Linux On My Samsung

Posted: **03 May 2010, 02:04**

Hi guys,

I have a quick question regarding HDD's Load_Cycle_Count. There used to be a LCC related bug in Ubuntu (actually in ACPI, all distros have the same problem). But it was fixed in Ubuntu 8.10.

https://bugs.launchpad.net/ubuntu/+sour ... +bug/59695

I run Ubuntu (D620) and Arch Linux (D630), when using AC power, Load_Cycle_Count is not increasing at all. This is the expected behavior.

However, on my NC148 I found the LCC is slowly increasing (when display is put to sleep, count +1, etc...) on AC Power even if I disable Spin Down HD for both AC/Battery in Power Management. I am wondering if I am missing some packages (laptop-mode-tools???), how do you guys prevent the LCC from increasing?

Since 8.10, acpi package has changed, config files under /etc/acpi changed, no easy way to understand what is happening.

Used to be:

Code: Select all

/etc/acpi/ac.d/
/etc/acpi/battery.d/
/etc/acpi/resume.d/
/etc/acpi/start.d/

Right now, it seems the only workaround is to manually control it by using hdparm:

Code: Select all

hdparm -B 254 /dev/sda

Terry

Posted: **03 May 2010, 19:50**

In Lucid 'laptop-mode-tools' is no more installed by default, if you want it you have to manually install it. Previously you had to enable it in '/etc/default/acpi-support', now it's enabled as soon as it's installed.
Then, if you are using 'Samsung Tools', in the 'Samsung Tools Preferences' dialog there will be new options for 'laptop-mode'. To reduce LCC I suggest to put an high value for the 'Hard Disk Power Management' option.

If LCC is yet increasing too fast, then check in 'gnome-power-manager' preferences dialog if the option 'slow down hard disk when possible' is enabled and try to disable it.

Posted: **06 May 2010, 00:10**

voRia wrote:In Lucid 'laptop-mode-tools' is no more installed by default, if you want it you have to manually install it. Previously you had to enable it in '/etc/default/acpi-support', now it's enabled as soon as it's installed.
Then, if you are using 'Samsung Tools', in the 'Samsung Tools Preferences' dialog there will be new options for 'laptop-mode'. To reduce LCC I suggest to put an high value for the 'Hard Disk Power Management' option.

If LCC is yet increasing too fast, then check in 'gnome-power-manager' preferences dialog if the option 'slow down hard disk when possible' is enabled and try to disable it.

Thanks Voria.

I have discussed with a few Linuxers. We agree that laptop-mode-tools are no longer required for Ubuntu. But not sure for other distros. Someone says their Arch Linux still need it for the batt to last longer.

Spin Down has already been disable right after the installation. LCC is not increasing fast, 10/day is acceptable to me;-)

BTW: thanks for mentioning the Samsung TOols Prefs GUI. I am not aware of it until I ran dpkg -L samsung-tools^^

Posted: **06 May 2010, 17:17**

Well, maybe 'laptop-mode' is no more required in lucid for the HD management, but it does a lot more of that.

I think it's yet a usefull piece of software.

Posted: **19 May 2010, 13:55**

Hi,

I've had a Samsung N210 netbook for a couple of weeks and installed Ubuntu Netbook Remix 10.04 on it.
It was only while reading the above post that I thought to check the Load_Cycle_Count of my own disk - it's increased on average by about 600 per hour for the last 50 hours...

I've tried all sorts of hdparm -B settings but there seems to be no effect, I've also tried installing laptop-mode-tools and configuring through that. Basically, the drive seems determined to increase the LCC and there doesn't appear to be much I can do about it.

Has anyone else experienced something similar with the N210/N220 ?

Cheers !
Andrew

Posted: **20 May 2010, 00:08**

algae105 wrote:Hi,

I've had a Samsung N210 netbook for a couple of weeks and installed Ubuntu Netbook Remix 10.04 on it.
It was only while reading the above post that I thought to check the Load_Cycle_Count of my own disk - it's increased on average by about 600 per hour for the last 50 hours...

