Hard drive failing

English Hardware
#1

I have been losing some mp3 files, and at least one became a folder somehow! In there I found mp3 files from another folder*, *and those are copies of mp3 files. To be safe, I have a new drive on order. On this failing drive (pretty sure it’s failing), I have a separate data partition, mounted to /data, and I set permissions for “users”, using the superuser version of Dolphin. Could it be that I did something wrong there, and the drive is really ok? I should mention that a long time ago my motherboard gave me the dreaded SMART “backup and replace” warning. I backed up, but didn’t replace, like a real fool. So, yeah, likely it’s a doorstop now. Still works, but lost files, so no good.

So, today I ran

smartctl -a /dev/sda

and I got this


linux-5sff:~ # smartctl -a /dev/sda
smartctl 6.0 2012-10-10 r3643 [x86_64-linux-3.7.10-1.28-desktop] (SUSE RPM)
Copyright (C) 2002-12, Bruce Allen, Christian Franke, www.smartmontools.org

=== START OF INFORMATION SECTION ===
Model Family:     Seagate Barracuda Green (AF)
Device Model:     ST2000DL003-9VT166
Serial Number:    5YD6GFWT
LU WWN Device Id: 5 000c50 0462b7d6f
Firmware Version: CC3C
User Capacity:    2,000,398,934,016 bytes [2.00 TB]
Sector Sizes:     512 bytes logical, 4096 bytes physical
Rotation Rate:    5900 rpm
Device is:        In smartctl database [for details use: -P show]
ATA Version is:   ATA8-ACS T13/1699-D revision 4
SATA Version is:  SATA 3.0, 6.0 Gb/s (current: 3.0 Gb/s)
Local Time is:    Mon Mar 24 20:59:29 2014 EDT

==> WARNING: A firmware update for this drive may be available,
see the following Seagate web pages:
http://knowledge.seagate.com/articles/en_US/FAQ/207931en
http://knowledge.seagate.com/articles/en_US/FAQ/218171en

SMART support is: Available - device has SMART capability.
SMART support is: Enabled

=== START OF READ SMART DATA SECTION ===
SMART overall-health self-assessment test result: PASSED
See vendor-specific Attribute list for marginal Attributes.

General SMART Values:
Offline data collection status:  (0x82) Offline data collection activity
                                        was completed without error.
                                        Auto Offline Data Collection: Enabled.
Self-test execution status:      (   0) The previous self-test routine completed
                                        without error or no self-test has ever 
                                        been run.
Total time to complete Offline 
data collection:                (  623) seconds.
Offline data collection
capabilities:                    (0x7b) SMART execute Offline immediate.
                                        Auto Offline data collection on/off support.
                                        Suspend Offline collection upon new
                                        command.
                                        Offline surface scan supported.
                                        Self-test supported.
                                        Conveyance Self-test supported.
                                        Selective Self-test supported.
SMART capabilities:            (0x0003) Saves SMART data before entering
                                        power-saving mode.
                                        Supports SMART auto save timer.
Error logging capability:        (0x01) Error logging supported.
                                        General Purpose Logging supported.
Short self-test routine 
recommended polling time:        (   1) minutes.
Extended self-test routine
recommended polling time:        ( 348) minutes.
Conveyance self-test routine
recommended polling time:        (   2) minutes.
SCT capabilities:              (0x30b7) SCT Status supported.
                                        SCT Feature Control supported.
                                        SCT Data Table supported.

SMART Attributes Data Structure revision number: 10
Vendor Specific SMART Attributes with Thresholds:
ID# ATTRIBUTE_NAME          FLAG     VALUE WORST THRESH TYPE      UPDATED  WHEN_FAILED RAW_VALUE
  1 Raw_Read_Error_Rate     0x000f   103   099   006    Pre-fail  Always       -       1252272
  3 Spin_Up_Time            0x0003   092   092   000    Pre-fail  Always       -       0
  4 Start_Stop_Count        0x0032   099   099   020    Old_age   Always       -       1034
  5 Reallocated_Sector_Ct   0x0033   100   100   036    Pre-fail  Always       -       0
  7 Seek_Error_Rate         0x000f   039   030   030    Pre-fail  Always   In_the_past 23798461240781
  9 Power_On_Hours          0x0032   091   091   000    Old_age   Always       -       8182
 10 Spin_Retry_Count        0x0013   100   100   097    Pre-fail  Always       -       0
 12 Power_Cycle_Count       0x0032   099   099   020    Old_age   Always       -       1038
183 Runtime_Bad_Block       0x0032   100   100   000    Old_age   Always       -       0
184 End-to-End_Error        0x0032   100   100   099    Old_age   Always       -       0
187 Reported_Uncorrect      0x0032   100   100   000    Old_age   Always       -       0
188 Command_Timeout         0x0032   100   097   000    Old_age   Always       -       4295032958
189 High_Fly_Writes         0x003a   100   100   000    Old_age   Always       -       0
190 Airflow_Temperature_Cel 0x0022   069   061   045    Old_age   Always       -       31 (Min/Max 20/32)
191 G-Sense_Error_Rate      0x0032   100   100   000    Old_age   Always       -       0
192 Power-Off_Retract_Count 0x0032   100   100   000    Old_age   Always       -       24
193 Load_Cycle_Count        0x0032   100   100   000    Old_age   Always       -       1037
194 Temperature_Celsius     0x0022   031   040   000    Old_age   Always       -       31 (0 16 0 0 0)
195 Hardware_ECC_Recovered  0x001a   037   013   000    Old_age   Always       -       1252272
197 Current_Pending_Sector  0x0012   100   100   000    Old_age   Always       -       0
198 Offline_Uncorrectable   0x0010   100   100   000    Old_age   Offline      -       0
199 UDMA_CRC_Error_Count    0x003e   200   200   000    Old_age   Always       -       0
240 Head_Flying_Hours       0x0000   100   253   000    Old_age   Offline      -       280057637511214
241 Total_LBAs_Written      0x0000   100   253   000    Old_age   Offline      -       2058100592
242 Total_LBAs_Read         0x0000   100   253   000    Old_age   Offline      -       358157636

