smartctl attributes not displayed for SAS drives?

[Stilez]

I've tried to solve this via Google but not had any luck.

The baseboard is Supermicro X10 Xeon and the SAS drives are connected via two LSI 9211 HBAs.

When I run `smartctl -a /dev/XXX`, I get detailed attribute data for SATA HDDs only. I know that SCSI/SAS, and therefore smartctl, didn't provide SMART data some years back, but AFAIK those days are long past, and both these specific drives and smartctl seem to have included smart handling for these drives for quite a long time. The drives are new and smartctl reports that SMART support is present and enabled. I've tried hinting with -d test which reports type "scsi" correctly, and tried hinting with that type explicitly, but no luck so far. I've added a sample output at the end of this post.

Can I get detailed SMART attributes for these drives some way? Would updating smartctl manually help, if that's the issue?

I also don't fully understand the information at the very end. Why does it say there haven't been any self-tests logged yet (although a few lines before implies that self tests are running periodically), where would I find details for the "Non-medium error count: 3", and is "global logging target" needed for these?


Sample output
# smartctl -a /dev/da5

Code:

smartctl 6.5 2016-05-07 r4318 [FreeBSD 11.1-STABLE amd64] (local build)
Copyright (C) 2002-16, Bruce Allen, Christian Franke, www.smartmontools.org

=== START OF INFORMATION SECTION ===
Vendor:			   SEAGATE
Product:			  ST8000NM0075
Revision:			 E002
Compliance:		   SPC-4
User Capacity:		8,001,563,222,016 bytes [8.00 TB]
Logical block size:   512 bytes
Physical block size:  4096 bytes
LU is fully provisioned
Rotation Rate:		7200 rpm
Form Factor:		  3.5 inches
Logical Unit id:	  ********
Serial number:		********
Device type:		  disk
Transport protocol:   SAS (SPL-3)
Local Time is:		Mon Jan 22 10:46:18 2018 GMT
SMART support is:	 Available - device has SMART capability.								   <====================
SMART support is:	 Enabled																	<====================
Temperature Warning:  Enabled

=== START OF READ SMART DATA SECTION ===
SMART Health Status: OK

Current Drive Temperature:	 33 C
Drive Trip Temperature:		60 C

Manufactured in week 25 of year 2017
Specified cycle count over device lifetime:  10000
Accumulated start-stop cycles:  118
Specified load-unload count over device lifetime:  300000
Accumulated load-unload cycles:  5021
Elements in grown defect list: 0

Vendor (Seagate) cache information
  Blocks sent to initiator = 46250176
  Blocks received from initiator = 561488
  Blocks read from cache and sent to initiator = 128257
  Number of read and write commands whose size <= segment size = 77199
  Number of read and write commands whose size > segment size = 17

Vendor (Seagate/Hitachi) factory information
  number of hours powered up = 1364.37
  number of minutes until next internal SMART test = 58

Error counter log:
		   Errors Corrected by		   Total   Correction	 Gigabytes	Total
			   ECC		  rereads/	errors   algorithm	  processed	uncorrected
		   fast | delayed   rewrites  corrected  invocations   [10^9 bytes]  errors
read:   11577718		0		 0  11577718		  0		 23.680		   0
write:		 0		0		 0		 0		  0		  0.307		   0

Non-medium error count:		3


[GLTSD (Global Logging Target Save Disable) set. Enable Save with '-S on']
No self-tests have been logged

 

[Chris Moore]

The report from SAS drives has been less than desired for a long time. I don't know if it can be improved because the drive does not appear to log the same kind of information.

Sent from my SAMSUNG-SGH-I537 using Tapatalk

 

[Johnnie Black]

That's a typical SAS SMART output, they don't have ATA like SMART attributes, from the smartmontools FAQ:

SCSI/SAS and NVMe drives do not provide ATA/SATA-like SMART Attributes. Therefore the drive database does not contain any entries for these drives. This may change in the future as some drives provide similar info via vendor specific commands (see ticket #870).

https://www.smartmontools.org/wiki/FAQ

 

[Stilez]

The report from SAS drives has been less than desired for a long time. I don't know if it can be improved because the drive does not appear to log the same kind of information.