I've tried all sorts of hdparm -B settings but there seems to be no effect, I've also tried installing laptop-mode-tools and configuring through that. Basically, the drive seems determined to increase the LCC and there doesn't appear to be much I can do about it.

Has anyone else experienced something similar with the N210/N220 ?

Cheers !
Andrew

Did you uncheck "Spin down Hard Disks when possible" for both AC and Battery in GNOME Power Management Prefs?

Also, I think by running hdparm -B 254 /dev/sdX using root, the LCC should stop increasing immediately anyway.

Posted: **20 May 2010, 12:11**

Sadly, yes, I've tried all of that.

The 'Spin down' options are both disabled in gnome-power-preferences and as I said, I've tried all manner of hdparm -B values (128. 220, 254, 255 etc) and none of them make the slightest difference to the rate at which LCC is increasing (about once every 10 seconds or so).

Posted: **21 May 2010, 02:52**

algae105 wrote:Sadly, yes, I've tried all of that.

The 'Spin down' options are both disabled in gnome-power-preferences and as I said, I've tried all manner of hdparm -B values (128. 220, 254, 255 etc) and none of them make the slightest difference to the rate at which LCC is increasing (about once every 10 seconds or so).

Interesting, what's the fdisk -l and smartctl -a /dev/sdX output?

Posted: **21 May 2010, 09:21**

fdisk -l /dev/sda

Disk /dev/sda: 250.1 GB, 250059350016 bytes
255 heads, 63 sectors/track, 30401 cylinders
Units = cylinders of 16065 * 512 = 8225280 bytes
Sector size (logical/physical): 512 bytes / 512 bytes
I/O size (minimum/optimal): 512 bytes / 512 bytes
Disk identifier: 0x9d97ba08

Device Boot Start End Blocks Id System
/dev/sda1 * 1 9846 79084961 83 Linux
/dev/sda2 29420 30402 7884801 5 Extended
/dev/sda3 9846 29420 157225984 83 Linux
/dev/sda5 29420 30402 7884800 82 Linux swap / Solaris

Partition table entries are not in disk order

And smartctl -a /dev/sda

smartctl version 5.38 [i686-pc-linux-gnu] Copyright (C) 2002-8 Bruce Allen
Home page is http://smartmontools.sourceforge.net/

=== START OF INFORMATION SECTION ===
Device Model: SAMSUNG HM250HI
Serial Number: S20TJD0SB98321
Firmware Version: 2AC101C4
User Capacity: 250,059,350,016 bytes
Device is: In smartctl database [for details use: -P show]
ATA Version is: 8
ATA Standard is: Not recognized. Minor revision code: 0x28
Local Time is: Fri May 21 09:18:22 2010 BST

==> WARNING: May need -F samsung or -F samsung2 enabled; see manual for details.

SMART support is: Available - device has SMART capability.
SMART support is: Enabled

=== START OF READ SMART DATA SECTION ===
SMART overall-health self-assessment test result: PASSED

General SMART Values:
Offline data collection status: (0x00) Offline data collection activity
was never started.
Auto Offline Data Collection: Disabled.
Self-test execution status: ( 0) The previous self-test routine completed
without error or no self-test has ever
been run.
Total time to complete Offline
data collection: (3960) seconds.
Offline data collection
capabilities: (0x5b) SMART execute Offline immediate.
Auto Offline data collection on/off support.
Suspend Offline collection upon new
command.
Offline surface scan supported.
Self-test supported.
No Conveyance Self-test supported.
Selective Self-test supported.
SMART capabilities: (0x0003) Saves SMART data before entering
power-saving mode.
Supports SMART auto save timer.
Error logging capability: (0x01) Error logging supported.
General Purpose Logging supported.
Short self-test routine
recommended polling time: ( 2) minutes.
Extended self-test routine
recommended polling time: ( 66) minutes.
SCT capabilities: (0x003f) SCT Status supported.
SCT Feature Control supported.
SCT Data Table supported.

