On Monday, 12 May 2025 09:11:54 British Summer Time Dale wrote: > Michael wrote: > > On Saturday, 10 May 2025 16:53:55 British Summer Time Dale wrote: > >> Dale wrote: > >>> I didn't know about that until now. I already shutdown my old rig. > >>> Might try that later. It may shed some light on this mess. > >>> > >>> I did send a email to the seller tho. They sell a LOT of drives. I've > >>> seen them show a stock of over 200 drives of a particular model and a > >>> day or so later, sold out. They sell new, a few kinds of used as well. > >>> I tend to buy used but most of the time, the number of power on hours is > >>> in the single digits. The recent drives show 2 hours each. I think if > >>> it is a problem, they will know since they test a lot of drives. Maybe > >>> it is normal but if not, I'm sure they will agree to swap or refund. > >>> They sold out of the 20TB drives shortly after I ordered mine. They > >>> started with right at 200 and sold out in like 2 or 3 days. > >>> > >>> I figure I'll hear back shortly. They been pretty fast to respond to > >>> questions in the past. > >>> > >>> Dale > >>> > >>> :-) :-) > >> > >> I got a response. This is what they said. > >> > >>> Thank you for bringing this to our attention. As long as we're not > >>> seeing any I/O errors that would inhibit your ability to use the > >>> drive, everything should be fine. > >>> > >>> This type of link speed negotiation issue can occur with helium-filled > >>> drives, as their spin-up time tends to be slightly longer than that of > >>> traditional drives. Is your system or HBA a bit on the older side? > >>> Most modern toolsets and software account for this extended spin-up > >>> time by allowing a longer delay before attempting speed negotiation, > >>> which typically avoids this issue altogether. > >>> > >>> In summary, this isn't unprecedented behavior when working with older > >>> hardware or software, but at this stage, it doesn’t point to any major > >>> functional problem. I hope this information helps. > >> > >> As I mentioned, it passed all the SMART tests. > > > > What do you get for the smart attribute with ID 22? > > > > https://www.backblaze.com/blog/smart-22-is-a-gas-gas-gas/ > > > > Although others report ID 16 as the "Current Helium Level", or "Internal > > Environmental Status" attribute. The ID number and Attribute description > > depends on the drive firmware. > > > >> I'm not sure on the > >> 3GB/sec connection yet tho. I'm pretty sure that mobo is capable of > >> 6GBs/sec tho. When I put it in my main rig, I'll know for sure. > > > > Slow spin-up or not, if it is not performing at 6Gbps as advertised when > > connected to a SATA 3 bus, then it is not fit for purpose - assuming > > transfer speeds are a consideration for you and you don't want to let > > this slip.> > >> What are your thoughts on what they say? It make sense to anyone who > >> knows more about hard drives than me? Now if they can just find that > >> last drive I ordered that is several days late. > >> > >> Thanks. > >> > >> Dale > >> > >> :-) :-) > > > > My knowledge of drives is quite limited and my working knowledge of large > > Helium filled drives is a fat zero. Despite this, here's some random > > thoughts - should you wish to read further: > > > > I have read drives which have seen continuous service in large datacenters > > and crypto-mining farms for a couple of years are decommissioned, tested, > > reset to zero and sold cheaper as 'refurbished'. If you keep an eye on > > Amazon and other large retailers and you notice large batches of > > refurbished drives suddenly show up sold at cut prices, then this is in > > all likelihood their origin and explains the low prices. When you check > > the perturbations in supply you'll notice some makes, models and sizes of > > drives arrive rather prematurely compared to their age in the refurbished > > drives marketplace and this is an indication of early failure rates > > higher than the big datacenters were wishing to see. It doesn't > > necessarily make all of these drives bad, but it is something to bear in > > mind when you check how much warranty they are being sold with after they > > are labelled as 