Provided by: smartmontools_7.3-1_amd64 
NAME
smartctl - Control and Monitor Utility for SMART Disks
SYNOPSIS
smartctl [options] device
DESCRIPTION
[This man page is generated for the Linux version of smartmontools. It does not contain
info specific to other platforms.]
smartctl controls the Self-Monitoring, Analysis and Reporting Technology (SMART) system
built into most ATA/SATA and SCSI/SAS hard drives and solid-state drives. The purpose of
SMART is to monitor the reliability of the hard drive and predict drive failures, and to
carry out different types of drive self-tests. smartctl also supports some features not
related to SMART. This version of smartctl is compatible with ACS-3, ACS-2, ATA8-ACS,
ATA/ATAPI-7 and earlier standards (see REFERENCES below).
smartctl also provides support for SCSI tape drives and changers (see TAPE DRIVES below).
The user must specify the device to be controlled or interrogated as the final argument to
smartctl. The command set used by the device is often derived from the device path but
may need help with the '-d' option (for more information see the section on "ATA, SCSI
command sets and SAT" below). Device paths are as follows:
LINUX: Use the forms "/dev/sd[a-z]" for ATA/SATA and SCSI/SAS devices. For SCSI Tape
Drives and Changers use the devices "/dev/nst*" and "/dev/sg*". For disks behind
3ware controllers you may need "/dev/sd[a-z]" or "/dev/twe[0-9]", "/dev/twa[0-9]"
or "/dev/twl[0-9]": see details below. For disks behind HighPoint RocketRAID
controllers you may need "/dev/sd[a-z]". For disks behind Areca SATA RAID
controllers, you need "/dev/sg[2-9]" (note that smartmontools interacts with the
Areca controllers via a SCSI generic device which is different than the SCSI
device used for reading and writing data)! For HP Smart Array RAID controllers,
there are three currently supported drivers: cciss, hpsa, and hpahcisr. For
disks accessed via the cciss driver the device nodes are of the form
"/dev/cciss/c[0-9]d0". For disks accessed via the hpahcisr and hpsa drivers, the
device nodes you need are "/dev/sg[0-9]*". ("lsscsi -g" is helpful in
determining which scsi generic device node corresponds to which device.) Use the
nodes corresponding to the RAID controllers, not the nodes corresponding to
logical drives. See the -d option below, as well. Use the forms
"/dev/nvme[0-9]" (broadcast namespace) or "/dev/nvme[0-9]n[1-9]" (specific
namespace 1-9) for NVMe devices.
if '-' is specified as the device path, smartctl reads and interprets it's own debug
output from standard input. See '-r ataioctl' below for details.
smartctl guesses the device type if possible. If necessary, the '-d' option can be used
to override this guess.
Note that the printed output of smartctl displays most numerical values in base 10
(decimal), but some values are displayed in base 16 (hexadecimal). To distinguish them,
the base 16 values are always displayed with a leading "0x", for example: "0xff". This
man page follows the same convention.
OPTIONS
The options are grouped below into several categories. smartctl will execute the
corresponding commands in the order: INFORMATION, ENABLE/DISABLE, DISPLAY DATA, RUN/ABORT
TESTS.
SHOW INFORMATION OPTIONS:
-h, --help, --usage
Prints a usage message to STDOUT and exits.
-V, --version, --copyright, --license
Prints version, copyright, license, home page and SVN revision information for your
copy of smartctl to STDOUT and then exits.
-i, --info
Prints the device model number, serial number, firmware version, and ATA Standard
version/revision information. Says if the device supports SMART, and if so,
whether SMART support is currently enabled or disabled. If the device supports
Logical Block Address mode (LBA mode) print current user drive capacity in bytes.
(If drive has a user protected area reserved, or is "clipped", this may be smaller
than the potential maximum drive capacity.) Indicates if the drive is in the
smartmontools database (see '-v' options below). If so, the drive model family may
also be printed. If '-n' (see below) is specified, the power mode of the drive is
printed.
[NVMe] For NVMe devices the information is obtained from the Identify Controller
and the Identify Namespace data structure.
--identify[=[w][nvb]]
[ATA only] Prints an annotated table of the IDENTIFY DEVICE data. By default, only
valid words (words not equal to 0x0000 or 0xffff) and nonzero bits and bit fields
are printed. This can be changed by the optional argument which consists of one or
two characters from the set 'wnvb'. The character 'w' enables printing of all 256
words. The character 'n' suppresses printing of bits, 'v' enables printing of all
bits from valid words, 'b' enables printing of all bits. For example
'--identify=n' (valid words, no bits) produces the shortest output and
'--identify=wb' (all words, all bits) produces the longest output.
-a, --all
Prints all SMART information about the disk. For ATA devices this is equivalent to
'-H -i -c -A -l error -l selftest -l selective'
and for SCSI, this is equivalent to
'-H -i -A -l error -l selftest'.
For NVMe, this is equivalent to
'-H -i -c -A -l error'.
Note that for ATA disks this does not enable the non-SMART options and the SMART
options which require support for 48-bit ATA commands.
-x, --xall
Prints all SMART and non-SMART information about the device. For ATA devices this
is equivalent to
'-H -i -g all -g wcreorder -c -A -f brief -l xerror,error -l xselftest,selftest -l
selective -l directory -l scttemp -l scterc -l devstat -l defects -l sataphy'.
and for SCSI disks, this is equivalent to
'-H -i -g all -A -l error -l selftest -l background -l sasphy -l defects -l
env_rep'.
and for SCSI zoned disks, add -l zdevstat
and for SCSI tape drivers and changers, add -l tapedevstat
For NVMe, this is equivalent to
'-H -i -c -A -l error'.
--scan Scans for devices and prints each device name, device type and protocol ([ATA] or
[SCSI]) info. May be used in conjunction with '-d TYPE' to restrict the scan to a
specific TYPE. See also info about platform specific device scan and the
DEVICESCAN directive on smartd(8) man page.
--scan-open
Same as --scan, but also tries to open each device before printing device info.
The device open may change the device type due to autodetection (see also '-d
test').
This option can be used to create a draft smartd.conf file. All options after '--'
are appended to each output line. For example:
smartctl --scan-open -- -a -W 4,45,50 -m admin@work > smartd.conf
Multiple '-d TYPE' options may be specified with '--scan[-open]' to combine the
scan results of more than one TYPE.
-g NAME, --get=NAME
Get non-SMART device settings. See '-s, --set' below for further info.
RUN-TIME BEHAVIOR OPTIONS:
-j, --json[=cgiosuvy]
Enables JSON or YAML output mode.
The output could be modified or enhanced by the optional argument which consists of
one or more characters from the set 'cgiosuvy':
'c': Outputs compact format without extra spaces and newlines. By default, output
is pretty-printed. If used with YAML format, the indentation of arrays is reduced.
'g': Outputs JSON structure as single assignments to allow the usage of grep. Each
assignment reflects the absolute path of a value. The syntax is compatible with
gron:
'json.KEY1[INDEX2].KEY3 = VALUE;'.
'o': Includes the full original plaintext output of smartctl as a JSON array
'smartctl.output[]'.
's': Outputs JSON object elements sorted by key. By default, object elements are
ordered as generated internally.
'v': Enables verbose output of possible unsafe integers. If specified, values
which may exceed JSON safe integer (53-bit) range are always output as a number
(with some 'KEY') and a string ('KEY_s'), regardless of the actual value. Values
which may exceed 64-bit range are also output as a little endian byte array
('KEY_le'). By default, the additional elements are only output if the value
actually exceeds the range.
'y': [NEW EXPERIMENTAL SMARTCTL FEATURE] Outputs in YAML format.
The following two arguments are primarily indented for development:
'i': Includes lines from the plaintext output which print info already implemented
for JSON output. The lines appear as strings with key 'smartctl_NNNN_i'.
'u': Includes lines from the plaintext output which print info still unimplemented
for JSON output. The lines appear as strings with key 'smartctl_NNNN_u'.
-q TYPE, --quietmode=TYPE
Specifies that smartctl should run in one of the quiet modes described here. The
valid arguments to this option are:
errorsonly - only print: For the '-l error' option, if nonzero, the number of
errors recorded in the SMART error log and the power-on time when they occurred;
For the '-l selftest' option, errors recorded in the device self-test log; For the
'-H' option, SMART "disk failing" status or device Attributes (pre-failure or
usage) which failed either now or in the past; For the '-A' option, device
Attributes (pre-failure or usage) which failed either now or in the past.
silent - print no output. The only way to learn about what was found is to use the
exit status of smartctl (see EXIT STATUS below).
noserial - Do not print the serial number of the device.
-d TYPE, --device=TYPE
Specifies the type of the device. The valid arguments to this option are:
auto - attempt to guess the device type from the device name or from controller
type info provided by the operating system or from a matching USB ID entry in the
drive database. This is the default.
test - prints the guessed TYPE, then opens the device and prints the (possibly
changed) TYPE name and then exits without performing any further commands.
ata - the device type is ATA. This prevents smartctl from issuing SCSI commands to
an ATA device.
scsi - the device type is SCSI. This prevents smartctl from issuing ATA commands
to a SCSI device.
nvme[,NSID] - the device type is NVM Express (NVMe). The optional parameter NSID
specifies the namespace id (in hex) passed to the driver. Use 0xffffffff for the
broadcast namespace id. The default for NSID is the namespace id addressed by the
device name.
sat[,auto][,N] - the device type is SCSI to ATA Translation (SAT). This is for ATA
disks that have a SCSI to ATA Translation Layer (SATL) between the disk and the
operating system. SAT defines two ATA PASS THROUGH SCSI commands, one 12 bytes
long and the other 16 bytes long. The default is the 16 byte variant which can be
overridden with either '-d sat,12' or '-d sat,16'.
