Disabling ATAPI retry?

Disabling ATAPI retry?

[kelleycook]

I am attempting to copy data off a damaged partition on an
ATAPI hard drive onto a new drive using 'dd
conv=sync,noerror' since my Deskstar recently blew up.

My main problem is the fact that when it hits a bad sector,
the drive goes into retry mode for a sizeable portion of
time before coming back with an error.  This means that as a
rough estimate, it is going to take a month to copy the
partition.

Is there a boot parameter or a runtime command that can tell
the linux IDE driver not to automatically retry on error.

Sorry if this is an FAQ, but I could not find the
information.

Kelley Cook

Re: Disabling ATAPI retry?

[Alan Cox]

On Thu, 2003-03-06 at 20:58, kelleycook@wideopenwest.com wrote:
> Is there a boot parameter or a runtime command that can tell
> the linux IDE driver not to automatically retry on error.

There isn't. You can always build a kernel set not to, but even then it
takes the drive firmware a sizeable time to retry a block. If its an IBM
you might want to try the ibm tools on them if you can get them. They 
seem to have vanished from the face of the earth when IBM dumped its disk
business 

Re: Disabling ATAPI retry?

[Daniel Pittman]

On 06 Mar 2003, Alan Cox wrote:
> On Thu, 2003-03-06 at 20:58, kelleycook@wideopenwest.com wrote:
>> Is there a boot parameter or a runtime command that can tell
>> the linux IDE driver not to automatically retry on error.
> 
> There isn't. You can always build a kernel set not to, but even then
> it takes the drive firmware a sizeable time to retry a block. 

Hrm. Is this something that is likely to be introduced at some point?

My interest lies in the fact that I use a Linux based DVD player which
locked up for around twenty minutes the other night trying to read a
dozen bad blocks on a DVD with a single scratch...

Being able to reduce that time lag to a minimum, even if it left the
hardware delays, would be great -- even if it was only for ATAPI
devices.


The biggest slowdown was the kernel retrying each block a number of
times, then performing a full ATAPI bus reset before giving up.

       Daniel

-- 
Why could one never do a natural thing without having to
screen it behind a structure of artifice?
        -- Edith Wharton,  _House of Mirth_

Re: Disabling ATAPI retry?

[Alan Cox]

On Fri, 2003-03-07 at 04:08, Daniel Pittman wrote:
> On 06 Mar 2003, Alan Cox wrote:
> > On Thu, 2003-03-06 at 20:58, kelleycook@wideopenwest.com wrote:
> >> Is there a boot parameter or a runtime command that can tell
> >> the linux IDE driver not to automatically retry on error.
> > 
> > There isn't. You can always build a kernel set not to, but even then
> > it takes the drive firmware a sizeable time to retry a block. 
> 
> Hrm. Is this something that is likely to be introduced at some point?

I take patches. Otherwise its not going to happen until the bugs are
all sorted in 2.4 and 2.5, the current chipset stuff is all dealt with,
the initialisation mess is resolved, ide-cs unload bugs are fixed and
so on.

Alan

IBM^H^H^HHitachi disk tools (was Re: Disabling ATAPI retry?)

[Barry K. Nathan]

On Thu, Mar 06, 2003 at 11:01:12PM +0000, Alan Cox wrote:
> There isn't. You can always build a kernel set not to, but even then it
> takes the drive firmware a sizeable time to retry a block. If its an IBM
> you might want to try the ibm tools on them if you can get them. They 
> seem to have vanished from the face of the earth when IBM dumped its disk
> business 

Actually, IBM dumped its disk business to Hitachi, and that's where the
tools went too:
http://www.hgst.com/hdd/support/download.htm

They say "HITACHI" instead of "IBM" but otherwise they're the same tools
with the same user interface and same functionality.

-Barry K. Nathan <barryn@pobox.com>

Re: Disabling ATAPI retry?

[Mikael Pettersson]

Alan Cox wrote:
>   If its an IBM
>you might want to try the ibm tools on them if you can get them. They 
>seem to have vanished from the face of the earth when IBM dumped its disk
>business 

Nope, they're now at http://www.hgst.com/hdd/support/download.htm.