SAT provides two options. First is an optional ATA
PASS-THROUGH SCSI command (there are two variants). The second is a
translation from the closest SCSI command. Most current interest is in the
"pass-through" option.
The relevance to smartmontools (and hence smartctl) is that its interactions
with disks fall solidly into the "1%" category. So even if the OS
can happily treat (and name) a disk as "SCSI", smartmontools needs
to detect the native command set and act accordingly. As more storage
manufacturers (including external SATA drives) comply with SAT, smartmontools
is able to automatically distinguish the native command set of the device. In
some cases the '-d sat' option is needed on the command line.
There are also virtual disks which typically have no useful information to
convey to smartmontools, but could conceivably in the future. An example of a
virtual disk is the OS's view of a RAID 1 box. There are most likely two SATA
disks inside a RAID 1 box. Addressing those SATA disks from a distant OS is a
challenge for smartmontools. Another approach is running a tool like
smartmontools inside the RAID 1 box (e.g. a Network Attached Storage (NAS)
box) and fetching the logs via a browser.
EXAMPLES¶
smartctl -a /dev/hda
Print a large amount of SMART information for drive /dev/hda which is typically
an ATA (IDE) or SATA disk in Linux.
smartctl -a /dev/sdb
Print a large amount of SMART information for drive /dev/sdb . This may be a
SCSI disk or an ATA (SATA) disk.
smartctl -s off /dev/hdd
Disable SMART monitoring and data log collection on drive /dev/hdd .
smartctl --smart=on --offlineauto=on --saveauto=on /dev/hda
Enable SMART on drive /dev/hda, enable automatic offline testing every four
hours, and enable autosaving of SMART Attributes. This is a good start-up line
for your system´s init files. You can issue this command on a running
system.
smartctl -t long /dev/hdc
Begin an extended self-test of drive /dev/hdc. You can issue this command on a
running system. The results can be seen in the self-test log visible with the
´-l selftest´ option after it has completed.
smartctl -s on -t offline /dev/hda
Enable SMART on the disk, and begin an immediate offline test of drive /dev/hda.
You can issue this command on a running system. The results are only used to
update the SMART Attributes, visible with the ´-A´ option. If any
device errors occur, they are logged to the SMART error log, which can be seen
with the ´-l error´ option.
smartctl -A -v 9,minutes /dev/hda
Shows the vendor Attributes, when the disk stores its power-on time internally
in minutes rather than hours.
smartctl -q errorsonly -H -l selftest /dev/hda
Produces output only if the device returns failing SMART status, or if some of
the logged self-tests ended with errors.
smartctl -q silent -a /dev/hda
Examine all SMART data for device /dev/hda, but produce no printed output. You
must use the exit status (the
$? shell variable) to learn if any
Attributes are out of bound, if the SMART status is failing, if there are
errors recorded in the self-test log, or if there are errors recorded in the
disk error log.
smartctl -a -d 3ware,0 /dev/sda
Examine all SMART data for the first ATA disk connected to a 3ware RAID
controller card.
smartctl -a -d 3ware,0 /dev/twe0
Examine all SMART data for the first ATA disk connected to a 3ware RAID
6000/7000/8000 controller card.
smartctl -a -d 3ware,0 /dev/twa0
Examine all SMART data for the first ATA disk connected to a 3ware RAID 9000
controller card.
smartctl -a -d 3ware,0 /dev/twl0
Examine all SMART data for the first SATA (not SAS) disk connected to a 3ware
RAID 9750 controller card.
smartctl -t short -d 3ware,3 /dev/sdb
Start a short self-test on the fourth ATA disk connected to the 3ware RAID
controller card which is the second SCSI device /dev/sdb.
smartctl -t long -d areca,4 /dev/sg2
Start a long self-test on the fourth SATA disk connected to an Areca RAID
controller addressed by /dev/sg2.
smartctl -a -d hpt,1/3 /dev/sda (under Linux)
smartctl -a -d hpt,1/3 /dev/hptrr (under FreeBSD)
Examine all SMART data for the (S)ATA disk directly connected to the third
channel of the first HighPoint RocketRAID controller card.
smartctl -t short -d hpt,1/1/2 /dev/sda (under Linux)
smartctl -t short -d hpt,1/1/2 /dev/hptrr (under FreeBSD)
Start a short self-test on the (S)ATA disk connected to second pmport on the
first channel of the first HighPoint RocketRAID controller card.
smartctl -t select,10-100 -t select,30-300 -t afterselect,on -t pending,45 /dev/hda
Run a selective self-test on LBAs 10 to 100 and 30 to 300. After the these LBAs
have been tested, read-scan the remainder of the disk. If the disk is
power-cycled during the read-scan, resume the scan 45 minutes after power to
the device is restored.
smartctl -a -d cciss,0 /dev/cciss/c0d0
Examine all SMART data for the first SCSI disk connected to a cciss RAID
controller card.
