SMARTD(8) 2010-07-12 SMARTD(8)NAMEsmartd - SMART Disk Monitoring Daemon
SYNOPSISsmartd [options]
FULL PATH
/usr/sbin/smartd
PACKAGE VERSION
smartmontools-5.40 2010-07-12 r3124
DESCRIPTIONsmartd is a daemon that monitors the Self-Monitoring, Analysis and
Reporting Technology (SMART) system built into many ATA-3 and later
ATA, IDE and SCSI-3 hard drives. The purpose of SMART is to monitor the
reliability of the hard drive and predict drive failures, and to carry
out different types of drive self-tests. This version of smartd is
compatible with ATA/ATAPI-7 and earlier standards (see REFERENCES
below).
smartd will attempt to enable SMART monitoring on ATA devices (equiva‐
lent to smartctl -s on) and polls these and SCSI devices every 30 min‐
utes (configurable), logging SMART errors and changes of SMART
Attributes via the SYSLOG interface. The default location for these
SYSLOG notifications and warnings is system-dependent (typically
/var/log/messages or /var/log/syslog). To change this default loca‐
tion, please see the ´-l´ command-line option described below.
In addition to logging to a file, smartd can also be configured to send
email warnings if problems are detected. Depending upon the type of
problem, you may want to run self-tests on the disk, back up the disk,
replace the disk, or use a manufacturer´s utility to force reallocation
of bad or unreadable disk sectors. If disk problems are detected,
please see the smartctl manual page and the smartmontools web page/FAQ
for further guidance.
If you send a USR1 signal to smartd it will immediately check the sta‐
tus of the disks, and then return to polling the disks every 30 min‐
utes. See the ´-i´ option below for additional details.
smartd can be configured at start-up using the configuration file
/etc/smartd.conf (Windows: EXEDIR/smartd.conf). If the configuration
file is subsequently modified, smartd can be told to re-read the con‐
figuration file by sending it a HUP signal, for example with the com‐
mand:
killall -HUP smartd.
(Windows: See NOTES below.)
On startup, if smartd finds a syntax error in the configuration file,
it will print an error message and then exit. However if smartd is
already running, then is told with a HUP signal to re-read the configu‐
ration file, and then find a syntax error in this file, it will print
an error message and then continue, ignoring the contents of the
(faulty) configuration file, as if the HUP signal had never been
received.
When smartd is running in debug mode, the INT signal (normally gener‐
ated from a shell with CONTROL-C) is treated in the same way as a HUP
signal: it makes smartd reload its configuration file. To exit smartd
use CONTROL-\ (Cygwin: 2x CONTROL-C, Windows: CONTROL-Break).
On startup, in the absence of the configuration file /etc/smartd.conf,
the smartd daemon first scans for all devices that support SMART. The
scanning is done as follows:
LINUX: Examine all entries "/dev/hd[a-t]" for IDE/ATA devices, and
"/dev/sd[a-z]", "/dev/sd[a-c][a-z]" for SCSI or SATA devices.
FREEBSD: Authoritative list of disk devices is obtained from SCSI (CAM)
and ATA subsystems.
NETBSD/OPENBSD:
Authoritative list of disk devices is obtained from sysctl
´hw.disknames´.
SOLARIS: Examine all entries "/dev/rdsk/c?t?d?s?" for IDE/ATA and SCSI
disk devices, and entries "/dev/rmt/*" for SCSI tape devices.
DARWIN: The IOService plane is scanned for ATA block storage devices.
WINDOWS 9x/ME:
Examine all entries "/dev/hd[a-d]" (bitmask from
"\\.\SMARTVSD") for IDE/ATA devices. Examine all entries
"/dev/scsi[0-9][0-f]" for SCSI devices on ASPI adapter 0-9, ID
0-15.
