Hi All: Is there a utility available that will allow for the dump/display of the bad track table of a SCSI drive. We had this capability on SCO OSR5 but I have not been able to locate anything similar for Linux. The closest I have found is the badblocks utility that is part of the e2fsprogs package but this appears to only test for bad blocks not display the current bad block table contents. I have done quite a bit of searching with Google but either it does not exist or (more than likely) I am using the wrong search parameters. TIA Regards, Hugh -- Hugh E Cruickshank, Forward Software, www.forward-software.com
on 12/5/2007 12:13 PM Hugh E Cruickshank spake the following:> Hi All: > > Is there a utility available that will allow for the dump/display of > the bad track table of a SCSI drive. We had this capability on SCO > OSR5 but I have not been able to locate anything similar for Linux. > The closest I have found is the badblocks utility that is part of the > e2fsprogs package but this appears to only test for bad blocks not > display the current bad block table contents. > > I have done quite a bit of searching with Google but either it does > not exist or (more than likely) I am using the wrong search parameters. > > TIA > > Regards, Hugh >Don't most modern drives cover up the bad blocks with controller logic and spare block substitutions? -- MailScanner is like deodorant... You hope everybody uses it, and you notice quickly if they don't!!!!
Google 'sdparam' -Ross -----Original Message----- From: centos-bounces at centos.org <centos-bounces at centos.org> To: CentOS mailing list <centos at centos.org> Sent: Wed Dec 05 18:44:08 2007 Subject: RE: [CentOS] Re: SCSI bad block table display From: Scott Silva Sent: December 5, 2007 15:09> > on 12/5/2007 12:13 PM Hugh E Cruickshank spake the following: > > Hi All: > > > > Is there a utility available that will allow for the dump/display of > > the bad track table of a SCSI drive. We had this capability on SCO > > OSR5 but I have not been able to locate anything similar for Linux. > > The closest I have found is the badblocks utility that is part of the > > e2fsprogs package but this appears to only test for bad blocks not > > display the current bad block table contents. > > > > I have done quite a bit of searching with Google but either it does > > not exist or (more than likely) I am using the wrong search parameters. > > > > TIA > > > > Regards, Hugh > > > Don't most modern drives cover up the bad blocks with controller > logic and > spare block substitutions? >All SCSI drives do this but what I am trying to do is display the contents of this "bad block" table. I have some suspect drives that had errors report but format fine at the controller level. I would like to see how many bad blocks the format encountered and remapped. If there are a large number of these then I do not want to use the drives in any critical applications. If the number is small then I will assume that the drive is basically fine to use and that the errors were localized. Since I posted my original inquiry I have discovered that some of the drive manufacturers have T&D utilities that might allow me to get at this information. The main problem here is that they tend to be Windows based which means that I will need to setup a Windows system just to test the drives. I would rather test them in the systems that the will be running in (one is CentOS 4.5 and one is RHEL3). Seagate does have an older utility that supposedly will run at the Linux CLI (their terminology) which I will be trying out. Regards, Hugh -- Hugh E Cruickshank, Forward Software, www.forward-software.com _______________________________________________ CentOS mailing list CentOS at centos.org http://lists.centos.org/mailman/listinfo/centos ______________________________________________________________________ This e-mail, and any attachments thereto, is intended only for use by the addressee(s) named herein and may contain legally privileged and/or confidential information. If you are not the intended recipient of this e-mail, you are hereby notified that any dissemination, distribution or copying of this e-mail, and any attachments thereto, is strictly prohibited. If you have received this e-mail in error, please immediately notify the sender and permanently delete the original and any copy or printout thereof. -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: <http://lists.centos.org/pipermail/centos/attachments/20071205/5cb34de2/attachment-0003.html>
From: Ross S. W. Walker Sent: December 5, 2007 15:49> > Google 'sdparam' >Thanks. While that seems to be on the right track it does not appear to dump/display the bad block table. hec
Well it's not a clearly defined option, but it allows you to request all kinds of SCSI VPD pages from the disks and controllers, I was able to get a dump once don't remember the vpd page id I used to get it though, but I think it was an example in the man page... -Ross -----Original Message----- From: centos-bounces at centos.org <centos-bounces at centos.org> To: CentOS mailing list <centos at centos.org> Sent: Wed Dec 05 19:21:14 2007 Subject: RE: [CentOS] Re: SCSI bad block table display From: Ross S. W. Walker Sent: December 5, 2007 15:49> > Google 'sdparam' >Thanks. While that seems to be on the right track it does not appear to dump/display the bad block table. hec _______________________________________________ CentOS mailing list CentOS at centos.org http://lists.centos.org/mailman/listinfo/centos ______________________________________________________________________ This e-mail, and any attachments thereto, is intended only for use by the addressee(s) named herein and may contain legally privileged and/or confidential information. If you are not the intended recipient of this e-mail, you are hereby notified that any dissemination, distribution or copying of this e-mail, and any attachments thereto, is strictly prohibited. If you have received this e-mail in error, please immediately notify the sender and permanently delete the original and any copy or printout thereof. -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: <http://lists.centos.org/pipermail/centos/attachments/20071205/72745c29/attachment-0003.html>
From: Ross S. W. Walker Sent: December 5, 2007 16:28> > Well it's not a clearly defined option, but it allows you to request > all kinds of SCSI VPD pages from the disks and controllers, I was > able to get a dump once don't remember the vpd page id I used to get > it though, but I think it was an example in the man page... >Thanks. I will definitely take a closer look at this utility. Regards, Hugh -- Hugh E Cruickshank, Forward Software, www.forward-software.com
Hugh E Cruickshank wrote:> Hi All: > > Is there a utility available that will allow for the dump/display of > the bad track table of a SCSI drive. We had this capability on SCO > OSR5 but I have not been able to locate anything similar for Linux. > The closest I have found is the badblocks utility that is part of the > e2fsprogs package but this appears to only test for bad blocks not > display the current bad block table contents. > > I have done quite a bit of searching with Google but either it does > not exist or (more than likely) I am using the wrong search parameters. > > TIA > > Regards, Hugh > >Hello, If you are looking for the table which badblocks builds then you should use dumpe2fs (for ext2/3 filesystem). man dumpe2fs DUMPE2FS(8) DUMPE2FS(8) NAME dumpe2fs - dump ext2/ext3 filesystem information SYNOPSIS dumpe2fs [ -bfhixV ] [ -ob superblock ] [ -oB blocksize ] device DESCRIPTION dumpe2fs prints the super block and blocks group information for the filesystem present on device. dumpe2fs is similar to Berkeley?s dumpfs program for the BSD Fast File System. OPTIONS -b print the blocks which are reserved as bad in the filesystem. Regards, Lec