How to use ATA Secure Erase on ssd

[Rand]

Hi,

While running some performance test I overburdened one of my ssd's which suffers from horrible write speed now;)

So i tried to run ATA Secure Erase to clean it up again but unfortunately i cant can't get it to run.
Has anyone done that under FreeNas?
Alternatively i will use a windows machine and Intel SSD Toolbox but i thought it might work

Trying to set passowrd to run Erase afterwards fails so I cant get any further...

camcontrol security /dev/ada0 -U user -s Erase
pass13: <INTEL SSDSC2MH120A2 PPG4> ATA-8 SATA 3.x device
pass13: 600.000MB/s transfers (SATA 3.x, UDMA6, PIO 8192bytes)
Issuing SECURITY_SET_PASSWORD password='Erase', user='user', mode='high'
camcontrol: ATA SECURITY_SET_PASSWORD failed: 0

 

[cyberjock]

Ok.. one word of warning... Intel SSDs should be erased using the Intel SSD toolbox only.

If you read around there's a lot of people that have had problems using anything except the Intel SSD toolbox. I'm fairly sure it's Windows only, but many people have bricked their SSD while trying to use other things.

To be honest, there's no real need to do a secure erase unless you are planning to sell the drive or something. If you just repartition it and use it the drive will TRIM itself down assuming that TRIM is enabled and functioning with your hardware configuration and OS. All you'll need to do is use the drive like you normally would and in 20 minutes to an hour you should see performance is restored. I used to be more gung-ho about erasing a drive when I was going to reinstall the OS. But since the G2+ drives have TRIM support the "need" for secure erasing a drive is pretty invalid for Intel SSDs except when trying to sell the drive on ebay or something similar.

I'm going to move this to off-topic too since it's not directly related to FreeNAS support.

 

[Rand]

Ok, thx.

I will observer if performance restores itself and else use the Intel tool.
Just wondered why camcontrol didnt work;)

 

[cyberjock]

I don't know to be honest. I've never tried to do it with camcontrol before.

 

[eraser]

Rand,

Were you ever able to secure erase your SSD while booted into FreeNAS? I am looking to do the same thing myself.

 

[eraser]

Hey cool, this seems to work:

Code:

[root@bfd] ~# camcontrol security da4 -s Erase -e Erase
pass4: <Crucial CT120M500SSD1 MU05> ATA-9 SATA 3.x device
pass4: 600.000MB/s transfers, Command Queueing Enabled
 
You are about to ERASE ALL DATA from the following device:
pass4,da4: <Crucial CT120M500SSD1 MU05> ATA-9 SATA 3.x device
 
Are you SURE you want to ERASE ALL DATA? (yes/no) yes
Issuing SECURITY_SET_PASSWORD password='Erase', user='master', mode='high'
Issuing SECURITY_ERASE_PREPARE
Issuing SECURITY_ERASE_UNIT password='Erase', user='master'
 
Erase Complete
[root@bfd] ~# 

google search terms: freebsd secure erase SSD freenas camcontrol

 

[Rand]

I believe I moved it to a windows system as per CJs warning (Intel ssd) but glad you got it running:)