SMART Error Log Version: 1
No Errors Logged

SMART Self-test log structure revision number 1
Num  Test_Description    Status                  Remaining  LifeTime(hours)  LBA_of_first_error
# 1  Short offline       Completed without error       00%       356         -
# 2  Short offline       Aborted by host               90%       356         -
# 3  Short offline       Completed without error       00%       356         -

SMART Selective self-test log data structure revision number 1
 SPAN  MIN_LBA  MAX_LBA  CURRENT_TEST_STATUS
    1        0        0  Not_testing
    2        0        0  Not_testing
    3        0        0  Not_testing
    4        0        0  Not_testing
    5        0        0  Not_testing
Selective self-test flags (0x0):
  After scanning selected spans, do NOT read-scan remainder of disk.
If Selective self-test is pending on power-up, resume after 0 minute delay.

I don’t see anything about reallocating sectors, I do see this

  7 Seek_Error_Rate         0x000f   039   030   030    Pre-fail  Always   In_the_past 23798461240781

I probably know the answer already, but can this be saved by zeroing it or something?

Maybe the problem is this :slight_smile:

Model Family:     Seagate Barracuda Green (AF)
#2

I see no indication in the SMART data of a drive health issue.

Reallocated sectors, pending sectors, and global health all look fine and the drive has 8182 hours (well within life expectancy).

Some SMART attributes (like Seek_Error_Rate) have vendor implementations which can make deciphering them challenging. But usually critical drive issues will eventually show up in reallocated sectors, or failed SMART tests.

The issue you are seeing may be entirely file system related, independent of drive health.

As for “one became a folder somehow! In there I found mp3 files from another folder, and those are copies of mp3 files” **is it possible this occurred accidentally or from some program (Amarok?) “reorganizing” things?

#3

On 2014-03-25 02:16, HighBloodSugar wrote:

> I don’t see anything about reallocating sectors, I do see this
>
>
> Code:
> --------------------
> 7 Seek_Error_Rate 0x000f 039 030 030 Pre-fail Always In_the_past 23798461240781
> --------------------

It is getting near the “THRESH” value, yes.

>
>
> I probably know the answer already, but can this be saved by zeroing it
> or something?

No, just run the short and long tests first.

But zeroing it and doing the long test is something I like :slight_smile:

> Maybe the problem is this :slight_smile:
>
>
> Code:
> --------------------
> Model Family: Seagate Barracuda Green (AF)
> --------------------

Dunno.

If I remember correctly, one of the features of the green disks is that
they park the heads often. I think it is the parking count, but I can
not identify a parameter for it.

–
Cheers / Saludos,

Carlos E. R.
(from 13.1 x86_64 “Bottle” at Telcontar)

#4

I don’t use amarok, I only use Audacious. Well, wait - I did use EasyTag once or twice someplace, maybe it was that. I usually only use it on my USB MP3 player, to make playlists, but I remember doing something on the hard drive. Wish I could remember what. Come to think of it, I’ve only noticed problems with the mp3 files, though I haven’t really investigated further. Maybe I’ll just restore the mp3 folders from backups and see how it goes. Anyway, should I have set the permissions for the added partition in Yast instead? A few days ago it had permissions set to “root”, that’s not how I had it. It changed it back to “users”, using Dolphin. I set up this partition when installing openSuse 12.3, if that makes a difference. The idea was to leave my data files there when I move to openSuse 13.1, and so on. Would save many hours putting my mp3 and home video collections back each time.

#5

Tomorrow I’ll delete the mp3 folders, restore them from backups, and set the permissions to read-only just to be safe. Then I’ll see how it goes. Still wondering why the permissions for this partition changed to “root”. I set it back to “users”, seems ok so far… Anyway, this is mostly great news! If it goes as hoped, the drive I ordered will be used in a USB enclosure for an alternate backup. Makes a convenient way to restore files, but I still have DVD+R backups just in case. And I won’t have to reinstall everything, that will make me very happy! Thanks for the help, I’ll report back if I still have weird problems (with the hard drive I mean:))