If '-d sat,auto' is specified, device type SAT (for ATA/SATA disks) is only used if
the SCSI INQUIRY data reports a SATL (VENDOR: "ATA "). Otherwise device type
SCSI (for SCSI/SAS disks) is used.
usbcypress - this device type is for ATA disks that are behind a Cypress USB to
PATA bridge. This will use the ATACB proprietary scsi pass through command. The
default SCSI operation code is 0x24, but although it can be overridden with '-d
usbcypress,0xN', where N is the scsi operation code, you're running the risk of
damage to the device or filesystems on it.
usbjmicron[,p][,x][,PORT] - this device type is for SATA disks that are behind a
JMicron USB to PATA/SATA bridge. The 48-bit ATA commands (required e.g. for '-l
xerror', see below) do not work with all of these bridges and are therefore
disabled by default. These commands can be enabled by '-d usbjmicron,x'. If two
disks are connected to a bridge with two ports, an error message is printed if no
PORT is specified. The port can be specified by '-d usbjmicron[,x],PORT' where
PORT is 0 (master) or 1 (slave). This is not necessary if the device uses a port
multiplier to connect multiple disks to one port. The disks appear under separate
/dev/ice names then. CAUTION: Specifying ',x' for a device which does not support
it results in I/O errors and may disconnect the drive. The same applies if the
specified PORT does not exist or is not connected to a disk.
The Prolific PL2507/3507 USB bridges with older firmware support a pass-through
command similar to JMicron and work with '-d usbjmicron,0'. Newer Prolific
firmware requires a modified command which can be selected by '-d usbjmicron,p'.
Note that this does not yet support the SMART status command.
usbprolific - this device type is for SATA disks that are behind a Prolific
PL2571/2771/2773/2775 USB to SATA bridge.
usbsunplus - this device type is for SATA disks that are behind a SunplusIT USB to
SATA bridge.
sntasmedia - [NEW EXPERIMENTAL SMARTCTL FEATURE] this device type is for NVMe disks
that are behind an ASMedia USB to NVMe bridge.
sntjmicron[,NSID] - this device type is for NVMe disks that are behind a JMicron
USB to NVMe bridge. The optional parameter NSID specifies the namespace id (in
hex) passed to the driver. The default namespace id is the broadcast namespace id
(0xffffffff).
sntrealtek - [NEW EXPERIMENTAL SMARTCTL FEATURE] this device type is for NVMe disks
that are behind a Realtek USB to NVMe bridge.
marvell - [Linux only] interact with SATA disks behind Marvell chip-set controllers
(using the Marvell rather than libata driver).
megaraid,N - [FreeBSD and Linux only] the device consists of one or more SCSI/SAS
disks connected to a MegaRAID controller. The non-negative integer N (in the range
of 0 to 127 inclusive) denotes which disk on the controller is monitored. This
interface will also work for Dell PERC controllers. Use syntax such as:
smartctl -a -d megaraid,2 /dev/sda
smartctl -a -d megaraid,0 /dev/sdb
smartctl -a -d megaraid,0 /dev/bus/0
It is possible to set RAID device name as /dev/bus/N, where N is a SCSI bus number.
The following entry in /proc/devices must exist:
For PERC2/3/4 controllers: megadevN
For PERC5/6 controllers: megaraid_sas_ioctlN
aacraid,H,L,ID - [Linux, Windows and Cygwin only] the device consists of one or
more SCSI/SAS or SATA disks connected to an AacRaid controller. The non-negative
integers H,L,ID (Host number, Lun, ID) denote which disk on the controller is
monitored. Use syntax such as:
smartctl -a -d aacraid,0,0,2 /dev/sda
smartctl -a -d aacraid,1,0,4 /dev/sdb
Option '-d sat,auto+...' is implicitly enabled to detect SATA disks. Use '-d
scsi+aacraid,H,L,ID' to disable it.
On Linux, the following entry in /proc/devices must exist: aac. Character device
nodes /dev/aacH (H=Host number) are created if required.
3ware,N - [FreeBSD and Linux only] the device consists of one or more ATA disks
connected to a 3ware RAID controller. The non-negative integer N (in the range
from 0 to 127 inclusive) denotes which disk on the controller is monitored. Use
syntax such as:
smartctl -a -d 3ware,2 /dev/sda [Linux only]
smartctl -a -d 3ware,0 /dev/twe0
smartctl -a -d 3ware,1 /dev/twa0
smartctl -a -d 3ware,1 /dev/twl0 [Linux only]
smartctl -a -d 3ware,1 /dev/tws0 [FreeBSD only]
The first two forms, which refer to devices /dev/sda-z (deprecated) and
/dev/twe0-15, may be used with 3ware series 6000, 7000, and 8000 series controllers
that use the 3x-xxxx driver. The devices /dev/twa0-15, must be used with 3ware
9000 series controllers, which use the 3w-9xxx driver. The devices /dev/twl0-15
[Linux] or /dev/tws0-15 [FreeBSD] must be used with the 3ware/LSI 9750 series
controllers which use the 3w-sas driver.
Note that if the special character device nodes /dev/tw[ls]?, /dev/twa? and
/dev/twe? do not exist, or exist with the incorrect major or minor numbers,
smartctl will recreate them on the fly.
areca,N - [FreeBSD, Linux, Windows and Cygwin only] the device consists of one or
more SATA disks connected to an Areca SATA RAID controller. The positive integer N
(in the range from 1 to 24 inclusive) denotes which disk on the controller is
monitored. On Linux use syntax such as:
smartctl -a -d areca,2 /dev/sg2
smartctl -a -d areca,3 /dev/sg3
The first line above addresses the second disk on the first Areca RAID controller.
The second line addresses the third disk on the second Areca RAID controller. To
help identify the correct device on Linux, use the command:
cat /proc/scsi/sg/device_hdr /proc/scsi/sg/devices
to show the SCSI generic devices (one per line, starting with /dev/sg0). The
correct SCSI generic devices to address for smartmontools are the ones with the
type field equal to 3. If the incorrect device is addressed, please read the
warning/error messages carefully. They should provide hints about what devices to
use.
Important: the Areca controller must have firmware version 1.46 or later. Lower-
numbered firmware versions will give (harmless) SCSI error messages and no SMART
information.
areca,N/E - [FreeBSD, Linux, Windows and Cygwin only] the device consists of one or
more SATA or SAS disks connected to an Areca SAS RAID controller. The integer N
(range 1 to 128) denotes the channel (slot) and E (range 1 to 8) denotes the
enclosure. Important: This requires Areca SAS controller firmware version 1.51 or
later.
cciss,N - [FreeBSD and Linux only] the device consists of one or more SCSI/SAS or
SATA disks connected to a cciss RAID controller. The non-negative integer N (in
the range from 0 to 15 inclusive) denotes which disk on the controller is
monitored.
Option '-d sat,auto+...' is implicitly enabled to detect SATA disks. Use '-d
scsi+cciss,N' to disable it.
To look at disks behind HP Smart Array controllers, use syntax such as:
smartctl -a -d cciss,0 /dev/cciss/c0d0 (cciss driver under Linux)
smartctl -a -d cciss,0 /dev/sg2 (hpsa or hpahcisr drivers under Linux)
hpt,L/M/N - [FreeBSD and Linux only] the device consists of one or more ATA disks
connected to a HighPoint RocketRAID controller. The integer L is the controller
id, the integer M is the channel number, and the integer N is the PMPort number if
it is available. The allowed values of L are from 1 to 4 inclusive, M are from 1
to 128 inclusive and N from 1 to 4 if PMPort available. And also these values are
limited by the model of the HighPoint RocketRAID controller. Use syntax such as:
smartctl -a -d hpt,1/3 /dev/sda (under Linux)
smartctl -a -d hpt,1/2/3 /dev/sda (under Linux)
Note that the /dev/sda-z form should be the device node which stands for the disks
derived from the HighPoint RocketRAID controllers under Linux and under FreeBSD, it
is the character device which the driver registered (eg, /dev/hptrr, /dev/hptmv6).
intelliprop,N[+TYPE] - the device consists of multiple ATA disks connected to an
Intelliprop controller. The integer N is the port number from 0 to 3 of the ATA
drive to be targeted. The TYPE can be ata(default), sat, or a USB controller
listed above. Note: if a type of ATA does not work, try a type of sat. Use syntax
such as:
smartctl -a -d intelliprop,1 /dev/sda (under Linux)
smartctl -a -d intelliprop,1+sat /dev/sda (under Linux)
WARNING: The disks are selected by write commands to the ATA Device Vendor Specific
Log at address 0xc0. Using this option with other devices may have undesirable
side effects.
jmb39x[-q],N[,sLBA][,force][+TYPE] - [NEW EXPERIMENTAL SMARTCTL FEATURE] the device
consists of multiple SATA disks connected to a JMicron JMB39x RAID port multiplier.
The suffix '-q' selects a slightly different command variant used by some QNAP NAS
devices. The integer N is the port number from 0 to 4.
WARNING: The ATA pass-through commands are issued via READ/WRITE commands to LBA 33
of the RAID volume. Using this option with other devices may overwrite this
sector.
The LBA could be selected in the range 33 (last sector of a GPT) to 62 (last sector
of traditional boot area).
By default, access to the device is refused if the selected sector is not zero
filled. The 'force' flag disables this check.
WARNING: Original sector data is not written back if smartctl is aborted with a
signal.
jms56x,N[,sLBA][,force][+TYPE] - [NEW EXPERIMENTAL SMARTCTL FEATURE] the device
consists of multiple SATA disks connected to a JMicron JMS56x USB to SATA RAID
bridge. See 'jmb39x...' above for valid arguments.
-T TYPE, --tolerance=TYPE
[ATA only] Specifies how tolerant smartctl should be of ATA and SMART command
failures.
The behavior of smartctl depends upon whether the command is "optional" or
"mandatory". Here "mandatory" means "required by the ATA Specification if the
device implements the SMART command set" and "optional" means "not required by the
ATA Specification even if the device implements the SMART command set." The
"mandatory" ATA and SMART commands are: (1) ATA IDENTIFY DEVICE, (2) SMART
ENABLE/DISABLE ATTRIBUTE AUTOSAVE, (3) SMART ENABLE/DISABLE, and (4) SMART RETURN
STATUS.
The valid arguments to this option are:
normal - exit on failure of any mandatory SMART command, and ignore all failures of
optional SMART commands. This is the default. Note that on some devices, issuing
unimplemented optional SMART commands doesn't cause an error. This can result in
misleading smartctl messages such as "Feature X not implemented", followed shortly
by "Feature X: enabled". In most such cases, contrary to the final message,
Feature X is not enabled.
conservative - exit on failure of any optional SMART command.
permissive - ignore failure(s) of mandatory SMART commands. This option may be
given more than once. Each additional use of this option will cause one more
additional failure to be ignored. Note that the use of this option can lead to
messages like "Feature X not supported", followed shortly by "Feature X enable
failed". In a few such cases, contrary to the final message, Feature X is enabled.
verypermissive - equivalent to giving a large number of '-T permissive' options:
ignore failures of any number of mandatory SMART commands. Please see the note
above.