'refurbished', compared to the original OEM warranty when > > new. > > > > Regarding Helium sealed drives, they are reported to have a slightly lower > > average failure rate than conventional drives. Helium having a lower > > density than air and not smelling anywhere as bad as methane ;-) is used > > to reduce aerodynamic drag of the moving parts within the drive. The > > idea being such drives will consume less energy to run, with less windage > > the platters vibrate less and therefore they can be packed tighter, they > > will run cooler and at least theoretically will last longer. > > > > The laser welding techniques to seal the helium in the drive casing and > > keep denser air out is meant to ensure the 5 year warranty these drives > > are sold with when new. In practice, any light weight small molecule gas > > can leak and in this case the drive will lose its Helium content - and > > soon fail smart tests. As it loses Helium at some point it will start to > > draw more energy to operate in a higher drag environment. Since any SATA > > controller power threshold is not unlimited, the increased drag will > > cause a slower spin-up than when it was new. > > > > I'm not saying your drive is failing, but the slow spin-up argument > > *because* ... Helium, could be somewhat moot. Modelling studies have > > shown ceteris paribus a Helium filled drive will spin *faster* and remain > > cooler than an air filled drive: > > > > https://www.researchgate.net/publication/225162945_Thermal_analysis_of_hel > > ium-filled_enterprise_disk_drive > > > > You can check if smartctl output shows a different Spin-Up Time value > > against other drives - if this Attribute is reported at all. The Average > > Latency of your 20TB Helium filled drive is reported in its data sheet as > > 4.16ms - the same as 16TB, 14TB, 12TB non-Helium Ironwolf Pro drives. > > This indicates the time for an I/O request to be completed, not > > necessarily a spin-up performance alone, but why should your 20TB be > > slower to spin up? I don't know. :-/ > > > > Anyway, these are a lay person's comments. A drive engineer will know > > exactly what's what with this technology and its performance variations. > > A chat with Seagate's support may get you closer to the truth and explain > > why the 16TB drive spins up nicely while the 20TB drags its feet. > > > > HTH, > > OK. My old 8TB SMR drive seems to be having . . . issues. Luckily I > bought two 16TB drives and a 20TB, topic of this thread. So I got a > spare drive. Anyway, I finally got some time to hook this 20TB drive > back up to my main rig with a external enclosure that I know works at > full speed. Other drives do. I recall you mentioning using hdparm -I. > Here is the output of that. > > > root@Gentoo-1 / # hdparm -I /dev/sdb > > /dev/sdb: > > ATA device, with non-removable media > Model Number: ST20000NM007D-3DJ103 > Serial Number: :-D :-D :-D > Firmware Revision: SN05 > Transport: Serial, ATA8-AST, SATA 1.0a, SATA II > Extensions, SATA Rev 2.5, SATA Rev 2.6, SATA Rev 3.0 ^^^^^^^ The drive is SATA 3 capable.
> Standards:
> Used: unknown (minor revision code 0xffff)
> Supported: 11 10 9 8 7 6 5
> Likely used: 11
> Configuration:
> Logical max current
> cylinders 16383 16383
> heads 16 16
> sectors/track 63 63
> --
> CHS current addressable sectors: 16514064
> LBA user addressable sectors: 268435455
> LBA48 user addressable sectors: 39063650304
> Logical Sector size: 512 bytes [ Supported:
> 512 4096 ]
> Physical Sector size: 4096 bytes
> Logical Sector-0 offset: 0 bytes
> device size with M = 1024*1024: 19074048 MBytes
> device size with M = 1000*1000: 20000588 MBytes (20000 GB)
> cache/buffer size = unknown
> Form Factor: 3.5 inch
> Nominal Media Rotation Rate: 7200
> Capabilities:
> LBA, IORDY(can be disabled)
> Queue depth: 32
> Standby timer values: spec'd by Standard, no device specific minimum
> R/W multiple sector transfer: Max = 16 Current = 16
> Recommended acoustic management value: 254, current value: 0
> DMA: mdma0 mdma1 mdma2 udma0 udma1 udma2 udma3 udma4 udma5 *udma6
> Cycle time: min=120ns recommended=120ns
^^^^^
It can access the system memory as fast as it possibly gets for a spinning
drive.
