From mboxrd@z Thu Jan 1 00:00:00 1970 From: Hans Reiser Subject: Re: 'let the hdd remap the bad blocks' Date: Tue, 20 Aug 2002 13:55:06 +0400 Message-ID: <3D6211FA.3010500@namesys.com> References: <5.1.1.6.2.20020819155611.01ff7af0@pop.tvnet.hu> <20020819195906.A19984@namesys.com> <3D614477.8050500@namesys.com> Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Transfer-Encoding: quoted-printable Return-path: list-help: list-unsubscribe: list-post: Errors-To: flx@namesys.com List-Id: Content-Type: text/plain; charset="iso-8859-1"; format="flowed" To: Matthias Andree Cc: reiserfs-list@namesys.com, Vitaly Fertman Matthias Andree wrote: >Hans Reiser writes: > > =20 > >>Just taking a guess, many hard drives have difficult and time-consuming >>procedures that they can go through to read a troublesome block. These >>can take 20-30 seconds. Probably if they have to go through these >>procedures, once they finally succeed the smart vendors remap the block. >> =20 >> > >They should try to rewrite and write verify the block before remapping >it, as there is only a finite amount of spares. > >For SCSI drives, there's also J=F6rg Schilling's "sformat" tool that can >do the "badblocks" stuff directly in the drive rather than through all >the kernel buffers, and can also refresh or reassign bad blocks. > > =20 > Vitaly, take a look at that. Part of a good user interface is letting=20 users know what tools are available. Remember, most users will=20 encounter a failing drive and/or fsck on a journaling fs as a rare and=20 stressful event in their lives, so it is good to educate them with URLs=20 and other references at the time they run fsck.