Smartd message: What does it mean?

[Daniel Frerejacque]

On Fri, Oct 28, 2005 at 18:59:09 -0700,

>  "Daniel B. Thurman" <dant at cdkkt.com> wrote:
>
>>Hi Folks,
>>
>>Trying to understand this message, any ideas?
>>
>>This email was generated by the smartd daemon running on:
>>
>>   host name: xxx.xxx.com
>>  DNS domain: xxx.com
>>  NIS domain: (none)
>>
>>The following warning/error was logged by the smartd daemon:
>>Device: /dev/hdb, 14 Currently unreadable (pending) sectors
>>For details see host's SYSLOG (default: /var/log/messages).
>>
Take a look at
http://smartmontools.sourceforge.net/man/smartctl.8.html
and do some google on smart disks

The firmware on all modern disk, --smart capable--, takes note
of a lot of parameters:  hours of spinning, number of misses,
inner temperature (high temp diminishes the life time),
runnig time, number of errors on look, read, write,
etc....
If these parameters are out of ranges specified by the builder,
the lifetime diminishes, and they indicate potential problems.
And there is a machanical lifetime: sleeve or ball bearings
are not eternal (only diamonds are, as James told)

smartd is a daemon checking out of range parameters and reporting
problems as non-readeable sectors, missing read may indicate some
wear;

So you may believe what you want (free thinking still allowed),
but the day the disk is dead there is no way to recover data.
Disks are not very expensive but you have good and bad brands,
same for car tyres.

Daniel Frèrejacque