SMART errors - are they for real? or, BIOS weirdness?

[Mike McCarty]

Jason L Tibbitts III wrote:

[snip]

> I have used the "wipe drive" functionality in each drive's diagnostic
> utilities and used dd to zero the entire drive as well.  The drives
> still report problems.
> 
> Unfortunately at this point I usually just throw them out, which is
> terribly wasteful but I can't trust them for important data and I
> can't get the manufacturer to replace them without an actual failure
> of their diagnostic tools.

This is a consequence of a trade-off. Any time sth gets more complex,
it has greater liklihood of failure. When I was technical lead, I used
to have to insist that my engineers not put in any code to accomplish
anything not listed in the requirements and design documents. Every
extra line of code is another place for a defect to hide. Adding more
code to the firmware in the drives, in an attempt to make the drives
last longer, makes the liklihood that the eventual failure is due
to a defect in the firmware rather than the hardware itself, rise.
There is an optimum point where additional complexity of the firmware
decreases the eventual lifetime of the product.

This is true for all products, not just disc drives.

That's one reason I don't like SeLinux and LVM. Although the
intent is make the machine more usable, it also adds more
potential points of failure. Also, the more complex a product is,
the more complex can be the failure modes, making them more
difficult to diagnose.

Mike
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