Hard Drive Burn-In Testing - Discussion Thread

[Ericloewe]

I have Putty setup to run SSH from here on out.

Good, but not the issue here: If the SSH connection fails, you're back to square one. You should use tmux to spawn the required number of terminal sessions and, if needed, return to them with tmux attach (I think it's attach).

 

[pratman2]

You should use tmux to spawn the required number of terminal sessions.

Thanks. I used "tmux" in the GUI Shell as in the tutorial to get everything started. But from the sound of it I guess you are referring to a separate program called "tmux"? I have been a little confused on that part throughout this tutorial post. It's mentioned in the steps, but not as a standalone program to run, qwertymodo just gives the command line to run which I did in the GUI.

If the standalone program is what is recommended, can someone revise the intro to this post? It looks like I'm not the only one who has been confused.

Didn't see anything on how to setup tmux in the forum, It looks like you have to have other apps to get it going since it's not an executable...on to Google...

 

[Ericloewe]

tmux is a command line program. Most stuff you invoke from the command line is. ;)

 

[pratman2]

tmux is a command line program. Most stuff you invoke from the command line is. ;)

Ok, so the manual says that tmux is included in freeNAS, that makes sense. Step 5 of this tutorial is the command to start tmux, which I did.

So for this tutorial the only difference between SSH and the Shell is that if SSH closes out in the middle of a task, so does the task that is running on the drive. If the Shell running tmux closes out in the middle of a task, you have to wait for the task to finish before you can get back into the Shell and hit "tmux attach" to rejoin the session.

Do I have this right?

 

[Bidule0hm]

It's already installed, you don't need to copy any file to use it.

 

[rogerh]

Ok, so the manual says that tmux is included in freeNAS, that makes sense. Step 5 of this tutorial is the command to start tmux, which I did.

So for this tutorial the only difference between SSH and the Shell is that if SSH closes out in the middle of a task, so does the task that is running on the drive. If the Shell running tmux closes out in the middle of a task, you have to wait for the task to finish before you can get back into the Shell and hit "tmux attach" to rejoin the session.

Do I have this right?

I don't think so. You can connect to a shell via SSH anytime, and several of them if you wish. What tmux can do is re-display the running task (before it has finished) in one of the SSH sessions. The task is still running attached to a tmux instance but you need a shell session being displayed to see its progress.

 

[Ericloewe]

You can do tmux attach at any time, as long as tmux is running in the background. It'll find the tmux session and display whatever is to be displayed.

 

[adamjs83]

Forgive me if there is an obvious answer to this question but suppose you are going to run these tests on multiple identical disks say 6 or 8 and one or more the disks is determined to need RMA, how do you determine which physical disk is the one that needs to be replaced?

 

[Robert Trevellyan]

how do you determine which physical disk is the one that needs to be replaced?

If I were doing it on an Ubuntu box, I would use Disk Utility to match the device name with its serial number. You could go through a similar process at the command-line of any *nix distro (including FreeNAS) using smartctl.

 

[pratman2]

Forgive me if there is an obvious answer to this question but suppose you are going to run these tests on multiple identical disks say 6 or 8 and one or more the disks is determined to need RMA, how do you determine which physical disk is the one that needs to be replaced?

You'll need to figure out the serial of the bad disk for sure. If you follow this tutorial, you have to type in the disk name into the terminal, example ada1, ada2, ada3 etc in order to run the tests. Take note of which disk name you typed in with the test that shows issues.

Then, in the web interface (GUI), go to [Storage] and then [View Disks]. There you will see the first column with the disk name and the second with the drive's serial number. Then all you have to do is open your server and find the drive with that serial number on the label.

 

[Vivan]

If my drives all pass these tests, how confident can I be that they're okay, especially if they've all been shipped in dubious packaging?

 

[Robert Trevellyan]

dubious packaging

The SMART conveyance test is supposed to check for damage in transit. If everything passed then you should be fine.

 

[Vivan]

The SMART conveyance test is supposed to check for damage in transit. If everything passed then you should be fine.

That's just what I wanted to know - thank you :). Ordered 8 6TB drives and I hear amazon logistics are particularly bad...

 

[Robert Trevellyan]

I hear amazon logistics are particularly bad

I bought my WD Reds from Amazon because for a long time they claimed to use "WD certified packaging". I can't find that claim on their website any more, but my drives were properly packaged.

 

[Vivan]

I bought my WD Reds from Amazon because for a long time they claimed to use "WD certified packaging". I can't find that claim on their website any more, but my drives were properly packaged.

I've seen lots of horror stories of it coming in just an anti-static bag (btw this is amazon UK). Regardless, it looks like they've left the packages on my unsecured doorstep.... great.

 

[Robert Trevellyan]

horror stories of it coming in just an anti-static bag

Sold by Amazon, or from a marketplace seller and fulfilled by Amazon? There's a big difference.

 

[pratman2]

Trying to run the burn in test using SSH method with Putty. I can log in under my user with Putty, but get the following message for every test I try to run. Nothing will work, any ideas?
Is this a permissions issue?

I am running FreeNAS 9.3

/dev/xpt0 control device couldn't opened: Permission denied
Unable to get CAM device list
/dev/ada0: Unable to detect device type
Please specify device type with the -d option.


Thanks for any help

 

[okgunguy]

Pratman2, just go into Servies, SSH (wrench), and tick Login With Root and Allow Password. Then you can just enter Root and its PW and you're in! Sorry, should have read your post better. Are you logged in as Root? If it can't find ada0, then are you sure that's the name of the disc? Could it be da0?

 

[ShimadaRiku]

I have a couple old used 4TB drives from another machine. Is it still advised to run badblocks on them even if SMART data returns a clean bill of health before adding it to a pool?

 

[Robert Trevellyan]

I have a couple old used 4TB drives from another machine. Is it still advised to run badblocks on them even if SMART data returns a clean bill of health before adding it to a pool?

Yes. You get the benefit of verifying the condition of the drives and completely wiping them at the same time.