WINDOWS NT4/2000/XP/2003/Vista:
Examine all entries "/dev/sd[a-j]" ("\\.\PhysicalDrive[0-9]")
for IDE/(S)ATA and SCSI disk devices
If a 3ware 9000 controller is installed, examine all entries
"/dev/sdX,N" for the first logical drive (´unit´ "/dev/sdX")
and all physical disks (´ports´ ",N") detected behind this
controller. Same for a second controller if present.
CYGWIN: See "WINDOWS NT4/2000/XP/2003/Vista" above.
OS/2,eComStation:
Use the form "/dev/hd[a-z]" for IDE/ATA devices.
smartd then monitors for all possible SMART errors (corresponding to
the ´-a´ Directive in the configuration file; see CONFIGURATION FILE
below).
OPTIONS-A PREFIX, --attributelog=PREFIX
[NEW EXPERIMENTAL SMARTD FEATURE] [ATA ONLY] Writes smartd
attribute information (normalized and raw attribute values) to
files ´PREFIX´´MODEL-SERIAL.ata.csv´. At each check cycle
attributes are logged as a line of semicolon separated triplets
of the form "attribute-ID;attribute-norm-value;attribute-raw-
value;". Each line is led by a date string of the form "yyyy-mm-
dd HH:MM:SS" (in UTC).
If this option is not specified, attribute information is writ‐
ten to files ´/var/lib/smartmontools/attr‐
log.MODEL-SERIAL.ata.csv´. To disable attribute log files,
specify this option with an empty string argument: ´-A ""´.
MODEL and SERIAL are build from drive identify information,
invalid characters are replaced by underline.
If the PREFIX has the form ´/path/dir/´ (e.g.
´/var/lib/smartd/´), then files ´MODEL-SERIAL.ata.csv´ are cre‐
ated in directory ´/path/dir´. If the PREFIX has the form
´/path/name´ (e.g. ´/var/lib/misc/attrlog-´), then files 'nameM‐
ODEL-SERIAL.ata.csv' are created in directory '/path/'. The
path must be absolute, except if debug mode is enabled.
-B [+]FILE, --drivedb=[+]FILE
[NEW EXPERIMENTAL SMARTD FEATURE] Read the drive database from
FILE. The new database replaces the built in database by
default. If ´+´ is specified, then the new entries prepend the
built in entries. Please see the smartctl(8) man page for fur‐
ther details.
-c FILE, --configfile=FILE
Read smartd configuration Directives from FILE, instead of from
the default location /etc/smartd.conf (Windows:
EXEDIR/smartd.conf). If FILE does not exist, then smartd will
print an error message and exit with nonzero status. Thus, ´-c
/etc/smartd.conf´ can be used to verify the existence of the
default configuration file.
By using ´-´ for FILE, the configuration is read from standard
input. This is useful for commands like:
echo /dev/hdb -m user@home -M test | smartd-c - -q onecheck
to perform quick and simple checks without a configuration file.
-C, --capabilities
Use capabilities(7) (EXPERIMENTAL).
Warning: Mail notification does not work when used.
-d, --debug
Runs smartd in "debug" mode. In this mode, it displays status
information to STDOUT rather than logging it to SYSLOG and does
not fork(2) into the background and detach from the controlling
terminal. In this mode, smartd also prints more verbose infor‐
mation about what it is doing than when operating in "daemon"
mode. In this mode, the QUIT signal (normally generated from a
terminal with CONTROL-C) makes smartd reload its configuration
file. Please use CONTROL-\ to exit (Cygwin: 2x CONTROL-C, Win‐
dows: CONTROL-Break).
Windows only: The "debug" mode can be toggled by the command
smartd sigusr2. A new console for debug output is opened when
debug mode is enabled.
-D, --showdirectives
Prints a list (to STDOUT) of all the possible Directives which
may appear in the configuration file /etc/smartd.conf, and then
exits. These Directives are also described later in this man
page. They may appear in the configuration file following the
device name.
-h, --help, --usage
Prints usage message to STDOUT and exits.
-i N, --interval=N
Sets the interval between disk checks to N seconds, where N is a
decimal integer. The minimum allowed value is ten and the maxi‐
mum is the largest positive integer that can be represented on
your system (often 2^31-1). The default is 1800 seconds.