-b TYPE, --badsum=TYPE
[ATA only] Specifies the action smartctl should take if a checksum error is
detected in the: (1) Device Identity Structure, (2) SMART Self-Test Log Structure,
(3) SMART Attribute Value Structure, (4) SMART Attribute Threshold Structure, or
(5) ATA Error Log Structure.
The valid arguments to this option are:
warn - report the incorrect checksum but carry on in spite of it. This is the
default.
exit - exit smartctl.
ignore - continue silently without issuing a warning.
-r TYPE, --report=TYPE
Intended primarily to help smartmontools developers understand the behavior of
smartmontools on non-conforming or poorly conforming hardware. This option reports
details of smartctl transactions with the device. The option can be used multiple
times. When used just once, it shows a record of the ioctl() transactions with the
device. When used more than once, the detail of these ioctl() transactions are
reported in greater detail. The valid arguments to this option are:
ioctl - report all ioctl() transactions.
ataioctl - report only ioctl() transactions with ATA devices.
scsiioctl - report only ioctl() transactions with SCSI devices. Invoking this once
shows the SCSI commands in hex and the corresponding status. Invoking it a second
time adds a hex listing of the first 64 bytes of data send to, or received from the
device.
nvmeioctl - report only ioctl() transactions with NVMe devices.
Any argument may include a positive integer to specify the level of detail that
should be reported. The argument should be followed by a comma then the integer
with no spaces. For example, ataioctl,2 The default level is 1, so '-r ataioctl,1'
and '-r ataioctl' are equivalent.
For testing purposes, the output of '-r ataioctl,2' can later be parsed by smartctl
itself if '-' is used as device path argument. The ATA command input parameters,
sector data and return values are reconstructed from the debug report read from
stdin. Then smartctl internally simulates an ATA device with the same behaviour.
This is does not work for SCSI devices yet.
-n POWERMODE[,STATUS[,STATUS2]], --nocheck=POWERMODE[,STATUS[,STATUS2]]
[ATA] [SCSI: NEW EXPERIMENTAL SMARTCTL FEATURE] Specifies if smartctl should exit
before performing any checks when the device is in a low-power mode. It may be
used to prevent a disk from being spun-up by smartctl. The power mode is ignored
by default.
Note: If this option is used it may also be necessary to specify the device type
with the '-d' option. Otherwise the device may spin up due to commands issued
during device type autodetection.
By default, exit status 2 is returned if the device is in one of the specified low-
power modes. This status is also returned if the device open or identification
failed (see EXIT STATUS below). The optional STATUS parameter allows one to
override this default. STATUS is an integer in the range from 0 to 255 inclusive.
For example use '-n standby,0' to return success if a device is in SLEEP or STANDBY
mode. Use '-n standby,3' to return a unique exit status in this case.
The valid arguments to this option are:
never - check the device always, but print the power mode if '-i' is specified.
sleep[,STATUS[,STATUS2]] - check the device unless it is in SLEEP mode.
standby[,STATUS[,STATUS2]] - check the device unless it is in SLEEP or STANDBY
mode. In these modes most disks are not spinning, so if you want to prevent a disk
from spinning up, this is probably what you want.
idle[,STATUS[,STATUS2]] - check the device unless it is in SLEEP, STANDBY or IDLE
mode. In the IDLE state, most disks are still spinning, so this is probably not
what you want.
The '-n' option is ignored if the power mode check is not supported or returns an
unknown value.
[ATA only][NEW EXPERIMENTAL SMARTCTL FEATURE] If the optional STATUS2 parameter is
specified, smartctl exits immediately with STATUS2 in this case. For example use
'-n standby,3,5' to return unique exit statuses in the STANDBY and UNSUPPORTED
cases.
SMART FEATURE ENABLE/DISABLE COMMANDS:
Note: if multiple options are used to both enable and disable a feature, then both
the enable and disable commands will be issued. The enable command will always be
issued before the corresponding disable command.
-s VALUE, --smart=VALUE
Enables or disables SMART on device. The valid arguments to this option are on and
off.
[ATA] Note that the ATA commands SMART ENABLE/DISABLE OPERATIONS were declared
obsolete in ATA ACS-4 Revision 10 (Nov 2015).
[SCSI tape drive or changer] It is not necessary (or useful) to enable SMART to see
the TapeAlert messages.
-o VALUE, --offlineauto=VALUE
[ATA only] Enables or disables SMART automatic offline test, which scans the drive
every four hours for disk defects. This command can be given during normal system
operation. The valid arguments to this option are on and off.
Note that the SMART automatic offline test command is listed as "Obsolete" in every
version of the ATA and ATA/ATAPI Specifications. It was originally part of the
SFF-8035i Revision 2.0 specification, but was never part of any ATA specification.
However it is implemented and used by many vendors. You can tell if automatic
offline testing is supported by seeing if this command enables and disables it, as
indicated by the 'Auto Offline Data Collection' part of the SMART capabilities
report (displayed with '-c').
SMART provides three basic categories of testing. The first category, called
"online" testing, has no effect on the performance of the device. It is turned on
by the '-s on' option.
The second category of testing is called "offline" testing. This type of test can,
in principle, degrade the device performance. The '-o on' option causes this
offline testing to be carried out, automatically, on a regular scheduled basis.
Normally, the disk will suspend offline testing while disk accesses are taking
place, and then automatically resume it when the disk would otherwise be idle, so
in practice it has little effect. Note that a one-time offline test can also be
carried out immediately upon receipt of a user command. See the '-t offline'
option below, which causes a one-time offline test to be carried out immediately.
The choice (made by the SFF-8035i and ATA specification authors) of the word
testing for these first two categories is unfortunate, and often leads to
confusion. In fact these first two categories of online and offline testing could
have been more accurately described as online and offline data collection.
The results of this automatic or immediate offline testing (data collection) are
reflected in the values of the SMART Attributes. Thus, if problems or errors are
detected, the values of these Attributes will go below their failure thresholds;
some types of errors may also appear in the SMART error log. These are visible
with the '-A' and '-l error' options respectively.
Some SMART attribute values are updated only during off-line data collection
activities; the rest are updated during normal operation of the device or during
both normal operation and off-line testing. The Attribute value table produced by
the '-A' option indicates this in the UPDATED column. Attributes of the first type
are labeled "Offline" and Attributes of the second type are labeled "Always".
The third category of testing (and the only category for which the word 'testing'
is really an appropriate choice) is "self" testing. This third type of test is
only performed (immediately) when a command to run it is issued. The '-t' and '-X'
options can be used to carry out and abort such self-tests; please see below for
further details.
Any errors detected in the self testing will be shown in the SMART self-test log,
which can be examined using the '-l selftest' option.
Note: in this manual page, the word "Test" is used in connection with the second
category just described, e.g. for the "offline" testing. The words "Self-test" are
used in connection with the third category.
-S VALUE, --saveauto=VALUE
[ATA] Enables or disables SMART autosave of device vendor-specific Attributes. The
valid arguments to this option are on and off. Note that this feature is preserved
across disk power cycles, so you should only need to issue it once.
The ATA standard does not specify a method to check whether SMART autosave is
enabled. Unlike SCSI (below), smartctl is unable to print a warning if autosave is
disabled.
Note that the ATA commands SMART ENABLE/DISABLE AUTOSAVE were declared obsolete in
ATA ACS-4 Revision 10 (Nov 2015).
[SCSI] For SCSI devices this toggles the value of the Global Logging Target Save
Disabled (GLTSD) bit in the Control Mode Page. Some disk manufacturers set this
bit by default. This prevents error counters, power-up hours and other useful data
from being placed in non-volatile storage, so these values may be reset to zero the
next time the device is power-cycled. If the GLTSD bit is set then 'smartctl -a'
will issue a warning. Use on to clear the GLTSD bit and thus enable saving
counters to non-volatile storage. For extreme streaming-video type applications
you might consider using off to set the GLTSD bit.
-g NAME, --get=NAME, -s NAME[,VALUE], --set=NAME[,VALUE]
Gets/sets non-SMART device settings. Note that the '--set' option shares its short
option '-s' with '--smart'. Valid arguments are:
all - Gets all values. This is equivalent to
'-g aam -g apm -g lookahead -g security -g wcache -g rcache -g dsn'
aam[,N|off] - [ATA only] Gets/sets the Automatic Acoustic Management (AAM) feature
(if supported). A value of 128 sets the most quiet (slowest) mode and 254 the
fastest (loudest) mode, 'off' disables AAM. Devices may support intermediate
levels. Values below 128 are defined as vendor specific (0) or retired (1 to 127).
Note that the AAM feature was declared obsolete in ATA ACS-2 Revision 4a (Dec
2010).
apm[,N|off] - [ATA only] Gets/sets the Advanced Power Management (APM) feature on
device (if supported). If a value between 1 and 254 is provided, it will attempt
to enable APM and set the specified value, 'off' disables APM. Note the actual
behavior depends on the drive, for example some drives disable APM if their value
is set above 128. Values below 128 are supposed to allow drive spindown, values
128 and above adjust only head-parking frequency, although the actual behavior
defined is also vendor-specific.
lookahead[,on|off] - [ATA only] Gets/sets the read look-ahead feature (if
supported). Read look-ahead is usually enabled by default.
security - [ATA only] Gets the status of ATA Security feature (if supported). If
ATA Security is enabled an ATA user password is set. The drive will be locked on
next reset then.
security-freeze - [ATA only] Sets ATA Security feature to frozen mode. This
prevents that the drive accepts any security commands until next reset. Note that
the frozen mode may already be set by BIOS or OS.
standby,[N|off] - [ATA] Sets the standby (spindown) timer and places the drive in
the IDLE mode. A value of 0 or 'off' disables the standby timer. Values from 1 to
240 specify timeouts from 5 seconds to 20 minutes in 5 second increments. Values
from 241 to 251 specify timeouts from 30 minutes to 330 minutes in 30 minute
increments. Value 252 specifies 21 minutes. Value 253 specifies a vendor specific
time between 8 and 12 hours. Value 255 specifies 21 minutes and 15 seconds. Some
drives may use a vendor specific interpretation for the values. Note that there is
no get option because ATA standards do not specify a method to read the standby
timer. If '-s standby,now' is also specified, the drive is immediately placed in
the STANDBY mode without temporarily placing it in the IDLE mode. Note that ATA
standards do not specify a command to set the standby timer without affecting the
power mode.
