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USB3 Backup GOTCHA

G

glen

Limp Gawd
Joined
Nov 30, 2007
Messages
230
I bought a couple of the Hitachi 4TB USB3.0 external hard drives. USB3 is fast but there is an issue that has me sticking to esata.

I formatted one of the usb3 drives, then I pulled it from its case to use as an internal drive.

Gues what? Windows doesn't recognize the drive. The USB3 to Sata interface used in the case must be some proprietary format, so if that board goes bad you lose all your data.

So I am not sure for backups that USB3 is a good metod, since plugging the drive directly into ata shows it as unrecognizable.

Stick to esata.
 
Agree, but a pair of 4TB Hitachi for $160 each was too good a deal, just glad I tore one open to see what was really going on. They had it broke into 3 partitions, Had to use diskpart to clean the MBRs and make it a single GPT drive. Going to throw both enclosures in the trash and keep the $250 enclosures inside, they averaged 58F.
 
What about doing the opposite ? Once the drive is configured properly, putting it back in the enclosure to see what happens.
 
My Hitachi 4TB external has GPT.

Code: 
jmd0 recordings # gdisk -l /dev/sdh
GPT fdisk (gdisk) version 0.8.5

Partition table scan:
  MBR: protective
  BSD: not present
  APM: not present
  GPT: present

Found valid GPT with protective MBR; using GPT.
Disk /dev/sdh: 976754431 sectors, 3.6 TiB
Logical sector size: 4096 bytes
Disk identifier (GUID): A428994D-B45A-4F61-A4E7-2A2BCBAA70F5
Partition table holds up to 128 entries
First usable sector is 6, last usable sector is 976754425
Partitions will be aligned on 8-sector boundaries
Total free space is 490330364 sectors (1.8 TiB)

Number  Start (sector)    End (sector)  Size       Code  Name
   1               8       486424063   1.8 TiB     8300  Linux filesystem


However after I tested it for over 30 hours with badblocks (overwriting whatever was on the disk from the factory) I put a GPT partition table on it and a btrfs filesystem. I have not cracked it open though. I have no free SATA ports on the machine its connected to so I added a USB3 controller and all is well.
Code: 
jmd0 recordings # smartctl --all /dev/sdh
smartctl 6.0 2012-10-10 r3643 [x86_64-linux-3.8.4-gentoo-jmd0] (local build)
Copyright (C) 2002-12, Bruce Allen, Christian Franke, www.smartmontools.org

=== START OF INFORMATION SECTION ===
Model Family:     Hitachi Deskstar 5K4000
Device Model:     Hitachi HDS5C4040ALE630
Serial Number:    PL2311LAG2UNAJ
LU WWN Device Id: 5 000cca 22ec1490d
Firmware Version: MPAOA3B0
User Capacity:    4,000,787,030,016 bytes [4.00 TB]
Sector Sizes:     512 bytes logical, 4096 bytes physical
Rotation Rate:    5700 rpm
Device is:        In smartctl database [for details use: -P show]
ATA Version is:   ATA8-ACS T13/1699-D revision 4
SATA Version is:  SATA 3.0, 6.0 Gb/s (current: 3.0 Gb/s)
Local Time is:    Sat Mar 23 08:04:00 2013 EDT
SMART support is: Available - device has SMART capability.
SMART support is: Enabled

=== START OF READ SMART DATA SECTION ===
SMART STATUS RETURN: incomplete response, ATA output registers missing
SMART overall-health self-assessment test result: PASSED
Warning: This result is based on an Attribute check.

General SMART Values:
Offline data collection status:  (0x84) Offline data collection activity
                                        was suspended by an interrupting command from host.
                                        Auto Offline Data Collection: Enabled.
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:                (43378) 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:        (   1) minutes.
Extended self-test routine
recommended polling time:        ( 723) minutes.
SCT capabilities:              (0x003d) SCT Status supported.
                                        SCT Error Recovery Control 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     0x000b   100   100   016    Pre-fail  Always       -       0
  2 Throughput_Performance  0x0005   134   134   054    Pre-fail  Offline      -       101
  3 Spin_Up_Time            0x0007   124   124   024    Pre-fail  Always       -       560 (Average 561)
  4 Start_Stop_Count        0x0012   100   100   000    Old_age   Always       -       64
  5 Reallocated_Sector_Ct   0x0033   100   100   005    Pre-fail  Always       -       0
  7 Seek_Error_Rate         0x000b   100   100   067    Pre-fail  Always       -       0
  8 Seek_Time_Performance   0x0005   113   113   020    Pre-fail  Offline      -       42
  9 Power_On_Hours          0x0012   100   100   000    Old_age   Always       -       626
 10 Spin_Retry_Count        0x0013   100   100   060    Pre-fail  Always       -       0
 12 Power_Cycle_Count       0x0032   100   100   000    Old_age   Always       -       63
192 Power-Off_Retract_Count 0x0032   100   100   000    Old_age   Always       -       78
193 Load_Cycle_Count        0x0012   100   100   000    Old_age   Always       -       78
194 Temperature_Celsius     0x0002   117   117   000    Old_age   Always       -       51 (Min/Max 15/56)
196 Reallocated_Event_Count 0x0032   100   100   000    Old_age   Always       -       0
197 Current_Pending_Sector  0x0022   100   100   000    Old_age   Always       -       0
198 Offline_Uncorrectable   0x0008   100   100   000    Old_age   Offline      -       0
199 UDMA_CRC_Error_Count    0x000a   200   200   000    Old_age   Always       -       0

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 1
 SPAN  MIN_LBA  MAX_LBA  CURRENT_TEST_STATUS
    1        0        0  Not_testing
    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.

The temp right now on the drive is 51C. Although I have been rading and writing to it for over 12 hours. I am using it at the moment to reorganize a few 2TB internal drives (converting ext4 on top of lvm to btrfs on partitions).
 
Last edited:
Gues what? Windows doesn't recognize the drive. The USB3 to Sata interface used in the case must be some proprietary format, so if that board goes bad you lose all your data.
Click to expand...
Have you worked with 2TB+ drives before?

It's still a little confusing to me but generally (for a non-bootable Windows volume) the BIOS must recognize it and it must be formatted with GPT.

Seems any USB will recognize the drive but if formatted with NTFS you'll run into problems down the road.

If using eSATA the results would have been the same unrecognizable volume.
 
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