Note that the superuser can make smartd check the status of the
disks at any time by sending it the SIGUSR1 signal, for example
with the command:
kill -SIGUSR1 <pid>
where <pid> is the process id number of smartd. One may also
use:
killall -USR1smartd
for the same purpose.
(Windows: See NOTES below.)
-l FACILITY, --logfacility=FACILITY
Uses syslog facility FACILITY to log the messages from smartd.
Here FACILITY is one of local0, local1, ..., local7, or daemon
[default]. If this command-line option is not used, then by
default messages from smartd are logged to the facility daemon.
If you would like to have smartd messages logged somewhere other
than the default location, this can typically be accomplished
with (for example) the following steps:
[1] Modify the script that starts smartd to include the smartd
command-line argument ´-l local3´. This tells smartd to log
its messages to facility local3.
[2] Modify the syslogd configuration file (typically /etc/sys‐
log.conf) by adding a line of the form:
local3.* /var/log/smartd.log
This tells syslogd to log all the messages from facility
local3 to the designated file: /var/log/smartd.log.
[3] Tell syslogd to re-read its configuration file, typically by
sending the syslogd process a SIGHUP hang-up signal.
[4] Start (or restart) the smartd daemon.
For more detailed information, please refer to the man pages for
syslog.conf, syslogd, and syslog. You may also want to modify
the log rotation configuration files; see the man pages for
logrotate and examine your system´s /etc/logrotate.conf file.
Cygwin: Support for syslogd as described above is available
starting with Cygwin 1.5.15. On older releases or if no local
syslogd is running, the ´-l´ option has no effect. In this
case, all syslog messages are written to Windows event log or to
file C:/CYGWIN_SYSLOG.TXT if the event log is not available.
Windows: Some syslog functionality is implemented internally in
smartd as follows: If no ´-l´ option (or ´-l daemon´) is speci‐
fied, messages are written to Windows event log or to file
./smartd.log if event log is not available (Win9x/ME or access
denied). By specifying other values of FACILITY, log output is
redirected as follows: ´-l local0´ to file ./smartd.log, ´-l
local1´ to standard output (redirect with ´>´ to any file), ´-l
local2´ to standard error, ´-l local[3-7]´: to file
./smartd[1-5].log.
When using the event log, the enclosed utility syslogevt.exe
should be registered as an event message file to avoid error
messages from the event viewer. Use ´syslogevt -r smartd´ to
register, ´syslogevt -u smartd´ to unregister and ´syslogevt´
for more help.
-n, --no-fork
Do not fork into background; this is useful when executed from
modern init methods like initng, minit or supervise.
On Cygwin, this allows running smartd as service via cygrunsrv,
see NOTES below.
On Windows, this option is not available, use ´--service´
instead.
-p NAME, --pidfile=NAME
Writes pidfile NAME containing the smartd Process ID number
(PID). To avoid symlink attacks make sure the directory to
which pidfile is written is only writable for root. Without
this option, or if the --debug option is given, no PID file is
written on startup. If smartd is killed with a maskable signal
then the pidfile is removed.
-q WHEN, --quit=WHEN
Specifies when, if ever, smartd should exit. The valid argu‐
ments are to this option are:
nodev - Exit if there are no devices to monitor, or if any
errors are found at startup in the configuration file. This is
the default.
errors - Exit if there are no devices to monitor, or if any
errors are found in the configuration file /etc/smartd.conf at
startup or whenever it is reloaded.
nodevstartup - Exit if there are no devices to monitor at
startup. But continue to run if no devices are found whenever
the configuration file is reloaded.
never - Only exit if a fatal error occurs (no remaining system
memory, invalid command line arguments). In this mode, even if
there are no devices to monitor, or if the configuration file
/etc/smartd.conf has errors, smartd will continue to run, wait‐
ing to load a configuration file listing valid devices.
onecheck - Start smartd in debug mode, then register devices,
then check device´s SMART status once, and then exit with zero
exit status if all of these steps worked correctly.