[SCSI: NEW EXPERIMENTAL SMARTCTL FEATURE] Only the set option with 'standby,off' or
'standby,0' is accepted and will place the SCSI disk into "ACTIVE" power condition.
standby,now - [ATA] Places the drive in the STANDBY mode. This usually spins down
the drive. The setting of the standby timer is not affected unless '-s
standby,[N|off]' is also specified.
[SCSI: NEW EXPERIMENTAL SMARTCTL FEATURE] Only the set option is accepted and will
place the SCSI disk into "STANDBY_Z" power condition.
wcache[,on|off] - [ATA] Gets/sets the volatile write cache feature (if supported).
The write cache is usually enabled by default.
wcache[,on|off] - [SCSI] Gets/sets the 'Write Cache Enable' (WCE) bit (if
supported). The write cache is usually enabled by default.
wcache-sct[,ata|on|off[,p]] - [ATA only] Gets/sets the write cache feature through
SCT Feature Control (if supported). The state of write cache in SCT Feature
Control could be "Controlled by ATA", "Force Enabled", or "Force Disabled". SCT
Feature control overwrites the setting by ATA Set Features command (wcache[,on|off]
option). If SCT Feature Control sets write cache as "Force Enabled" or "Force
Disabled", the setting of wcache[,on|off] is ignored by the drive. SCT Feature
Control usually sets write cache as "Controlled by ATA" by default. If ',p' is
specified, the setting is preserved across power cycles.
wcreorder[,on|off[,p]] - [ATA only] Gets/sets Write Cache Reordering. If it is
disabled (off), disk write scheduling is executed on a first-in-first-out (FIFO)
basis. If Write Cache Reordering is enabled (on), then disk write scheduling may
be reordered by the drive. If write cache is disabled, the current Write Cache
Reordering state is remembered but has no effect on non-cached writes, which are
always written in the order received. The state of Write Cache Reordering has no
effect on either NCQ or LCQ queued commands. If ',p' is specified, the setting is
preserved across power cycles.
rcache[,on|off] - [SCSI only] Gets/sets the 'Read Cache Disable' (RCE) bit. 'Off'
value disables read cache (if supported). The read cache is usually enabled by
default.
dsn[,on|off] - [ATA only] Gets/sets the DSN feature (if supported). The dsn is
usually disabled by default.
SMART READ AND DISPLAY DATA OPTIONS:
-H, --health
Prints the health status of the device.
[SCSI tape drive or changer] For SCSI tape drives the TapeAlert log page is not
checked for pending alerts unless this option is given twice (see TAPE DRIVES for
the rationale).
If the device reports failing health status, this means either that the device has
already failed, or that it is predicting its own failure within the next 24 hours.
If this happens, use the '-a' option to get more information, and get your data off
the disk and to someplace safe as soon as you can.
[ATA] Health status is obtained by checking the (boolean) result returned by the
SMART RETURN STATUS command. The return value of this ATA command may be unknown
due to limitations or bugs in some layer (e.g. RAID controller or USB bridge
firmware) between disk and operating system. In this case, smartctl prints a
warning and checks whether any Prefailure SMART Attribute value is less than or
equal to its threshold (see '-A' below).
[SCSI] Health status is obtained by checking the Additional Sense Code (ASC) and
Additional Sense Code Qualifier (ASCQ) from Informal Exceptions (IE) log page (if
supported) and/or from SCSI sense data.
[SCSI tape drive or changer] TapeAlert status is obtained by reading the TapeAlert
log page only when this option is given twice.
[NVMe] NVMe status is obtained by reading the "Critical Warning" byte from the
SMART/Health Information log.
-c, --capabilities
[ATA] Prints only the generic SMART capabilities. These show what SMART features
are implemented and how the device will respond to some of the different SMART
commands. For example it shows if the device logs errors, if it supports offline
surface scanning, and so on. If the device can carry out self-tests, this option
also shows the estimated time required to run those tests.
[NVMe] Prints various NVMe device capabilities obtained from the Identify
Controller and the Identify Namespace data structure.
-A, --attributes
[ATA] Prints only the vendor specific SMART Attributes. The Attributes are
numbered from 1 to 253 and have specific names and ID numbers. For example
Attribute 12 is "power cycle count": how many times has the disk been powered up.
Each Attribute has a "Raw" value, printed under the heading "RAW_VALUE", and a
"Normalized" value printed under the heading "VALUE". [Note: smartctl prints these
values in base-10.] In the example just given, the "Raw Value" for Attribute 12
would be the actual number of times that the disk has been power-cycled, for
example 365 if the disk has been turned on once per day for exactly one year. Each
vendor uses their own algorithm to convert this "Raw" value to a "Normalized" value
in the range from 1 to 254. Please keep in mind that smartctl only reports the
different Attribute types, values, and thresholds as read from the device. It does
not carry out the conversion between "Raw" and "Normalized" values: this is done by
the disk's firmware.
The conversion from Raw value to a quantity with physical units is not specified by
the SMART standard. In most cases, the values printed by smartctl are sensible.
For example the temperature Attribute generally has its raw value equal to the
temperature in Celsius. However in some cases vendors use unusual conventions.
For example the Hitachi disk on my laptop reports its power-on hours in minutes,
not hours. Some IBM disks track three temperatures rather than one, in their raw
values. And so on.
Each Attribute also has a Threshold value (whose range is 0 to 255) which is
printed under the heading "THRESH". If the Normalized value is less than or equal
to the Threshold value, then the Attribute is said to have failed. If the
Attribute is a pre-failure Attribute, then disk failure is imminent.
Each Attribute also has a "Worst" value shown under the heading "WORST". This is
the smallest (closest to failure) value that the disk has recorded at any time
during its lifetime when SMART was enabled. [Note however that some vendors
firmware may actually increase the "Worst" value for some "rate-type" Attributes.]
The Attribute table printed out by smartctl also shows the "TYPE" of the Attribute.
Attributes are one of two possible types: Pre-failure or Old age. Pre-failure
Attributes are ones which, if less than or equal to their threshold values,
indicate pending disk failure. Old age, or usage Attributes, are ones which
indicate end-of-product life from old-age or normal aging and wearout, if the
Attribute value is less than or equal to the threshold. Please note: the fact that
an Attribute is of type 'Pre-fail' does not mean that your disk is about to fail!
It only has this meaning if the Attribute's current Normalized value is less than
or equal to the threshold value.
If the Attribute's current Normalized value is less than or equal to the threshold
value, then the "WHEN_FAILED" column will display "FAILING_NOW". If not, but the
worst recorded value is less than or equal to the threshold value, then this column
will display "In_the_past". If the "WHEN_FAILED" column has no entry (indicated by
a dash: '-') then this Attribute is OK now (not failing) and has also never failed
in the past.
The table column labeled "UPDATED" shows if the SMART Attribute values are updated
during both normal operation and off-line testing, or only during offline testing.
The former are labeled "Always" and the latter are labeled "Offline".
So to summarize: the Raw Attribute values are the ones that might have a real
physical interpretation, such as "Temperature Celsius", "Hours", or "Start-Stop
Cycles". Each manufacturer converts these, using their detailed knowledge of the
disk's operations and failure modes, to Normalized Attribute values in the range
1–254. The current and worst (lowest measured) of these Normalized Attribute
values are stored on the disk, along with a Threshold value that the manufacturer
has determined will indicate that the disk is going to fail, or that it has
exceeded its design age or aging limit. smartctl does not calculate any of the
Attribute values, thresholds, or types, it merely reports them from the SMART data
on the device.
Note that starting with ATA/ATAPI-4, revision 4, the meaning of these Attribute
fields has been made entirely vendor-specific. However most newer ATA/SATA disks
seem to respect their meaning, so we have retained the option of printing the
Attribute values.
Solid-state drives use different meanings for some of the attributes. In this case
the attribute name printed by smartctl is incorrect unless the drive is already in
the smartmontools drive database.
Note that the ATA command SMART READ DATA was declared obsolete in ATA ACS-4
Revision 10 (Nov 2015).
[SCSI] For SCSI devices the "attributes" are obtained from the temperature and
start-stop cycle counter log pages. Certain vendor specific attributes are listed
if recognised. The attributes are output in a relatively free format (compared
with ATA disk attributes).
[NVMe] For NVMe devices the attributes are obtained from the SMART/Health
Information log.
-f FORMAT, --format=FORMAT
[ATA only] Selects the output format of the attributes:
old - Old smartctl format. This is the default unless the '-x' option is
specified.
brief - New format which fits into 80 columns (except in some rare cases). This
format also decodes four additional attribute flags. This is the default if the
'-x' option is specified.
hex,id - Print all attribute IDs as hexadecimal numbers.
hex,val - Print all normalized values as hexadecimal numbers.
hex - Same as '-f hex,id -f hex,val'.
-l TYPE, --log=TYPE
Prints various device logs. The valid arguments to this option are:
error - [ATA] prints the Summary SMART error log. SMART disks maintain a log of
the most recent five non-trivial errors. For each of these errors, the disk power-
on lifetime at which the error occurred is recorded, as is the device status (idle,
standby, etc) at the time of the error. For some common types of errors, the Error
Register (ER) and Status Register (SR) values are decoded and printed as text. The
meanings of these are:
ABRT: Command ABoRTed
AMNF: Address Mark Not Found
CCTO: Command Completion Timed Out
EOM: End Of Media
ICRC: Interface Cyclic Redundancy Code (CRC) error
IDNF: IDentity Not Found
ILI: (packet command-set specific)
MC: Media Changed
MCR: Media Change Request
NM: No Media
obs: obsolete
TK0NF: TracK 0 Not Found
UNC: UNCorrectable Error in Data
WP: Media is Write Protected
In addition, up to the last five commands that preceded the error are listed, along
with a timestamp measured from the start of the corresponding power cycle. This is
displayed in the form Dd+HH:MM:SS.msec where D is the number of days, HH is hours,
MM is minutes, SS is seconds and msec is milliseconds. [Note: this time stamp
wraps after 2^32 milliseconds, or 49 days 17 hours 2 minutes and 47.296 seconds.]
The key ATA disk registers are also recorded in the log. The final column of the
error log is a text-string description of the ATA command defined by the Command
Register (CR) and Feature Register (FR) values. Commands that are obsolete in the
most current spec are listed like this: READ LONG (w/ retry) [OBS-4], indicating
that the command became obsolete with or in the ATA-4 specification. Similarly,
the notation [RET-N] is used to indicate that a command was retired in the ATA-N
specification. Some commands are not defined in any version of the ATA
specification but are in common use nonetheless; these are marked [NS], meaning
non-standard.
