SATA 300 Drive Being Run At 150

[Jeremy Chadwick]

On Sun, Jul 22, 2007 at 12:10:12AM -0300, Marc G. Fournier wrote:
> > In the last episode (Jul 21), Tim Daneliuk said:
> >> ad4: 238475MB <WDC WD2500JS-00NCB1 10.02E02> at ata2-master SATA150
>
> ad8: 152627MB <WDC WD1600AAJS-08PSA0 05.06H05> at ata4-master SATA150

Something else I thought I'd mention in passing (though neither of you 
are affected by this, but I thought I'd throw it out there so people
can find it):

There is a specific model of WDC drive that reports incorrect thermal
statistics via SMART.  The temperatures are approximately 20C off (20C
too high).  The problem may affect other models, but so far has been
confirmed by WD to affect 1 specific model.

Rumour is that a drive firmware update can fix the problem, but WD isn't
giving out the firmware nor the updater.  Instead they're insisting
owners file an RMA and send the drive back to WDC.  How "convenient".

Two weeks ago I noticed one (Seagate) drive in our server was reporting
32C, while the WDC drive in the carrier next to it was reporting 54C.

As usual these days: Google to the rescue.

I opted to do the "Advance Replacement", which is where you pay $80 or
so for a replacement drive to be shipped to you first, and you'll be
credited when WD receives the RMA'd drive.  I'm glad I did it this way
too, since chances are had I done a standard RMA it would've been
returned to me with a "there's nothing wrong with this drive" note.

The new drive I received had the same model and f/w revision, yet didn't
see +20C temperatures via SMART.  Hmmmm!  The reason I'm pointing this
out: either it's a hardware problem (thermistor of the wrong kind being
installed), or a f/w problem.  If it's a f/w problem, they aren't
bothering to update the f/w revision number to differentiate drives with
the broken code vs. ones with the working code.  Naughty Western
Digital...

The file I kept on this matter is below, which includes a quote from
some forum user.

-- 
| Jeremy Chadwick                                    jdc at parodius.com |
| Parodius Networking                           http://www.parodius.com/ |
| UNIX Systems Administrator                      Mountain View, CA, USA |
| Making life hard for others since 1977.                  PGP: 4BD6C0CB |

=====================================================
Protocol              Serial ATA II
device model          WDC WD2500KS-00MJB0
firmware revision     02.01C03

http://episteme.arstechnica.com/groupee/forums/a/tpc/f/24609792/m/857003655731
http://forum.effizienzgurus.de/f40/temps-bei-wd-se16-250gb-wd2500ks-t1060.html

  "So I got in touch with WD's Customer Support and I have just being informed
  that this paticular drive, WD2500KS-00MJB0, contains a bug in the Firmware
  (mine got version number 02.01C03) with regards to the usage of the SMART
  feature. The temperature of the drive which it reports is not correct. Mine
  read over 30 degrees centigrade just after I started the PC up. This
  Temperature got up to 62 degrees after a short while, whilst my other two WD
  drives still reported only 32-33 degrees in about the same position in the
  tower as this drive. I've been told an Firmware upgrade to rectify this is on
  it's way."

http://www.bugtrack.almico.com/view.php?id=468
http://secure.ncix.com/forumpost/displaythread.php?threadid=1026701
http://www.lavalys.com/forum/lofiversion/index.php/t1372.html
=====================================================