That's a typical SAS SMART output, they don't have ATA like SMART attributes

Thanks. I thought that was old outdated information based on the output stating that SMART was supported and enabled (implying it was a drive that now did provide it), and from smartmontools tickets like this which covers a similar ST8000NM model. But on checking the smartmontools database file, I see the models concerned aren't in the database either, so perhaps the problem is "Missing entry" rather than "sw can't read SAS".

I'll try to get it added, and see if that helps.

If not, the other possibility is that I might also need smartmontools 6.6. As it's basically standalone and the output format is pretty stable, I suspect it won't break anything to update it early, so would it be a problem to update that package manually so that I can use the latest version without waiting for FreeNAS 11.2-RELEASE? If so, what would the equivalent command to pkg add http://pkg.freebsd.org/freebsd:11:x86:64/latest/All/package.txz be, to update it?

 

[MrToddsFriends]

If not, the other possibility is that I might also need smartmontools 6.6. As it's basically standalone and the output format is pretty stable, I suspect it won't break anything to update it early, so would it be a problem to update that package manually so that I can use the latest version without waiting for FreeNAS 11.2-RELEASE?

The already available FreeNAS 11.1-U1 has smartmontols 6.6 included.
https://doc.freenas.org/11/intro.html#u1

 

[Chris Moore]

I see the models concerned aren't in the database either, so perhaps the problem is "Missing entry" rather than "sw can't read SAS".

I don't think this is the problem, but you can try it. I think that the SAS drives just don't record the same kind of data as SATA drives, so it is just not possible to get the reports to look the same. I don't like it, because I think the details given by the SATA drive a preferable, but I have not found a way to solve it.

 

[Stilez]

I don't think this is the problem, but you can try it. I think that the SAS drives just don't record the same kind of data as SATA drives, so it is just not possible to get the reports to look the same. I don't like it, because I think the details given by the SATA drive a preferable, but I have not found a way to solve it.

Damn... and yeah....

Thanks for the confirmation, though, which saves me time trying to figure what's needed to do it.

 

[Black Ninja]

I got same results on HGST 15K SAS drive. I also wonder how to interpret SAS drives SMART values ?

I couldn't find any helpful info.

P.S. On many enterprise stuff info is limited/hiden, like you are expected to be born knowing it. :)

 

[Chris Moore]

On many enterprise stuff info is limited/hiden, like you are expected to be born knowing it.

They just want you to pay to go to the certification class. It is all about the company that makes / sells the gear making piles of money.

 

[Black Ninja]

They just want you to pay to go to the certification class. It is all about the company that makes / sells the gear making piles of money.

I think you are right.

The people that have money will/want to make piles of money anyways, but is sad when it comes at the price of the progress. Imagine where internet would be today if it started as proprietary technology of Microsoft or Dell :-(

Anyway, just so I don't drift away, let me say that: If someone knows more about how to interpret sas SMART info , would be great to share it.

 

[Chris Moore]

I think you are right.

The people that have money will/want to make piles of money anyways, but is sad when it comes at the price of the progress. Imagine where internet would be today if it started as proprietary technology of Microsoft or Dell :-(

Anyway, just so I don't drift away, let me say that: If someone knows more about how to interpret sas SMART info , would be great to share it.

What drives are you looking at that are SAS drives?

You might look at this:
https://superuser.com/questions/618736/how-do-i-interpret-smart-data-for-sas-disks

 

[Chris Moore]

There is also this, if you want to look:

https://www.smartmontools.org/browser/trunk/www/smartmontools_scsi.xml

 

[Black Ninja]

What drives are you looking at that are SAS drives?