The ATA Specification (ATA ACS-2 Revision 7, Section A.7.1) says: "Error log data
structures shall include, but are not limited to, Uncorrectable errors, ID Not
Found errors for which the LBA requested was valid, servo errors, and write fault
errors. Error log data structures shall not include errors attributed to the
receipt of faulty commands." The definitions of these terms are:
UNC (UNCorrectable): data is uncorrectable. This refers to data which has been
read from the disk, but for which the Error Checking and Correction (ECC) codes are
inconsistent. In effect, this means that the data can not be read.
IDNF (ID Not Found): user-accessible address could not be found. For READ LOG type
commands, IDNF can also indicate that a device data log structure checksum was
incorrect.
If the command that caused the error was a READ or WRITE command, then the Logical
Block Address (LBA) at which the error occurred will be printed in base 10 and base
16. The LBA is a linear address, which counts 512-byte sectors on the disk,
starting from zero. (Because of the limitations of the SMART error log, if the LBA
is greater than 0xfffffff, then either no error log entry will be made, or the
error log entry will have an incorrect LBA. This may happen for drives with a
capacity greater than 128 GiB or 137 GB.) On Linux systems the smartmontools web
page has instructions about how to convert the LBA address to the name of the disk
file containing the erroneous disk sector.
Please note that some manufacturers ignore the ATA specifications, and make entries
in the error log if the device receives a command which is not implemented or is
not valid.
error - [SCSI] prints the error counter log pages for reads, write and verifies.
The verify row is only output if it has an element other than zero.
error[,NUM] - [NVMe] prints the NVMe Error Information log. Only the 16 most
recent log entries are printed by default. This number can be changed by the
optional parameter NUM. The maximum number of log entries is vendor specific (in
the range from 1 to 256 inclusive).
xerror[,NUM][,error] - [ATA only] prints the Extended Comprehensive SMART error log
(General Purpose Log address 0x03). Unlike the Summary SMART error log (see '-l
error' above), it provides sufficient space to log the contents of the 48-bit LBA
register set introduced with ATA-6. It also supports logs with more than one
sector. Each sector holds up to 4 log entries. The actual number of log sectors
is vendor specific.
Only the 8 most recent error log entries are printed by default. This number can
be changed by the optional parameter NUM.
If ',error' is appended and the Extended Comprehensive SMART error log is not
supported, the Summary SMART self-test log is printed.
Please note that recent drives may report errors only in the Extended Comprehensive
SMART error log. The Summary SMART error log may be reported as supported but is
always empty then.
selftest - [ATA] prints the SMART self-test log. The disk maintains a self-test
log showing the results of the self tests, which can be run using the '-t' option
described below. For each of the most recent twenty-one self-tests, the log shows
the type of test (short or extended, off-line or captive) and the final status of
the test. If the test did not complete successfully, then the percentage of the
test remaining is shown. The time at which the test took place, measured in hours
of disk lifetime, is also printed. [Note: this time stamp wraps after 2^16 hours,
or 2730 days and 16 hours, or about 7.5 years.] If any errors were detected, the
Logical Block Address (LBA) of the first error is printed in decimal notation.
selftest - [SCSI] the self-test log for a SCSI device has a slightly different
format than for an ATA device. For each of the most recent twenty self-tests, it
shows the type of test and the status (final or in progress) of the test. SCSI
standards use the terms "foreground" and "background" (rather than ATA's
corresponding "captive" and "off-line") and "short" and "long" (rather than ATA's
corresponding "short" and "extended") to describe the type of the test. The
printed segment number is only relevant when a test fails in the third or later
test segment. It identifies the test that failed and consists of either the number
of the segment that failed during the test, or the number of the test that failed
and the number of the segment in which the test was run, using a vendor-specific
method of putting both numbers into a single byte. The Logical Block Address (LBA)
of the first error is printed in hexadecimal notation. If provided, the SCSI Sense
Key (SK), Additional Sense Code (ASC) and Additional Sense Code Qualifier (ASCQ)
are also printed. The self tests can be run using the '-t' option described below
(using the ATA test terminology).
xselftest[,NUM][,selftest] - [ATA only] prints the Extended SMART self-test log
(General Purpose Log address 0x07). Unlike the SMART self-test log (see '-l
selftest' above), it supports 48-bit LBA and logs with more than one sector. Each
sector holds up to 19 log entries. The actual number of log sectors is vendor
specific.
Only the 25 most recent log entries are printed by default. This number can be
changed by the optional parameter NUM.
If ',selftest' is appended and the Extended SMART self-test log is not supported,
the old SMART self-test log is printed.
selective - [ATA only] Please see the '-t select' option below for a description of
selective self-tests. The selective self-test log shows the start/end Logical
Block Addresses (LBA) of each of the five test spans, and their current test
status. If the span is being tested or the remainder of the disk is being read-
scanned, the current 65536-sector block of LBAs being tested is also displayed.
The selective self-test log also shows if a read-scan of the remainder of the disk
will be carried out after the selective self-test has completed (see '-t
afterselect' option) and the time delay before restarting this read-scan if it is
interrupted (see '-t pending' option).
directory[,gs] - [ATA only] if the device supports the General Purpose Logging
feature set (ATA-6 and above) then this prints the Log Directory (the log at
address 0). The Log Directory shows what logs are available and their length in
sectors (512 bytes). The contents of the logs at address 1 [Summary SMART error
log] and at address 6 [SMART self-test log] may be printed using the previously-
described error and selftest arguments to this option. If your version of smartctl
supports 48-bit ATA commands, both the General Purpose Log (GPL) and SMART Log (SL)
directories are printed in one combined table. The output can be restricted to the
GPL directory or SL directory by '-l directory,q' or '-l directory,s' respectively.
background - [SCSI only] the background scan results log outputs information
derived from Background Media Scans (BMS) done after power up and/or periodically
(e.g. every 24 hours) on recent SCSI disks. If supported, the BMS status is output
first, indicating whether a background scan is currently underway (and if so a
progress percentage), the amount of time the disk has been powered up and the
number of scans already completed. Then there is a header and a line for each
background scan "event". These will typically be either recovered or unrecoverable
errors. That latter group may need some attention. There is a description of the
background scan mechanism in section 4.18 of SBC-3 revision 6 (see www.t10.org ).
scttemp, scttempsts, scttemphist - [ATA only] prints the disk temperature
information provided by the SMART Command Transport (SCT) commands. The option
'scttempsts' prints current temperature and temperature ranges returned by the SCT
Status command, 'scttemphist' prints temperature limits and the temperature history
table returned by the SCT Data Table command, and 'scttemp' prints both. The
temperature values are preserved across power cycles. The logging interval can be
configured with the '-l scttempint,N[,p]' option, see below. The SCT commands were
introduced in ATA8-ACS and were also supported by many ATA-7 disks.
scttempint,N[,p] - [ATA only] clears the SCT temperature history table and sets the
time interval for temperature logging to N minutes. If ',p' is specified, the
setting is preserved across power cycles. Otherwise, the setting is volatile and
will be reverted to the last non-volatile setting by the next hard reset. The
default interval is vendor specific, typical values are 1, 2, or 5 minutes.
scterc[,READTIME,WRITETIME][,p|reset] - [ATA only] prints values and descriptions
of the SCT Error Recovery Control settings. These are equivalent to TLER (as used
by Western Digital), CCTL (as used by Samsung and Hitachi/HGST) and ERC (as used by
Seagate). READTIME and WRITETIME arguments (deciseconds) set the specified values.
Values of 0 disable the feature, other values less than 65 are probably not
supported. For RAID configurations, this is typically set to 70,70 deciseconds.
[NEW EXPERIMENTAL SMARTCTL FEATURE] If 'scterc,READTIME,WRITETIME,p' is specified,
these time values will be persistent over a power-on reset. If 'scterc,p' is
specified, the persistent over power-on values are printed. If 'scterc,reset' is
specified, all SCT timer settings are restored to the manufacturer's default value.
The ',p' and ',reset' options require the device to support ATA ACS-4 or higher.
devstat[,PAGE] - [ATA only] prints values and descriptions of the ATA Device
Statistics log pages (General Purpose Log address 0x04). If no PAGE number is
specified, entries from all supported pages are printed. If PAGE 0 is specified,
the list of supported pages is printed. Device Statistics was introduced in ACS-2
and is only supported by some recent devices.
defects[,NUM] - [ATA] prints LBA and hours values from the ATA Pending Defects log
(General Purpose Log address 0x0c). Only the 31 entries from first log page are
printed by default. This number can be changed by the optional parameter NUM. The
size of the log and the order of the entries are vendor specific. The Pending
Defects log was introduced in ACS-4 Revision 01 (Mar 2014).
defects - [SCSI: NEW EXPERIMENTAL SMARTCTL FEATURE] prints LBAs that the background
scan was unable to read (i.e. a defect). Entries, if any, show the defective LBA
and the value of the power-on hours (since manufacture) when the background scan
found the defect. Note these pending defects may appear in advance of any
application trying to read a defective LBA.
envrep - [SCSI only: NEW EXPERIMENTAL SMARTCTL FEATURE] prints values and
descriptions of the SCSI Environmental reporting log page. This includes one or
more temperatures and may include relative humidities. Lifetime maximums and
minimums are also reported.
sataphy[,reset] - [SATA only] prints values and descriptions of the SATA Phy Event
Counters (General Purpose Log address 0x11). If '-l sataphy,reset' is specified,
all counters are reset after reading the values. This also works for SATA devices
with Packet interface like CD/DVD drives.
sasphy[,reset] - [SAS (SCSI) only] prints values and descriptions of the SAS (SSP)
Protocol Specific log page (log page 0x18). If '-l sasphy,reset' is specified, all
counters are reset after reading the values.
tapealert - [SCSI tape drives and changers: NEW EXPERIMENTAL SMARTCTL FEATURE]
prints values and descriptions of the (SSC) Tape Alert log page. See TAPE DRIVES
below for issue associated with printing this log page.
tapedevstat - [SCSI tape drives and changers: NEW EXPERIMENTAL SMARTCTL FEATURE]
prints values and descriptions of the (SSC) Device Statistics log page.
zdevstat - [SCSI zoned disks: NEW EXPERIMENTAL SMARTCTL FEATURE] prints values and
descriptions of the Zoned Block Device Statistics log page (ZBC-2).
gplog,ADDR[,FIRST[-LAST|+SIZE]] - [ATA only] prints a hex dump of any log
accessible via General Purpose Logging (GPL) feature. The log address ADDR is the
hex address listed in the log directory (see '-l directory' above). The range of
log sectors (pages) can be specified by decimal values FIRST-LAST or FIRST+SIZE.