SMART Attributes Data Structure revision number: 16
Vendor Specific SMART Attributes with Thresholds:
ID# ATTRIBUTE_NAME FLAG VALUE WORST THRESH TYPE UPDATED WHEN_FAILED RAW_VALUE
1 Raw_Read_Error_Rate 0x002f 100 100 051 Pre-fail Always - 0
2 Throughput_Performance 0x0026 252 252 000 Old_age Always - 0
3 Spin_Up_Time 0x0023 093 093 025 Pre-fail Always - 2340
4 Start_Stop_Count 0x0032 100 100 000 Old_age Always - 122
5 Reallocated_Sector_Ct 0x0033 252 252 010 Pre-fail Always - 0
7 Seek_Error_Rate 0x002e 252 252 051 Old_age Always - 0
8 Seek_Time_Performance 0x0024 252 252 015 Old_age Offline - 0
9 Power_On_Hours 0x0032 100 100 000 Old_age Always - 49
10 Spin_Retry_Count 0x0032 252 252 051 Old_age Always - 0
11 Calibration_Retry_Count 0x0032 100 100 000 Old_age Always - 1
12 Power_Cycle_Count 0x0032 100 100 000 Old_age Always - 83
191 G-Sense_Error_Rate 0x0022 100 100 000 Old_age Always - 22
192 Power-Off_Retract_Count 0x0022 252 252 000 Old_age Always - 0
194 Temperature_Celsius 0x0002 064 062 000 Old_age Always - 24 (Lifetime Min/Max 12/38)
195 Hardware_ECC_Recovered 0x003a 100 100 000 Old_age Always - 0
196 Reallocated_Event_Count 0x0032 252 252 000 Old_age Always - 0
197 Current_Pending_Sector 0x0032 252 252 000 Old_age Always - 0
198 Offline_Uncorrectable 0x0030 252 252 000 Old_age Offline - 0
199 UDMA_CRC_Error_Count 0x0036 200 200 000 Old_age Always - 0
200 Multi_Zone_Error_Rate 0x002a 100 100 000 Old_age Always - 0
223 Load_Retry_Count 0x0032 100 100 000 Old_age Always - 1
225 Load_Cycle_Count 0x0032 097 097 000 Old_age Always - 32404

SMART Error Log Version: 1
No Errors Logged

SMART Self-test log structure revision number 1
No self-tests have been logged. [To run self-tests, use: smartctl -t]

SMART Selective Self-Test Log Data Structure Revision Number (0) should be 1
SMART Selective self-test log data structure revision number 0
Warning: ATA Specification requires selective self-test log data structure revision number = 1
SPAN MIN_LBA MAX_LBA CURRENT_TEST_STATUS
1 0 0 Completed [00% left] (0-65535)
2 0 0 Not_testing
3 0 0 Not_testing
4 0 0 Not_testing
5 0 0 Not_testing
Selective self-test flags (0x0):
After scanning selected spans, do NOT read-scan remainder of disk.
If Selective self-test is pending on power-up, resume after 0 minute delay.

And for good measure, hdparm -B /dev/sda

/dev/sda:
APM_level = 254

You'll see that power on hours = 49 and LCC = 32404. It's been on AC power almost the entire time I've had it.

Posted: **24 May 2010, 01:16**

Looks like your HD is different from mine. You're with a Samsung HDD;-)

Mine is:
Device Model: TOSHIBA MK2555GSX

Posted: **24 May 2010, 08:45**

Yes, I'm going to try swapping the Samsung HDD for a Western Digital to see if the 'problem' goes away. Mind you, I'm not even sure it's a problem at all. Sometimes too much information is a bad thing

Posted: **26 May 2010, 22:04**

Just for the sake of anyone else with an N210/N220 who might look at this.,, I've now tried a Western Digital WD2500BEVT in the same netbook and it responds perfectly to hdparm commands. Must be some quirk of the Samsung HM250 drive that ships with the netbook.

Cheers,
Andrew

Linux On My Samsung

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