replacing hard disk

[rodp]

It doesn't matter. You can always re-format. And badblocks doesn't necessarily destroy the data anyway.
CF (and badblocks) is in flash and nothing to do with any packages you may install later on to the disk.

I didn't know it was in Flash. Knowing that would have saved me alot of hassle!! When looking at the drives and folders, is there anyway to tell what's in flash and what's not?

I'm assuming you can stop the humax formatting the drive when installing a new one and then access the unit via telnet to then run checks etc.?

If the disk is about to be or has just been formatted, just run the short or even long SMART test, which should run happily in the disk firmware while the system is running, and be much quicker than badblocks.

I came across a thread from someone replacing and testing HDDs before putting them into use suggesting to do it and it sounded like it was more thorough than a SMART test but agree it would obviously take a long time and be much less convenient.

If you go via the command window from webif and execute a long SMART test, do you have to keep the window / session live or can you come back to it later or does it report somewhere - perhaps on the HDD diagnostics page?

Thanks

Rodp

 

[Black Hole]

I didn't know it was in Flash. Knowing that would have saved me alot of hassle!!

Logically, how else could you take the drive off-line to run checks on it?

When looking at the drives and folders, is there anyway to tell what's in flash and what's not?

There's a specific part of the tree located in flash (or temporarily in RAM), but the determining factor is: does this need to run before the HDD is on-line after boot, or without the HDD on-line at all?

If you go via the command window from webif and execute a long SMART test, do you have to keep the window / session live

Run it in an abduco session to be sure, and redirect standard output to a file. Details here:

abduco

A problem with running a long process from a Telnet session or the webshell package (a command terminal available as a web page - access via WebIF >> Diagnostics >> Command Line) is that the session inconveniently drops out and terminates any active processes if you take the focus away to do something else. Then you have to reconnect and restart the youtube-dl command, which then has to do its initial thinking before the download resumes...

fixdisk selected from the maintenance mode Telnet menu automatically runs in an abduco session, and there is an option on the menu to reconnect to an existing session.

 

[prpr]

Run it in an abduco session to be sure, and redirect standard output to a file

There's no point in doing that. Running e.g. smartctl -t long /dev/sda from a command prompt returns a result immediately and the disk firmware runs the test offline. All you need to do is make sure the HDR doesn't go to sleep or reboot.
You collect the logs later either using e.g. smartctl -a /dev/sda or from the WebIf's Disk Diagnostics page:

Self-test logs

No.	Description	Status	Remaining	When	First Error LBA
# 1	Short offline	Completed without error	00%	0	-

As you can see, I did exactly this test when I installed this disk.

It strikes me at this point that there is apparently no easy way to initiate a SMART self-test from the WebIf. Perhaps there should be...

 

[prpr]

When looking at the drives and folders, is there anyway to tell what's in flash and what's not?

As a general rule:
Everything below /mod is on the disk, except /mod/boot which is in flash (and is really an alias for /var/lib/humaxtv/mod )
Everything else is either in flash or in a tmpfs filesystem in RAM.

As with all rules, there are exceptions, depending on various things.

 

[/df]

...
It strikes me at this point that there is apparently no easy way to initiate a SMART self-test from the WebIf. Perhaps there should be...

IIRC the latest versions of the Humax settop program for HDR include a short SMART test as one of the options in Menu>System>Data Storage. Certainly the command template is included in the HDR binary (it looks for the result "read failure"), though not the HD binary.

Supposing that WebShell> smartctl -t long /dev/sda doesn't count as an "easy way", one possibility is to have buttons on the Disk Diagnostics page; possibly also a button that refreshes the statistics shown, which (again IIRC) are normally updated overnight but can be forced to refresh by running the diskattrs diagnostic. Another is just to add disktests and disktestl diagnostics.

 

[Black Hole]

IIRC the latest versions of the Humax settop program for HDR include a short SMART test as one of the options in Menu>System>Data Storage.

It does:

[MENU]

Settings​

System​

Data Storage​

Internal HDD​

HDD Test (BEWARE!)​

Why "beware"? IIRC, the "HDD Test" is executed immediately the user selects that menu item, with no "are you sure" dialogue.

 

[prpr]

one possibility is to have buttons on the Disk Diagnostics page;

Yes, that's what I was thinking.

possibly also a button that refreshes the statistics shown, which (again IIRC) are normally updated overnight

I thought the page showed the live stats. Stuff that goes into the database (startstop, realloc, hours, spinretry, pending, offline) is updated overnight.

 

[/df]

...
I thought the page showed the live stats. Stuff that goes into the database (startstop, realloc, hours, spinretry, pending, offline) is updated overnight.

You're so right. Similar, but sufficiently different, code is used in both the diskattrs diagnostic (which is also the overnight job) and the disk diagnostics page.

 

[/df]

Also, why does the diskattrs script punt for HDs? It gets installed to /mod/etc/anacrontab but the distributed version does nothing. Seems a bit harsh. Surely it ought to be able to diagnose a disk attached to an HD, and why not also run the overnight check?

 

[wacman]

Hi, just been reading all this post as I am after a new hard drive but can not really find one. I have a Seagate Pipeline ST1000VM002.

Does someone have a link to an alternative, 500 or 1tb will do.

Thanks.

 

[Black Hole]

This subject is taken up here: HDR-FOX HDD Replacement