FIRST defaults to 0, SIZE defaults to 1. LAST can be set to 'max' to specify the
last page of the log.
smartlog,ADDR[,FIRST[-LAST|+SIZE]] - [ATA only] prints a hex dump of any log
accessible via SMART Read Log command. See '-l gplog,...' above for parameter
syntax.
For example, all these commands:
smartctl -l gplog,0x80,10-15 /dev/sda
smartctl -l gplog,0x80,10+6 /dev/sda
smartctl -l smartlog,0x80,10-15 /dev/sda
print pages 10–15 of log 0x80 (first host vendor specific log).
The hex dump format is compatible with the 'xxd -r' command. This command:
smartctl -l gplog,0x11 /dev/sda | grep ^0 | xxd -r >log.bin
writes a binary representation of the one sector log 0x11 (SATA Phy Event Counters)
to file log.bin.
nvmelog,PAGE,SIZE - [NVMe only] prints a hex dump of the first SIZE bytes from the
NVMe log with identifier PAGE. PAGE is a hexadecimal number in the range from 0x1
to 0xff. SIZE is a hexadecimal number in the range from 0x4 to 0x4000 (16 KiB).
WARNING: Do not specify the identifier of an unknown log page. Reading a log page
may have undesirable side effects.
ssd - [ATA] prints the Solid State Device Statistics log page. This has the same
effect as '-l devstat,7', see above.
ssd - [SCSI] prints the Solid State Media percentage used endurance indicator. A
value of 0 indicates as new condition while 100 indicates the device is at the end
of its lifetime as projected by the manufacturer. The value may reach 255.
-v ID,FORMAT[:BYTEORDER][,NAME], --vendorattribute=ID,FORMAT...
[ATA only] Sets a vendor-specific raw value print FORMAT, an optional BYTEORDER and
an optional NAME for Attribute ID. This option may be used multiple times.
The Attribute ID can be in the range 1 to 255. If 'N' is specified as ID, the
settings for all Attributes are changed.
The optional BYTEORDER consists of 1 to 8 characters from the set '012345rvwz'.
The characters '0' to '5' select the byte 0 to 5 from the 48-bit raw value, 'r'
selects the reserved byte of the attribute data block, 'v' selects the normalized
value, 'w' selects the worst value and 'z' inserts a zero byte. The default
BYTEORDER is '543210' for all 48-bit formats, 'r543210' for the 54-bit formats, and
'543210wv' for the 64-bit formats. For example, '-v 5,raw48:012345' prints the raw
value of attribute 5 with big endian instead of little endian byte ordering.
The NAME is a string of letters, digits and underscore. Its length should not
exceed 23 characters. The '-P showall' option reports an error if this is the
case.
-v help - Prints (to STDOUT) a list of all valid arguments to this option, then
exits.
Valid arguments for FORMAT are:
raw8 - Print the Raw value as six 8-bit unsigned base-10 integers. This may be
useful for decoding the meaning of the Raw value.
raw16 - Print the Raw value as three 16-bit unsigned base-10 integers. This may be
useful for decoding the meaning of the Raw value.
raw48 - Print the Raw value as a 48-bit unsigned base-10 integer. This is the
default for most attributes.
hex48 - Print the Raw value as a 12 digit hexadecimal number. This may be useful
for decoding the meaning of the Raw value.
raw56 - Print the Raw value as a 54-bit unsigned base-10 integer. This includes
the reserved byte which follows the 48-bit raw value.
hex56 - Print the Raw value as a 14 digit hexadecimal number. This includes the
reserved byte which follows the 48-bit raw value.
raw64 - Print the Raw value as a 64-bit unsigned base-10 integer. This includes
two bytes from the normalized and worst attribute value. This raw format is used
by some SSD devices with Indilinx controller.
hex64 - Print the Raw value as a 16 digit hexadecimal number. This includes two
bytes from the normalized and worst attribute value. This raw format is used by
some SSD devices with Indilinx controller.
min2hour - Raw Attribute is power-on time in minutes. Its raw value will be
displayed in the form "Xh+Ym". Here X is hours, and Y is minutes in the range 0–59
inclusive. Y is always printed with two digits, for example "06" or "31" or "00".
sec2hour - Raw Attribute is power-on time in seconds. Its raw value will be
displayed in the form "Xh+Ym+Zs". Here X is hours, Y is minutes in the range 0–59
inclusive, and Z is seconds in the range 0–59 inclusive. Y and Z are always
printed with two digits, for example "06" or "31" or "00".
halfmin2hour - Raw Attribute is power-on time, measured in units of 30 seconds.
This format is used by some Samsung disks. Its raw value will be displayed in the
form "Xh+Ym". Here X is hours, and Y is minutes in the range 0–59 inclusive. Y is
always printed with two digits, for example "06" or "31" or "00".
msec24hour32 - Raw Attribute is power-on time measured in 32-bit hours and 24-bit
milliseconds since last hour update. It will be displayed in the form
"Xh+Ym+Z.Ms". Here X is hours, Y is minutes, Z is seconds and M is milliseconds.
tempminmax - Raw Attribute is the disk temperature in Celsius. Info about Min/Max
temperature is printed if available. This is the default for Attributes 190 and
194. The recording interval (lifetime, last power cycle, last soft reset) of the
min/max values is device specific.
temp10x - Raw Attribute is ten times the disk temperature in Celsius.
raw16(raw16) - Print the raw attribute as a 16-bit value and two optional 16-bit
values if these words are nonzero. This is the default for Attributes 5 and 196.
raw16(avg16) - Raw attribute is spin-up time. It is printed as a 16-bit value and
an optional "Average" 16-bit value if the word is nonzero. This is the default for
Attribute 3.
raw24(raw8) - Print the raw attribute as a 24-bit value and three optional 8-bit
values if these bytes are nonzero. This is the default for Attribute 9.
raw24/raw24 - Raw Attribute contains two 24-bit values. The first is the number of
load cycles. The second is the number of unload cycles. The difference between
these two values is the number of times that the drive was unexpectedly powered off
(also called an emergency unload). As a rule of thumb, the mechanical stress
created by one emergency unload is equivalent to that created by one hundred normal
unloads.
raw24/raw32 - Raw attribute is an error rate which consists of a 24-bit error count
and a 32-bit total count.
The following old arguments to '-v' are also still valid:
9,minutes - same as: 9,min2hour,Power_On_Minutes.
9,seconds - same as: 9,sec2hour,Power_On_Seconds.
9,halfminutes - same as: 9,halfmin2hour,Power_On_Half_Minutes.
9,temp - same as: 9,tempminmax,Temperature_Celsius.
192,emergencyretractcyclect - same as: 192,raw48,Emerg_Retract_Cycle_Ct
193,loadunload - same as: 193,raw24/raw24.
194,10xCelsius - same as: 194,temp10x,Temperature_Celsius_x10.
194,unknown - same as: 194,raw48,Unknown_Attribute.
197,increasing - same as: 197,raw48,Total_Pending_Sectors. Also means that
Attribute number 197 (Current Pending Sector Count) is not reset if uncorrectable
sectors are reallocated (see smartd.conf(5) man page).
198,increasing - same as: 198,raw48,Total_Offl_Uncorrectabl. Also means that
Attribute number 198 (Offline Uncorrectable Sector Count) is not reset if
uncorrectable sectors are reallocated (see smartd.conf(5) man page).
198,offlinescanuncsectorct - same as: 198,raw48,Offline_Scan_UNC_SectCt.
200,writeerrorcount - same as: 200,raw48,Write_Error_Count.
201,detectedtacount - same as: 201,raw48,Detected_TA_Count.
220,temp - same as: 220,tempminmax,Temperature_Celsius.
-F TYPE, --firmwarebug=TYPE
[ATA only] Modifies the behavior of smartctl to compensate for some known and
understood device firmware or driver bug. This option may be used multiple times.
The valid arguments are:
none - Assume that the device firmware obeys the ATA specifications. This is the
default, unless the device has presets for '-F' in the drive database. Using this
option on the command line will override any preset values.
nologdir - Suppresses read attempts of SMART or GP Log Directory. Support for all
standard logs is assumed without an actual check. Some Intel SSDs may freeze if
log address 0 is read.
samsung - In some Samsung disks (example: model SV4012H Firmware Version: RM100-08)
some of the two- and four-byte quantities in the SMART data structures are byte-
swapped (relative to the ATA specification). Enabling this option tells smartctl
to evaluate these quantities in byte-reversed order. Some signs that your disk
needs this option are (1) no self-test log printed, even though you have run self-
tests; (2) very large numbers of ATA errors reported in the ATA error log; (3)
strange and impossible values for the ATA error log timestamps.
samsung2 - In some Samsung disks the number of ATA errors reported is byte swapped.
Enabling this option tells smartctl to evaluate this quantity in byte-reversed
order. An indication that your Samsung disk needs this option is that the self-
test log is printed correctly, but there are a very large number of errors in the
SMART error log. This is because the error count is byte swapped. Thus a disk
with five errors (0x0005) will appear to have 20480 errors (0x5000).
samsung3 - Some Samsung disks (at least SP2514N with Firmware VF100-37) report a
self-test still in progress with 0% remaining when the test was already completed.
Enabling this option modifies the output of the self-test execution status (see
options '-c' or '-a' above) accordingly.
xerrorlba - Fixes LBA byte ordering in Extended Comprehensive SMART error log.
Some disks use little endian byte ordering instead of ATA register ordering to
specify the LBA addresses in the log entries.
swapid - Fixes byte swapped ATA identify strings (device name, serial number,
firmware version) returned by some buggy device drivers.
-P TYPE, --presets=TYPE
[ATA only] Specifies whether smartctl should use any preset options that are
available for this drive. By default, if the drive is recognized in the
smartmontools database, then the presets are used.
