S.M.A.R.T. is a technology that allows you to monitor and analyze the health and performance of your hard drives. It provides valuable information about the status of your storage devices. Here are some useful commands and tips for using S.M.A.R.T. with smartctl:

Display S.M.A.R.T. Information

To display S.M.A.R.T. information for a specific drive, you can use the following command:

smartctl -a /dev/sda

This command will show all available S.M.A.R.T. data for the /dev/sda drive.

Check if a Disk Supports S.M.A.R.T.

Before running S.M.A.R.T. tests, you should check if your disk supports S.M.A.R.T. Use the following commands:

For IDE disks:

smartctl -i /dev/hda

For SATA disks:

smartctl -i -d ata /dev/sda

If SMART support is available, you’ll see the message: “SMART support is: Available โ€“ device has SMART capability.” To enable SMART if it’s not already enabled, use:

For IDE disks:

smartctl -s on /dev/hda

For SATA disks:

smartctl -s on -d ata /dev/sda

To get all SMART details of your drive:

For IDE disks:

smartctl -a /dev/hda

For SATA disks:

smartctl -a -d ata /dev/sda

Run S.M.A.R.T. Tests

To run various S.M.A.R.T. tests on your hard drive, you can use the following commands:

  • Short test:
smartctl -t short /dev/sda
  • Long test:
smartctl -t long /dev/sda

Health Check

To perform a health check on your hard drive, use:

smartctl -H /dev/sda

If the hard drive status is healthy, it will return “PASSED.” If there are issues, consider running additional tests.

Viewing Error Logs

To view the SMART Error Log, use:

smartctl -l error /dev/sda

If “No Errors Logged” is printed, your hard drive is likely healthy. Investigate further if there are errors.

Automatically Monitor Your Drives

You can set up automatic monitoring of your drives using the smartd daemon. Edit the configuration in /etc/smartd.conf. Here’s a sample configuration to get you started:

DEVICESCAN -H -l error -l selftest -t -m myuser@gmail.com -M exec /bin/mail -s (S/../.././02|L/../../6/03)

This configuration checks attributes and sends an email notification to myuser@gmail.com if issues are detected.

To start the smartd daemon:

/etc/rc.d/smartd restart

Remember to remove the -M test option from the configuration after testing.

These commands will provide comprehensive information about your drive’s SMART attributes.

For more information and advanced options, refer to the man smartctl command.

Sources

Some blog on the topic.