This last option is intended for ´distribution-writers´ who want
to create automated scripts to determine whether or not to auto‐
matically start up smartd after installing smartmontools. After
starting smartd with this command-line option, the distribu‐
tion´s install scripts should wait a reasonable length of time
(say ten seconds). If smartd has not exited with zero status by
that time, the script should send smartd a SIGTERM or SIGKILL
and assume that smartd will not operate correctly on the host.
Conversely, if smartd exits with zero status, then it is safe to
run smartd in normal daemon mode. If smartd is unable to monitor
any devices or encounters other problems then it will return
with non-zero exit status.
showtests - Start smartd in debug mode, then register devices,
then write a list of future scheduled self tests to stdout, and
then exit with zero exit status if all of these steps worked
correctly. Device's SMART status is not checked.
This option is intended to test whether the '-s REGEX' direc‐
tives in smartd.conf will have the desired effect. The output
lists the next test schedules, limited to 5 tests per type and
device. This is followed by a summary of all tests of each
device within the next 90 days.
-r TYPE, --report=TYPE
Intended primarily to help smartmontools developers understand
the behavior of smartmontools on non-conforming or poorly-con‐
forming hardware. This option reports details of smartd trans‐
actions with the device. The option can be used multiple times.
When used just once, it shows a record of the ioctl() transac‐
tions with the device. When used more than once, the detail of
these ioctl() transactions are reported in greater detail. The
valid arguments to this option are:
ioctl - report all ioctl() transactions.
ataioctl - report only ioctl() transactions with ATA devices.
scsiioctl - report only ioctl() transactions with SCSI devices.
Any argument may include a positive integer to specify the level
of detail that should be reported. The argument should be fol‐
lowed by a comma then the integer with no spaces. For example,
ataioctl,2 The default level is 1, so ´-r ataioctl,1´ and ´-r
ataioctl´ are equivalent.
-s PREFIX, --savestates=PREFIX
[NEW EXPERIMENTAL SMARTD FEATURE] [ATA ONLY] Reads/writes smartd
state information from/to files ´PRE‐
FIX´´MODEL-SERIAL.ata.state´. This preserves SMART attributes,
drive min and max temperatures (-W directive), info about last
sent warning email (-m directive), and the time of next check of
the self-test REGEXP (-s directive) across boot cycles.
If this option is not specified, state information is maintained
in files ´/var/lib/smartmontools/smartd.MODEL-SERIAL.ata.state´.
To disable state files, specify this option with an empty string
argument: ´-s ""´. MODEL and SERIAL are build from drive iden‐
tify information, invalid characters are replaced by underline.
If the PREFIX has the form ´/path/dir/´ (e.g.
´/var/lib/smartd/´), then files ´MODEL-SERIAL.ata.state´ are
created in directory ´/path/dir´. If the PREFIX has the form
´/path/name´ (e.g. ´/var/lib/misc/smartd-´), then files 'nameMO‐
DEL-SERIAL.ata.state' are created in directory '/path/'. The
path must be absolute, except if debug mode is enabled.
The state information files are read on smartd startup. The
files are always (re)written after reading the configuration
file, before rereading the configuration file (SIGHUP), before
smartd shutdown, and after a check forced by SIGUSR1. After a
normal check cycle, a file is only rewritten if an important
change (which usually results in a SYSLOG output) occurred.
--service
Cygwin and Windows only: Enables smartd to run as a Windows ser‐
vice.
On Cygwin, this option is kept for backward compatibility only.
It has the same effect as ´-n, --no-fork´, see above.
On Windows, this option enables the buildin service support.
The option must be specified in the service command line as the
first argument. It should not be used from console. See NOTES
below for details.
-V, --version, --license, --copyright
Prints version, copyright, license, home page and SVN revision
information for your copy of smartd to STDOUT and then exits.
Please include this information if you are reporting bugs or
problems.
EXAMPLESsmartd
Runs the daemon in forked mode. This is the normal way to run smartd.