You might look at this:
https://superuser.com/questions/618736/how-do-i-interpret-smart-data-for-sas-disks

I have some HGST Ultrastar HUC156030CSS200 300GB 15K 128MB, but these are not what I'll be using in next FreeNAS. I'll get some 8-10TB HGST which I would like to be SAS. But that besides the point, I would like to know how to interpret the data that SMART is showing, so I can determine when problems start to occur.


I came across the link you mention , but this : "It's hard to say whether the number of errors you have is worrisome or not ..... You can usually download a utility from the manufacturers website to get extra information."

just don't give me much. Thanks for the effort anyway, but I got this far too. :-(

 

[Chris Moore]

I have some HGST Ultrastar HUC156030CSS200 300GB 15K 128MB, but these are not what I'll be using in next freenas. I'll get some 8-10TB HGST which I would like to be sas. But that besides the point, I would like to know how to interpret the data that SMART is showing, so I can determine when problems start to occur.


I came across the link you mention , but this : "It's hard to say whether the number of errors you have is worrisome or not ..... You can usually download a utility from the manufacturers website to get extra information."

just don't give me much. Thanks for the effort anyway, but I got this far too. :-(

If you are going to spend double the price for a drive to get SAS drives, you must have a good reason for it. I have hundreds of drives in the servers I manage at work and I use SATA drives for them. There really are only a few special cases where SAS drives are worth the extra cost. Do you have a reason for wanting them?

 

[Black Ninja]

If I can find a good deal on SAS I would pay little bit more for the SAS advantages like:
- longer cables (ruining JBOD from external chassis)
- better compatibility with SAS expanders
- the rest of the option that SAS enterprise drives have over sata will be nice: better error recovery, vibration endurance, much more reliable, longer life expectation, higher temp endurance, etc.

But of course if price is double, is not really worth it. (which most of the time is the case)


P.S. I have a sweet tooth for enterprise stuff.:)
Everything is made much better with the goal to take 24/7 beating and still work and outperform any consumer stuff , that are made with the hope they won't be used.

 

[Black Ninja]

Either way I would like to know how to interpret the values they have.

 

[Chris Moore]

But of course if price is double, is not really worth it. (which most of the time is the case)

Let me put it this way. SATA drives give easily readable results, SAS drives don't. Then there is this:
This is the HGST 10TB NAS drive, for $288:
https://www.bhphotovideo.com/c/product/1354329-REG
This is the HGST 10TB SAS drive, for $520:
https://serverpartdeals.com/hgst-ul...as-12gb-s-512e-256mb-cache-3-5-ise-hard-drive

The price isn't exactly double, but I don't think it is worth the extra money. Especially since they don't give SMART results that are easily interpreted.

I am in the process of contracting the purchase (for work) of a new server that will have 60 drives and I am specifying SATA drives for these reasons.

 

[Black Ninja]

I think you are right for the most part.

If capacity is the most important part, price difference is huge. But if we take the price out, just for a moment then there is no other reason to go with sata. SAS protocol is superior in every way.

And here is suggestion, which I think makes more sense:
How about you go to your second vendor (serverpartdeals), and get sata instead. Price difference will negligible , but you'll get much better drive (ultrastar) compared to the consumer one(deskstar/nas).

 

[Chris Moore]

And here is suggestion, which I think makes more sense:

No, I have been doing this long enough that I know there is a time to spend the money on a SAS drive and a time when there is no point in spending the extra money. The SATA drives are more than good enough for bulk storage. I have more than 200 of them running in my corner of the data-center at work and the failure rate is lower than the industry average.

 

[Black Ninja]

Perhaps too long, that you didn't even read what my suggestions was:

How about you go to your second vendor (serverpartdeals), and get sata instead.

I was suggesting that you can get a sata (enterprise) from serverdeals , for the same price you can get a consumer sata (deskstar/nas) from bhphotovideo.