Bad luck or bad configuration? Guidance needed with repetitive SMART error Hard drive failure...

[Smpd_77]

I have recently built a FreeNas (converting a media centre PC and using its components) and adding the NAS drives. I am new to FreeNas and I wanted to make this a media centre NAS – this is my first build.

Core components are;

Fractal Design Node 304 Mini ITX Case

Thermaltake Litepower 650W PSU

MSI B450I GAMING PLUS AC AM4 DDR4 mITX Motherboard

ADATA XPG SX8200 Pro 256GB M.2 Gaming Solid State Drive (SSD)

AMD Ryzen 5 1600 6 Core AM4 CPU/Processor

Corsair Vengeance LPX 32GB (2 x 16GB) DDR4 2400 DIMM Memory

Gigabyte GeForce GTX 1050 Ti OC 4GB Graphics Card

Toshiba N300 8TB High-Reliability NAS Hard Drive x4

Everything seemed to be going fine on the system and I started to copy data to it and then around 48 hrs in I had two critical errors show on one of the drives.

Device: /dev/ada1, FAILED SMART self-check. BACK UP DATA NOW!.

and

Device: /dev/ada1, Failed SMART usage Attribute: 7 Seek_Error_Rate..

I called the supplier and explained, and they agreed that the drive was faulty and to return the drive, sending about 10 days later a replacement drive (same as before). I put the drive in (I had scrubbed and created the pool from new and again 48 hrs later the same thing occurred on the replacement drive that was sent.

I am now in the process of retuning that drive – as agreed with the supplier.

In the meantime I ordered the same drive from Amazon as it was next day – (don’t hold it against me!) and thinking I may have a dodgy sata cable I replaced it and swapped it over with one of the other drives that has been working fine.

This time I off lined the drive and replaced as per the FreeNas instructions, re-silvered and off I went – copying my data over to the NAS. Again 48 hrs later the drive is showing as failed – same smart errors and on the replaced disk only?

Am I doing something wrong? I believe the M.2 and the x 4 SATA drives run on separate PCI lanes on this motherboard so one shouldn’t knock the other out, but I could be wrong here – could this be my issue or am I just having bad luck with the drives?

Any help or guidance would be greatly appreciated!

 

[Redcoat]

Welcome to the forums!

Sorry that it's a negative experience that has heralded your arrival here...

There have been reports of similar failures on these drives here before - take a look at this thread https://www.truenas.com/community/threads/new-build-s-m-a-r-t-seek_error_rate-failure.87755/#post-608133 and the linked one - then do a search here and look at the history.

At least one thing I would suggest is to burn in the drives before you put them in service - that will, at least to some degree, address the infant mortality question. You'll find guides here on drive check and burn-in. I suggest you look for Dr, Fester's Guide in the resources here - there's a comprehensive how-to in there on setting up a new system.

Good luck to you to find a comfortable resolution!

 

[Johnnie Black]

That error is quite common with those drives, most times it goes away by itself after a reboot or power cycle, likely a firmware issue.

 

[Smpd_77]

Welcome to the forums!

Sorry that it's a negative experience that has heralded your arrival here...

There have been reports of similar failures on these drives here before - take a look at this thread https://www.truenas.com/community/threads/new-build-s-m-a-r-t-seek_error_rate-failure.87755/#post-608133 and the linked one - then do a search here and look at the history.

At least one thing I would suggest is to burn in the drives before you put them in service - that will, at least to some degree, address the infant mortality question. You'll find guides here on drive check and burn-in. I suggest you look for Dr, Fester's Guide in the resources here - there's a comprehensive how-to in there on setting up a new system.

Good luck to you to find a comfortable resolution!

Many thanks Redcoat for your response - I will indeed follow up on the threads and the articles on burning in drives...Much appreciate your help. I am currently running a smart scan (long) on the drive to see what it throws up.

 

[Smpd_77]

That error is quite common with those drives, most times it goes away by itself after a reboot or power cycle, likely a firmware issue.

Many thanks Johnnie - would the firmware be on the drive itself as the other three are running fine? I've dismissed the errors and ma running a long health check/scan on the drive to see if it throws up any further errors/information. My pool is saying is in an ok state - not degraded...
Is there a way to update the firmware on the drive whilst its still in the NAS?

 

[Redcoat]

what it throws up.

Good - but I hope the result is more pleasant than conjured up by your choice of words!

If you did the search I suggested you may have seen a post by @Patrick M. Hausen speaking about N300's as his preference for a personal project. Everything I have observed about him suggests conservatism and a high degree of technical analysis. I've tweaked him here in the hope that he might be able give you some words of wisdom on these Toshiba drives. I don't know anything personally. just recalled the earlier postings.

 

[Johnnie Black]

Is there a way to update the firmware on the drive whilst its still in the NAS?

If Toshiba releases an update you can usually do it with a DOS boot flash, though this issue is common it still only affects a small percentage of disks, so it could be a while, if it's indeed a firmware issue.