Entries are logged to SYSLOG.
smartd-d -i 30
Run in foreground (debug) mode, checking the disk status every 30 sec‐
onds.
smartd-q onecheck
Registers devices, and checks the status of the devices exactly once.
The exit status (the bash $? variable) will be zero if all went well,
and nonzero if no devices were detected or some other problem was
encountered.
Note that smartmontools provides a start-up script in
/etc/init.d/smartd which is responsible for starting and stopping the
daemon via the normal init interface. Using this script, you can start
smartd by giving the command:
/etc/init.d/smartd start
and stop it by using the command:
/etc/init.d/smartd stop
CONFIGURATION FILE /etc/smartd.conf
In the absence of a configuration file, under Linux smartd will try to
open the 20 ATA devices /dev/hd[a-t] and the 26 SCSI devices /dev/sd[a-
z]. Under FreeBSD, smartd will try to open all existing ATA devices
(with entries in /dev) /dev/ad[0-9]+ and all existing SCSI devices
(using CAM subsystem). Under NetBSD/OpenBSD, smartd will try to open
all existing ATA devices (with entries in /dev) /dev/wd[0-9]+c and all
existing SCSI devices /dev/sd[0-9]+c. Under Solaris smartd will try to
open all entries "/dev/rdsk/c?t?d?s?" for IDE/ATA and SCSI disk
devices, and entries "/dev/rmt/*" for SCSI tape devices. Under Windows
smartd will try to open all entries "/dev/hd[a-j]" ("\\.\Physi‐
calDrive[0-9]") for IDE/ATA devices on WinNT4/2000/XP, "/dev/hd[a-d]"
(bitmask from "\\.\SMARTVSD") for IDE/ATA devices on Win95/98/98SE/ME,
and "/dev/scsi[0-9][0-7]" (ASPI adapter 0-9, ID 0-7) for SCSI devices
on all versions of Windows. Under Darwin, smartd will open any ATA
block storage device.
This can be annoying if you have an ATA or SCSI device that hangs or
misbehaves when receiving SMART commands. Even if this causes no prob‐
lems, you may be annoyed by the string of error log messages about
block-major devices that can´t be found, and SCSI devices that can´t be
opened.
One can avoid this problem, and gain more control over the types of
events monitored by smartd, by using the configuration file
/etc/smartd.conf. This file contains a list of devices to monitor,
with one device per line. An example file is included with the smart‐
montools distribution. You will find this sample configuration file in
/usr/share/doc/smartmontools/. For security, the configuration file
should not be writable by anyone but root. The syntax of the file is as
follows:
· There should be one device listed per line, although you may have
lines that are entirely comments or white space.
· Any text following a hash sign ´#´ and up to the end of the line is
taken to be a comment, and ignored.
· Lines may be continued by using a backslash ´\´ as the last non-
whitespace or non-comment item on a line.
· Note: a line whose first character is a hash sign ´#´ is treated as
a white-space blank line, not as a non-existent line, and will end
a continuation line.
Here is an example configuration file. It´s for illustrative purposes
only; please don´t copy it onto your system without reading to the end
of the DIRECTIVES Section below!