> PIO: pio0 pio1 pio2 pio3 pio4
> Cycle time: no flow control=120ns IORDY flow control=120ns
> Commands/features:
> Enabled Supported:
> * SMART feature set
> Security Mode feature set
> * Power Management feature set
> * Write cache
> * Look-ahead
> * WRITE_BUFFER command
> * READ_BUFFER command
> * DOWNLOAD_MICROCODE
> Power-Up In Standby feature set
> * SET_FEATURES required to spinup after power up
> SET_MAX security extension
> * 48-bit Address feature set
> * Mandatory FLUSH_CACHE
> * FLUSH_CACHE_EXT
> * SMART error logging
> * SMART self-test
> * Media Card Pass-Through
> * General Purpose Logging feature set
> * WRITE_{DMA|MULTIPLE}_FUA_EXT
> * 64-bit World wide name
> * IDLE_IMMEDIATE with UNLOAD
> Write-Read-Verify feature set
> * WRITE_UNCORRECTABLE_EXT command
> * {READ,WRITE}_DMA_EXT_GPL commands
> * Segmented DOWNLOAD_MICROCODE
> * unknown 119[6]
> * unknown 119[7]
> unknown 119[8]
> unknown 119[9]
> * Gen1 signaling speed (1.5Gb/s)
> * Gen2 signaling speed (3.0Gb/s)
> * Gen3 signaling speed (6.0Gb/s)
^^^^^^^
> * Native Command Queueing (NCQ)
> * Phy event counters
> * Idle-Unload when NCQ is active
> * READ_LOG_DMA_EXT equivalent to READ_LOG_EXT
> * DMA Setup Auto-Activate optimization
> Device-initiated interface power management
> * Software settings preservation
> unknown 78[7]
> * SMART Command Transport (SCT) feature set
> * SCT Write Same (AC2)
> * SCT Error Recovery Control (AC3)
> * SCT Features Control (AC4)
> * SCT Data Tables (AC5)
> unknown 206[7]
> unknown 206[12] (vendor specific)
> unknown 206[13] (vendor specific)
> unknown 206[14] (vendor specific)
> * SANITIZE_ANTIFREEZE_LOCK_EXT command
> * SANITIZE feature set
> * OVERWRITE_EXT command
> * All write cache is non-volatile
> * Extended number of user addressable sectors
> Security:
> Master password revision code = 65534
> supported
> not enabled
> not locked
> not frozen
> not expired: security count
> supported: enhanced erase
> 1716min for SECURITY ERASE UNIT. 1716min for ENHANCED SECURITY
> ERASE UNIT.
> Logical Unit WWN Device Identifier: 5000c500e59b0554
> NAA : 5
> IEEE OUI : 000c50
> Unique ID : 0e59b0554
> Checksum: correct
> root@Gentoo-1 / #
>
>
> If I recall correctly, udma6 is the fastest speed.
Yes, for accessing memory (Ultra Direct Memory Access).
> So, in the end the
> drive should be connected at 6GB/sec. Right?
Yep, the "SATA Rev 3.0" transport capability means it can achieve 6Gbps when
connected to a compatible SATA controller.
Your dmesg will confirm it has been able to achieve this when it was detected
by the kernel.
> Also, do you see anything
> else in there that would concern you? I'm also going to include the
> output of smartctl -a for it as well.
From a cursory look I can't see anything wrong.
> root@Gentoo-1 / # smartctl -a /dev/sdb
> smartctl 7.4 2023-08-01 r5530 [x86_64-linux-6.9.10-gentoo] (local build)
> Copyright (C) 2002-23, Bruce Allen, Christian Franke, www.smartmontools.org
>
> === START OF INFORMATION SECTION ===
> Model Family: Seagate Exos X20
> Device Model: ST20000NM007D-3DJ103
> Serial Number: :-D :-D :-D
> LU WWN Device Id: 5 000c50 0e59b0554
> Firmware Version: SN05
> User Capacity: 20,000,588,955,648 bytes [20.0 TB]
> Sector Sizes: 512 bytes logical, 4096 bytes physical
> Rotation Rate: 7200 rpm
> Form Factor: 3.5 inches
> Device is: In smartctl database 7.3/5671
> ATA Version is: ACS-4 (minor revision not indicated)
> SATA Version is: SATA 3.3, 6.0 Gb/s (current: 6.0 Gb/s)
^^^^^^^^
Yes, it is connected at SATA 3 speeds. The SATA Revision 3.3 indicates an era
of manufacture of >=2016.
> Local Time is: Mon May 12 03:05:08 2025 CDT
> SMART support is: Available - device has SMART capability.
> SMART support is: Enabled
>
> === START OF READ SMART DATA SECTION ===
> SMART overall-health self-assessment test result: PASSED
[snip ...]