The argument show will show any preset options for your drive and the argument
showall will show all known drives in the smartmontools database, along with their
preset options. If there are no presets for your drive and you think there should
be (for example, a -v or -F option is needed to get smartctl to display correct
values) then please contact the smartmontools developers so that this information
can be added to the smartmontools database. Contact information is at the end of
this man page.
The valid arguments to this option are:
use - if a drive is recognized, then use the stored presets for it. This is the
default. Note that presets will NOT override additional Attribute interpretation
('-v N,something') command-line options or explicit '-F' command-line options..
ignore - do not use presets.
show - show if the drive is recognized in the database, and if so, its presets,
then exit.
showall - list all recognized drives, and the presets that are set for them, then
exit. This also checks the drive database regular expressions and settings for
syntax errors.
The '-P showall' option takes up to two optional arguments to match a specific
drive type and firmware version. The command:
smartctl -P showall
lists all entries, the command:
smartctl -P showall 'MODEL'
lists all entries matching MODEL, and the command:
smartctl -P showall 'MODEL' 'FIRMWARE'
lists all entries for this MODEL and a specific FIRMWARE version.
-B [+]FILE, --drivedb=[+]FILE
[ATA only] Read the drive database from FILE. The new database replaces the built
in database by default. If '+' is specified, then the new entries prepend the
built in entries.
Optional entries are read from the file /etc/smart_drivedb.h if this option is not
specified.
If /var/lib/smartmontools/drivedb/drivedb.h is present, the contents of this file
is used instead of the built in table.
Run /usr/sbin/update-smart-drivedb to update this file from the smartmontools SVN
repository.
The database files use the same C/C++ syntax that is used to initialize the built
in database array. C/C++ style comments are allowed. Example:
/* Full entry: */
{
"Model family", // Info about model family/series.
"MODEL1.*REGEX", // Regular expression to match model of device.
"VERSION.*REGEX", // Regular expression to match firmware version(s).
"Some warning", // Warning message.
"-v 9,minutes" // String of preset -v and -F options.
},
/* Minimal entry: */
{
"", // No model family/series info.
"MODEL2.*REGEX", // Regular expression to match model of device.
"", // All firmware versions.
"", // No warning.
"" // No options preset.
},
/* USB ID entry: */
{
"USB: Device; Bridge", // Info about USB device and bridge name.
"0x1234:0xabcd", // Regular expression to match vendor:product ID.
"0x0101", // Regular expression to match bcdDevice.
"", // Not used.
"-d sat" // String with device type option.
},
/* ... */
SMART RUN/ABORT OFFLINE TEST AND self-test OPTIONS:
-t TEST, --test=TEST
Executes TEST immediately. The '-C' option can be used in conjunction with this
option to run the short or long (and also for ATA devices, selective or conveyance)
self-tests in captive mode (known as "foreground mode" for SCSI devices). Note
that only one test type can be run at a time, so only one test type should be
specified per command line. Note also that if a computer is shutdown or power
cycled during a self-test, no harm should result. The self-test will either be
aborted or will resume automatically.
All '-t TEST' commands can be given during normal system operation unless captive
mode ('-C' option) is used. A running self-test can, however, degrade performance
of the drive. Frequent I/O requests from the operating system increase the
duration of a test. These impacts may vary from device to device.
If a test failure occurs then the device may discontinue the testing and report the
result immediately.
[ATA] Note that the ATA command SMART EXECUTE OFF-LINE IMMEDIATE (the command to
start a test) was declared obsolete in ATA ACS-4 Revision 10 (Nov 2015).
The valid arguments to this option are:
offline - [ATA] runs SMART Immediate Offline Test. This immediately starts the
test described above. This command can be given during normal system operation.
The effects of this test are visible only in that it updates the SMART Attribute
values, and if errors are found they will appear in the SMART error log, visible
with the '-l error' option.
If the '-c' option to smartctl shows that the device has the "Suspend Offline
collection upon new command" capability then you can track the progress of the
Immediate Offline test using the '-c' option to smartctl. If the '-c' option show
that the device has the "Abort Offline collection upon new command" capability then
most commands will abort the Immediate Offline Test, so you should not try to track
the progress of the test with '-c', as it will abort the test.
offline - [SCSI] runs the default self test in foreground. No entry is placed in
the self test log.
short - [ATA] runs SMART Short Self Test (usually under ten minutes). This command
can be given during normal system operation (unless run in captive mode - see the
'-C' option below). This is a test in a different category than the immediate or
automatic offline tests. The "Self" tests check the electrical and mechanical
performance as well as the read performance of the disk. Their results are
reported in the Self Test Error Log, readable with the '-l selftest' option. Note
that on some disks the progress of the self-test can be monitored by watching this
log during the self-test; with other disks use the '-c' option to monitor progress.
short - [SCSI] runs the "Background short" self-test.
long - [ATA] runs SMART Extended Self Test (tens of minutes to several hours).
This is a longer and more thorough version of the Short Self Test described above.
Note that this command can be given during normal system operation (unless run in
captive mode - see the '-C' option below).
long - [SCSI] runs the "Background long" self-test.
conveyance - [ATA only] runs a SMART Conveyance Self Test (minutes). This self-
test routine is intended to identify damage incurred during transporting of the
device. This self-test routine should take on the order of minutes to complete.
Note that this command can be given during normal system operation (unless run in
captive mode - see the '-C' option below).
select,N-M, select,N+SIZE - [ATA only] runs a SMART Selective Self Test, to test a
range of disk Logical Block Addresses (LBAs), rather than the entire disk. Each
range of LBAs that is checked is called a "span" and is specified by a starting LBA
(N) and an ending LBA (M) with N less than or equal to M. The range can also be
specified as N+SIZE. A span at the end of a disk can be specified by N-max.
For example the commands:
smartctl -t select,10-20 /dev/sda
smartctl -t select,10+11 /dev/sda
both runs a self test on one span consisting of LBAs ten to twenty (inclusive).
The command:
smartctl -t select,100000000-max /dev/sda
run a self test from LBA 100000000 up to the end of the disk. The '-t' option can
be given up to five times, to test up to five spans. For example the command:
smartctl -t select,0-100 -t select,1000-2000 /dev/sda
runs a self test on two spans. The first span consists of 101 LBAs and the second
span consists of 1001 LBAs. Note that the spans can overlap partially or
completely, for example:
smartctl -t select,0-10 -t select,5-15 -t select,10-20 /dev/sda
The results of the selective self-test can be obtained (both during and after the
test) by printing the SMART self-test log, using the '-l selftest' option to
smartctl.
Selective self tests are particularly useful as disk capacities increase: an
extended self test (smartctl -t long) can take several hours. Selective self-tests
are helpful if (based on SYSLOG error messages, previous failed self-tests, or
SMART error log entries) you suspect that a disk is having problems at a particular
range of Logical Block Addresses (LBAs).
Selective self-tests can be run during normal system operation (unless done in
captive mode - see the '-C' option below).
The following variants of the selective self-test command use spans based on the
ranges from past tests already stored on the disk:
select,redo[+SIZE] - [ATA only] redo the last SMART Selective Self Test using the
same LBA range. The starting LBA is identical to the LBA used by last test, same
for ending LBA unless a new span size is specified by optional +SIZE argument.
For example the commands:
smartctl -t select,10-20 /dev/sda
smartctl -t select,redo /dev/sda
smartctl -t select,redo+20 /dev/sda
have the same effect as:
smartctl -t select,10-20 /dev/sda
smartctl -t select,10-20 /dev/sda
smartctl -t select,10-29 /dev/sda
select,next[+SIZE] - [ATA only] runs a SMART Selective Self Test on the LBA range
which follows the range of the last test. The starting LBA is set to (ending LBA
+1) of the last test. A new span size may be specified by the optional +SIZE
argument.
For example the commands:
smartctl -t select,0-999 /dev/sda
smartctl -t select,next /dev/sda
smartctl -t select,next+2000 /dev/sda
have the same effect as:
smartctl -t select,0-999 /dev/sda
smartctl -t select,1000-1999 /dev/sda
smartctl -t select,2000-3999 /dev/sda
If the last test ended at the last LBA of the disk, the new range starts at LBA 0.
The span size of the last span of a disk is adjusted such that the total number of
spans to check the full disk will not be changed by future uses of '-t
select,next'.
select,cont[+SIZE] - [ATA only] performs a 'redo' (above) if the self test status
reports that the last test was aborted by the host. Otherwise it run the 'next'
(above) test.
afterselect,on - [ATA only] perform an offline read scan after a Selective self-
test has completed. This option must be used together with one or more of the
select,N-M options above. If the LBAs that have been specified in the Selective
self-test pass the test with no errors found, then read scan the remainder of the
disk. If the device is powered-cycled while this read scan is in progress, the
read scan will be automatically resumed after a time specified by the pending timer
(see below). The value of this option is preserved between selective self-tests.
afterselect,off - [ATA only] do not read scan the remainder of the disk after a
Selective self-test has completed. This option must be use together with one or
more of the select,N-M options above. The value of this option is preserved
between selective self-tests.
pending,N - [ATA only] set the pending offline read scan timer to N minutes. Here
N is an integer in the range from 0 to 65535 inclusive. If the device is powered
off during a read scan after a Selective self-test, then resume the test
automatically N minutes after power-up. This option must be use together with one
or more of the select,N-M options above. The value of this option is preserved
between selective self-tests.
vendor,N - [ATA only] issues the ATA command SMART EXECUTE OFF-LINE IMMEDIATE with
subcommand N in LBA LOW register. The subcommand is specified as a hex value in
the range 0x00 to 0xff. Subcommands 0x40–0x7e and 0x90–0xff are reserved for
vendor specific use, see table 61 of T13/1699-D Revision 6a (ATA8-ACS). Note that
the subcommands 0x00–0x04, 0x7f, 0x81–0x84 are supported by other smartctl options
(e.g. 0x01: '-t short', 0x7f: '-X', 0x82: '-C -t long').
WARNING: Only run subcommands documented by the vendor of the device.
Example for some Intel SSDs only: The subcommand 0x40 ('-t vendor,0x40') clears the
timed workload related SMART attributes (226, 227, 228). Note that the raw values
of these attributes are held at 65535 (0xffff) until the workload timer reaches 60
minutes.
force - start new self-test even if another test is already running. By default a
running self-test will not be interrupted to begin another test.
-C, --captive
[ATA] Runs self-tests in captive mode. This has no effect with '-t offline' or if
the '-t' option is not used.
WARNING: Tests run in captive mode may busy out the drive for the length of the
test. Only run captive tests on drives without any mounted partitions!
