Hard Drive Health

[iKersh]

My fellow esteemed FreeNAS-ers,

I am no expert on this so I would like to present to all of you a copy of the last SMART report for the two drives in my FreeNAS install (HP N54L Microserver with 12GB ECC RAM) which have had running for almost a year without issues.

From reading about SMART codes and meanings, everything -seems- to be normal to me; I am correct? Is there anything I need to watch out for?

 

[Mirfster]

Looks like these are the results of SMART Short tests and the first time a SMART has been ran? I don't see any issues, but you may want to have a SMART Long test ran as well.

 

[joeschmuck]

I agree, everything looks good but you need to run a Long Test. Hopefully you are running routine Short and Long tests. I run a short test each evening and a long test once a week. Others here may have more relaxed schedules. If you run a Long test and it passes, then you are looking very good.

Was there a concern about your hard drives which brought up this question?

 

[iKersh]

I have the SMART script (SATA version) and the others mentioned on this thread running on a schedule pretty much the same as the schedule mentioned in that thread so the long SMART test is scheduled for 2nd and 17th each month (set this all pretty early on in my installation). Having said that, now both of you have mentioned a long SMART test should be run, I will have to check the schedule again to make sure it is indeed set to run or it is set but has not been running.

I asked the question to confirm whether my own interpretation of the SMART report for these two drives was correct and to minimise the potential of me overlooking a rapidly approaching failure.

I have another question after looking at the report again - looking at the 'lifetime (hours)' value for both drives, at what amount of hours does is a drive likely to start failing in some way?

 

[Mirfster]

I have another question after looking at the report again - looking at the 'lifetime (hours)' value for both drives, at what amount of hours does is a drive likely to start failing in some way?

That really depends on factors like actual usage, temps, vibration, voltages, etc... Not trying to avoid a direct answer, but clarifying on why it is a difficult answer.

Some drives will "Go gentle into that good night" while others may "Rage, rage against the dying of the light". This behavior could even occur from exact Make/Models of drives.

With most drives claiming a 1,000,000 hours MTTF (Mean Time To Failure) one would think they are good for > 10 years... But then there is MTTR (Mean Time To Repair) and MTBF (Mean Time Between Failures) to consider... Heck toss in "Infant Mortality" and I am guessing I got you pretty confused by now.

I prefer to just *assume* 2 - 3 years, since more than likely after that I may be replacing them with bigger drives by then, but:

1. Always have backups (FreeNAS is NOT a replacement for properly maintained backups)
   • If desired search for "Rule of 3" for more info on that
2. Ensure you have Redundancy
   • I not only consider this when deciding on the vDevs, but also have at least one (if not more) "Cold Spare" Hard Drives on a shelf
3. Keep up on SMART Tests (Long and Short) as well as Scrubs
   • You can get a good overview of how to interpret SMART results here (Section "ATA S.M.A.R.T. attributes")

 

[joeschmuck]

looking at the 'lifetime (hours)' value for both drives, at what amount of hours does is a drive likely to start failing in some way?

Well you really didn't tell us what model of drives you have but looking at the serial number I'm taking a wild guess they are WD Red 3TB drives. I've heard a few complaints about the 3TB drives but in general the WD Red series are pretty robust. My six drives have exceeded their warranty and have been running basically non-stop since I purchased them. Non-stop meaning physically rotating and heads loaded.

Here is a some of my SMART data for one of my drives...

As for how long your drives will last, it's a guess but they are in a good class.

 

[iKersh]

you really didn't tell us what model of drives you have

Apologies for that - you are correct, one is a WD Red 3TB and the other is a Hitachi NAS 3TB which are in a mirror (server is running v9.3 at the moment).

It's good to hear that the drives are okay and no looming errors; I will check later today to make sure the long SMART test is still scheduled to run as in my previous message in this thread and update all of you.

 

[Robert Trevellyan]

Some drives will "Go gentle into that good night" while others may "Rage, rage against the dying of the light".

I expect to learn about tech stuff when I visit this forum. I do not expect to learn about literature.

 

[Mirfster]

I expect to learn about tech stuff when I visit this forum. I do not expect to learn about literature.

Makes learning fun.. ;)