> SMART Attributes Data Structure revision number: 10
> Vendor Specific SMART Attributes with Thresholds:
> ID# ATTRIBUTE_NAME FLAG VALUE WORST THRESH TYPE
> UPDATED WHEN_FAILED RAW_VALUE
> 1 Raw_Read_Error_Rate 0x000f 083 079 044 Pre-fail
> Always - 0/223644630
> 3 Spin_Up_Time 0x0003 091 091 000 Pre-fail
> Always - 0
> 4 Start_Stop_Count 0x0032 100 100 020 Old_age
> Always - 12
> 5 Reallocated_Sector_Ct 0x0033 100 100 010 Pre-fail
> Always - 0
> 7 Seek_Error_Rate 0x000f 071 060 045 Pre-fail
> Always - 0/12784911
> 9 Power_On_Hours 0x0032 100 100 000 Old_age
> Always - 36
> 10 Spin_Retry_Count 0x0013 100 100 097 Pre-fail
> Always - 0
> 12 Power_Cycle_Count 0x0032 100 100 020 Old_age
> Always - 12
> 18 Head_Health 0x000b 100 100 050 Pre-fail
> Always - 0
> 187 Reported_Uncorrect 0x0032 100 100 000 Old_age
> Always - 0
> 188 Command_Timeout 0x0032 100 100 000 Old_age
> Always - 0 0 0
> 190 Airflow_Temperature_Cel 0x0022 071 049 000 Old_age
> Always - 29 (Min/Max 24/29)
> 192 Power-Off_Retract_Count 0x0032 100 100 000 Old_age
> Always - 5
> 193 Load_Cycle_Count 0x0032 100 100 000 Old_age
> Always - 13
> 194 Temperature_Celsius 0x0022 029 048 000 Old_age
> Always - 29 (0 22 0 0 0)
> 197 Current_Pending_Sector 0x0012 100 100 000 Old_age
> Always - 0
> 198 Offline_Uncorrectable 0x0010 100 100 000 Old_age
> Offline - 0
> 199 UDMA_CRC_Error_Count 0x003e 200 200 000 Old_age
> Always - 15
> 200 Pressure_Limit 0x0023 100 100 001 Pre-fail
> Always - 0
> 240 Head_Flying_Hours 0x0000 100 100 000 Old_age
> Offline - 35h+57m+09.784s
> 241 Total_LBAs_Written 0x0000 100 253 000 Old_age
> Offline - 46594603
> 242 Total_LBAs_Read 0x0000 100 253 000 Old_age
> Offline - 3602490543
>
> SMART Error Log Version: 1
> No Errors Logged
I can't see anything wrong with this drive, but Seagate's raw numbers always
confused me. I mean, as an example Raw_Read_Error_Rate shows 0/223644630.
:-/
Is this a ratio, does it mean 0 out of 22364463 read attempts? Or should it
be read as 0x223644630, in which case it would be 2 errors in 593,774,128
operations?
https://www.disktuna.com/big-scary-raw-s-m-a-r-t-values-arent-always-bad-news/
#0x223644630
Or does it mean 223644630 were recorded in the past and 0 were recorded since
the smart data were zeroed out as part of the refurbishment? I don't know.
More here:
https://forums.unraid.net/topic/86337-are-my-smart-reports-bad/#comment-800888
Either way, the normalised values make more sense, whereby the current
Raw_Read_Error_Rate is 083, the worst its been is 079 and both are well above
a failure threshold of 044.
The critical attributes of reallocated sectors, uncorrectable errors and the
like all show zero, indicating a healthy drive.
Interestingly, the UDMA_CRC_Error_Count shows 15. Typically this indicates a
dodgy cable. I had asked if you tried a different cable/SATA port when you
first posted about this drive. If these errors crept up since you bought the
drive, this is an indication of some bits flipping and then being corrected in
the journey between the drive and the SATA controller. I would have certainly
suggested you try another cable if I had seen this error correction count
upfront. Keep an eye on it and if it keeps going up, then definitely replace
the cable to see if it makes a difference.
Note, if the Helium was leaking from the drive casing, attribute 200 would
show 'failed', but it shows 0.
> I'm thinking about adding this to my backup drive set. With this
> addition, I can have one backup for all my videos instead of breaking it
> into two pieces.
>
> Any concerns with the data you see? Would you be OK using this drive?
I don't want to say go ahead, only for the drive to fail when you come to rely
on it. Knowing it's a refurbished drive, it takes time to spin up, but shows
no errors, I would use it in a non-critical operational setup and keep an eye
on it for a while, but that's just me. I've had drives with critical errors
on them and have been waiting for them to fail for years now. I'm still
waiting ... ;-)
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