RETURN VALUES¶
The return values of
smartctl are defined by a bitmask. If all is well
with the disk, the return value (exit status) of
smartctl is 0 (all
bits turned off). If a problem occurs, or an error, potential error, or fault
is detected, then a non-zero status is returned. In this case, the eight
different bits in the return value have the following meanings for ATA disks;
some of these values may also be returned for SCSI disks.
- Bit 0:
- Command line did not parse.
- Bit 1:
- Device open failed, device did not return an IDENTIFY
DEVICE structure, or device is in a low-power mode (see ´-n´
option above).
- Bit 2:
- Some SMART command to the disk failed, or there was a
checksum error in a SMART data structure (see ´-b´ option
above).
- Bit 3:
- SMART status check returned "DISK FAILING".
- Bit 4:
- We found prefail Attributes <= threshold.
- Bit 5:
- SMART status check returned "DISK OK" but we
found that some (usage or prefail) Attributes have been <= threshold at
some time in the past.
- Bit 6:
- The device error log contains records of errors.
- Bit 7:
- The device self-test log contains records of errors. [ATA
only] Failed self-tests outdated by a newer successful extended self-test
are ignored.
To test within the shell for whether or not the different bits are turned on
or off, you can use the following type of construction (this is bash
syntax):
smartstat=$(($? & 8))
This looks at only at bit 3 of the exit status $? (since 8=2^3). The
shell variable $smartstat will be nonzero if SMART status check returned
"disk failing" and zero otherwise.
NOTES¶
The TapeAlert log page flags are cleared for the initiator when the page is
read. This means that each alert condition is reported only once by
smartctl for each initiator for each activation of the condition.
AUTHOR¶
Bruce Allen smartmontools-support@lists.sourceforge.net
University of Wisconsin - Milwaukee Physics Department
CONTRIBUTORS¶
The following have made large contributions to smartmontools:
Casper Dik (Solaris SCSI interface)
Christian Franke (Windows interface, C++ redesign, USB support, ...)
Douglas Gilbert (SCSI subsystem)
Guido Guenther (Autoconf/Automake packaging)
Geoffrey Keating (Darwin ATA interface)
Eduard Martinescu (FreeBSD interface)
Fr´ed´eric L. W. Meunier (Web site and Mailing list)
Gabriele Pohl (Web site and Wiki, conversion from CVS to SVN)
Keiji Sawada (Solaris ATA interface)
Manfred Schwarb (Drive database)
Sergey Svishchev (NetBSD interface)
David Snyder and Sergey Svishchev (OpenBSD interface)
Phil Williams (User interface and drive database)
Yuri Dario (OS/2, eComStation interface)
Shengfeng Zhou (Linux/FreeBSD HighPoint RocketRAID interface)
Many other individuals have made smaller contributions and corrections.
CREDITS¶
This code was derived from the smartsuite package, written by Michael Cornwell,
and from the previous UCSC smartsuite package. It extends these to cover ATA-5
disks. This code was originally developed as a Senior Thesis by Michael
Cornwell at the Concurrent Systems Laboratory (now part of the Storage Systems
Research Center), Jack Baskin School of Engineering, University of California,
Santa Cruz.
http://ssrc.soe.ucsc.edu/ .
HOME PAGE FOR SMARTMONTOOLS:¶
Please see the following web site for updates, further documentation, bug
reports and patches:
http://smartmontools.sourceforge.net/
SEE ALSO:¶
smartd(8),
badblocks(8),
ide-smart(8).
REFERENCES FOR SMART¶
An introductory article about smartmontools is
Monitoring Hard Disks
with SMART, by Bruce Allen, Linux Journal, January 2004, pages 74-77. This
is
http://www.linuxjournal.com/article/6983 online.
If you would like to understand better how SMART works, and what it does, a good
place to start is with Sections 4.8 and 6.54 of the first volume of the
´AT Attachment with Packet Interface-7´ (ATA/ATAPI-7) specification
Revision 4b. This documents the SMART functionality which the
smartmontools utilities provide access to. This and other versions of
this Specification are available from the T13 web site
http://www.t13.org/ .
The functioning of SMART was originally defined by the SFF-8035i revision 2 and
the SFF-8055i revision 1.4 specifications. These are publications of the Small
Form Factors (SFF) Committee.
Links to these and other documents may be found on the Links page of the
smartmontools Wiki at
http://sourceforge.net/apps/trac/smartmontools/wiki/Links .
SVN ID OF THIS PAGE:¶
$Id: smartctl.8.in 3320 2011-04-30 20:44:55Z chrfranke $