[SCSI] Runs the self-test in "Foreground" mode.
-X, --abort
Aborts non-captive SMART Self Tests. Note that this command will abort the Offline
Immediate Test routine only if your disk has the "Abort Offline collection upon new
command" capability.
ATA, SCSI command sets and SAT
In the past there has been a clear distinction between storage devices that used the ATA
and SCSI command sets. This distinction was often reflected in their device naming and
hardware. Now various SCSI transports (e.g. SAS, FC and iSCSI) can interconnect to both
SCSI disks (e.g. FC and SAS) and ATA disks (especially SATA). USB and IEEE 1394 storage
devices use the SCSI command set externally but almost always contain ATA or SATA disks
(or flash). The storage subsystems in some operating systems have started to remove the
distinction between ATA and SCSI in their device naming policies.
99% of operations that an OS performs on a disk involve the SCSI INQUIRY, READ CAPACITY,
READ and WRITE commands, or their ATA equivalents. Since the SCSI commands are slightly
more general than their ATA equivalents, many OSes are generating SCSI commands (mainly
READ and WRITE) and letting a lower level translate them to their ATA equivalents as the
need arises. An important note here is that "lower level" may be in external equipment
and hence outside the control of an OS.
SCSI to ATA Translation (SAT) is a standard (ANSI INCITS 431-2007) that specifies how this
translation is done. For the other 1% of operations that an OS performs on a disk, SAT
provides two options. First is an optional ATA PASS-THROUGH SCSI command (there are two
variants). The second is a translation from the closest SCSI command. Most current
interest is in the "pass-through" option.
The relevance to smartmontools (and hence smartctl) is that its interactions with disks
fall solidly into the "1%" category. So even if the OS can happily treat (and name) a
disk as "SCSI", smartmontools needs to detect the native command set and act accordingly.
As more storage manufacturers (including external SATA drives) comply with SAT,
smartmontools is able to automatically distinguish the native command set of the device.
In some cases the '-d sat' option is needed on the command line.
There are also virtual disks which typically have no useful information to convey to
smartmontools, but could conceivably in the future. An example of a virtual disk is the
OS's view of a RAID 1 box. There are most likely two SATA disks inside a RAID 1 box.
Addressing those SATA disks from a distant OS is a challenge for smartmontools. Another
approach is running a tool like smartmontools inside the RAID 1 box (e.g. a Network
Attached Storage (NAS) box) and fetching the logs via a browser.
TAPE DRIVES
Commands for SCSI Tape drives as defined in the SSC-4 standard (ANSI INCITS 516-2013). SSC
stands for "SCSI Streaming Commands". Draft standards can be found at
<https://www.t10.org/> .
Many SMART related features of SCSI disks are shared by SCSI tape drives. One important
tape-specific log page is called "TapeAlert" which is used to report abnormal conditions.
Unlike most other log pages the TapeAlert log page clears pending alerts after that page
is fetched (i.e. read from the tape drive). To be more precise, the TapeAlert log page is
cleared for the I_T nexus (initiator-target pair) that sent the (SCSI LOG SENSE) command;
so another initiator (e.g. a HBA on another machine) will still have pending alerts
reported. [This clearing action can be controlled by the TAPLSD bit is the [SSC] Device
Configuration Extension mode page but the original and default action remains: clear any
pending TapeAlerts. The sdparm utility can be used to access and change TAPLSD.]
Previous versions of smartctl have supported polling the TapeAlert log page when the
--health option is given. This clearing of pending alerts has created problems for other
tape-specific tools. This version of smartctl will only fetch the TapeAlert log page if
the --health option is given twice in the command line invocation (or the --log=tapealert
option is given).
There are other tape-specific log pages such as --log=tapedevstat that behave normally
(i.e. they don't change any state information in the tape drive).
EXAMPLES
smartctl -a /dev/sda
Print a large amount of SMART information for drive /dev/sda.
smartctl -s off /dev/sdd
Disable SMART monitoring and data log collection on drive /dev/sdd.
smartctl --smart=on --offlineauto=on --saveauto=on /dev/sda
Enable SMART on drive /dev/sda, enable automatic offline testing every four hours, and
enable autosaving of SMART Attributes. This is a good start-up line for your system's
init files. You can issue this command on a running system.
smartctl -t long /dev/sdc
Begin an extended self-test of drive /dev/sdc. You can issue this command on a running
system. The results can be seen in the self-test log visible with the '-l selftest'
option after it has completed.
smartctl -s on -t offline /dev/sda
Enable SMART on the disk, and begin an immediate offline test of drive /dev/sda. You can
issue this command on a running system. The results are only used to update the SMART
Attributes, visible with the '-A' option. If any device errors occur, they are logged to
the SMART error log, which can be seen with the '-l error' option.
smartctl -A -v 9,minutes /dev/sda
Shows the vendor Attributes, when the disk stores its power-on time internally in minutes
rather than hours.
smartctl -q errorsonly -H -l selftest /dev/sda
Produces output only if the device returns failing SMART status, or if some of the logged
self-tests ended with errors.
smartctl -q silent -a /dev/sda
Examine all SMART data for device /dev/sda, but produce no printed output. You must use
the exit status (the $? shell variable) to learn if any Attributes are out of bound, if
the SMART status is failing, if there are errors recorded in the self-test log, or if
there are errors recorded in the disk error log.
smartctl -a -d 3ware,0 /dev/twl0
Examine all SMART data for the first SATA (not SAS) disk connected to a 3ware RAID 9750
controller card.
smartctl -t long -d areca,4 /dev/sg2
Start a long self-test on the fourth SATA disk connected to an Areca RAID controller
addressed by /dev/sg2.
smartctl -a -d hpt,1/3 /dev/sda (under Linux)
smartctl -a -d hpt,1/3 /dev/hptrr (under FreeBSD)
Examine all SMART data for the (S)ATA disk directly connected to the third channel of the
first HighPoint RocketRAID controller card.
smartctl -t short -d hpt,1/1/2 /dev/sda (under Linux)
smartctl -t short -d hpt,1/1/2 /dev/hptrr (under FreeBSD)
Start a short self-test on the (S)ATA disk connected to second pmport on the first channel
of the first HighPoint RocketRAID controller card.
smartctl -t select,10-100 -t select,30-300 -t afterselect,on -t pending,45 /dev/sda
Run a selective self-test on LBAs 10 to 100 and 30 to 300. After the these LBAs have been
tested, read-scan the remainder of the disk. If the disk is power-cycled during the read-
scan, resume the scan 45 minutes after power to the device is restored.
smartctl -a -d cciss,0 /dev/cciss/c0d0
Examine all SMART data for the first SCSI disk connected to a cciss RAID controller card.
EXIT STATUS
The exit statuses of smartctl are defined by a bitmask. If all is well with the disk, the
exit status (return value) of smartctl is 0 (all bits turned off). If a problem occurs,
or an error, potential error, or fault is detected, then a non-zero status is returned.
In this case, the eight different bits in the exit status have the following meanings for
ATA disks; some of these values may also be returned for SCSI disks.
Bit 0: Command line did not parse.
Bit 1: Device open failed, device did not return an IDENTIFY DEVICE structure, or device
is in a low-power mode (see '-n' option above).
Bit 2: Some SMART or other ATA command to the disk failed, or there was a checksum error
in a SMART data structure (see '-b' option above).
Bit 3: SMART status check returned "DISK FAILING".
Bit 4: We found prefail Attributes <= threshold.
Bit 5: SMART status check returned "DISK OK" but we found that some (usage or prefail)
Attributes have been <= threshold at some time in the past.
Bit 6: The device error log contains records of errors.
Bit 7: The device self-test log contains records of errors. [ATA only] Failed self-tests
outdated by a newer successful extended self-test are ignored.
To test within the shell for whether or not the different bits are turned on or off, you
can use the following type of construction (which should work with any POSIX compatible
shell):
smartstat=$(($? & 8))
This looks at only at bit 3 of the exit status $? (since 8=2^3). The shell variable
$smartstat will be nonzero if SMART status check returned "disk failing" and zero
otherwise.
This shell script prints all status bits:
val=$?; mask=1
for i in 0 1 2 3 4 5 6 7; do
echo "Bit $i: $(((val & mask) && 1))"
mask=$((mask << 1))
done
FILES
/usr/sbin/smartctl
full path of this executable.
/var/lib/smartmontools/drivedb/drivedb.h
drive database (see '-B' option).
/etc/smart_drivedb.h
optional local drive database (see '-B' option).
AUTHORS
Bruce Allen (project initiator),
Christian Franke (project manager, Windows port and all sort of things),
Douglas Gilbert (SCSI subsystem),
Volker Kuhlmann (moderator of support and database mailing list),
Gabriele Pohl (wiki & development team support),
Alex Samorukov (FreeBSD port and more, new Trac wiki).
Many other individuals have made contributions and corrections, see AUTHORS, ChangeLog and
repository files.
The first smartmontools code was derived from the smartsuite package, written by Michael
Cornwell and Andre Hedrick.
REPORTING BUGS
To submit a bug report, create a ticket in smartmontools wiki:
<https://www.smartmontools.org/>.
Alternatively send the info to the smartmontools support mailing list:
<https://listi.jpberlin.de/mailman/listinfo/smartmontools-support>.
SEE ALSO
smartd(8).
update-smart-drivedb(8).
REFERENCES
Please see the following web site for more info: <https://www.smartmontools.org/>
An introductory article about smartmontools is Monitoring Hard Disks with SMART, by Bruce
Allen, Linux Journal, January 2004, pages 74–77. See
<https://www.linuxjournal.com/article/6983>.
If you would like to understand better how SMART works, and what it does, a good place to
start is with Sections 4.8 and 6.54 of the first volume of the 'AT Attachment with Packet
Interface-7' (ATA/ATAPI-7) specification Revision 4b. This documents the SMART
functionality which the smartmontools utilities provide access to.
The functioning of SMART was originally defined by the SFF-8035i revision 2 and the
SFF-8055i revision 1.4 specifications. These are publications of the Small Form Factors
(SFF) Committee.
Links to these and other documents may be found on the Links page of the smartmontools
Wiki at <https://www.smartmontools.org/wiki/Links>.
PACKAGE VERSION
smartmontools-7.3 2022-02-28 r5338
$Id: smartctl.8.in 5333 2022-02-26 00:15:22Z dpgilbert $