################################################
# This is an example smartd startup config file
# /etc/smartd.conf for monitoring three
# ATA disks, three SCSI disks, six ATA disks
# behind two 3ware controllers, two disks on a cciss
# controller, three SATA disks directly connected
# to the HighPoint Rocket-RAID controller,
# two SATA disks connected to the HighPoint
# RocketRAID controller via a pmport
# device, four SATA disks connected to an Areca
# RAID controller, and one SATA disk.
#
# First ATA disk on two different interfaces. On
# the second disk, start a long self-test every
# Sunday between 3 and 4 am.
#
/dev/hda -a -m admin@example.com,root@localhost
/dev/hdc -a -I 194 -I 5 -i 12 -s L/../../7/03
#
# SCSI disks. Send a TEST warning email to admin on
# startup.
#
/dev/sda
/dev/sdb -m admin@example.com -M test
#
# Strange device. It´s SCSI. Start a scheduled
# long self test between 5 and 6 am Monday/Thursday
/dev/weird -d scsi -s L/../../(1|4)/05
#
# An ATA disk may appear as a SCSI device to the
# OS. If a SCSI to ATA Translation (SAT) layer
# is between the OS and the device then this can be
# flagged with the '-d sat' option. This situation
# may become common with SATA disks in SAS and FC
# environments.
/dev/sda -a -d sat
#
# Three disks connected to a MegaRAID controller
# Start short self-tests daily between 1-2, 2-3, and
# 3-4 am.
/dev/sda -d megaraid,0 -a -s S/../.././01
/dev/sda -d megaraid,1 -a -s S/../.././02
/dev/sda -d megaraid,2 -a -s S/../.././03
#
# Four ATA disks on a 3ware 6/7/8000 controller.
# Start short self-tests daily between midnight and 1am,
# 1-2, 2-3, and 3-4 am. Starting with the Linux 2.6
# kernel series, /dev/sdX is deprecated in favor of
# /dev/tweN. For example replace /dev/sdc by /dev/twe0
# and /dev/sdd by /dev/twe1.
/dev/sdc -d 3ware,0 -a -s S/../.././00
/dev/sdc -d 3ware,1 -a -s S/../.././01
/dev/sdd -d 3ware,2 -a -s S/../.././02
/dev/sdd -d 3ware,3 -a -s S/../.././03
#
# Two ATA disks on a 3ware 9000 controller.
# Start long self-tests Sundays between midnight and
# 1am and 2-3 am
/dev/twa0 -d 3ware,0 -a -s L/../../7/00
/dev/twa0 -d 3ware,1 -a -s L/../../7/02
#
# Two SATA (not SAS) disks on a 3ware 9750 controller.
# Start long self-tests Sundays between midnight and
# 1am and 2-3 am
/dev/twl0 -d 3ware,0 -a -s L/../../7/00
/dev/twl0 -d 3ware,1 -a -s L/../../7/02
#
# Monitor 2 disks connected to the first HP SmartArray controller which
# uses the cciss driver. Start long tests on Sunday nights and short
# self-tests every night and send errors to root
/dev/cciss/c0d0 -d cciss,0 -a -s (L/../../7/02|S/../.././02) -m root
/dev/cciss/c0d0 -d cciss,1 -a -s (L/../../7/03|S/../.././03) -m root
#
# Three SATA disks on a HighPoint RocketRAID controller.
# Start short self-tests daily between 1-2, 2-3, and
# 3-4 am.
# under Linux
/dev/sde -d hpt,1/1 -a -s S/../.././01
/dev/sde -d hpt,1/2 -a -s S/../.././02
/dev/sde -d hpt,1/3 -a -s S/../.././03
# or under FreeBSD
# /dev/hptrr -d hpt,1/1 -a -s S/../.././01
# /dev/hptrr -d hpt,1/2 -a -s S/../.././02
# /dev/hptrr -d hpt,1/3 -a -s S/../.././03
#
# Two SATA disks connected to a HighPoint RocketRAID
# via a pmport device. Start long self-tests Sundays
# between midnight and 1am and 2-3 am.
# under Linux
/dev/sde -d hpt,1/4/1 -a -s L/../../7/00
/dev/sde -d hpt,1/4/2 -a -s L/../../7/02
# or under FreeBSD
# /dev/hptrr -d hpt,1/4/1 -a -s L/../../7/00
# /dev/hptrr -d hpt,1/4/2 -a -s L/../../7/02
#
# Three SATA disks connected to an Areca
# RAID controller. Start long self-tests Sundays
# between midnight and 3 am.
/dev/sg2 -d areca,1 -a -s L/../../7/00
/dev/sg2 -d areca,2 -a -s L/../../7/01
/dev/sg2 -d areca,3 -a -s L/../../7/02
#
# The following line enables monitoring of the
# ATA Error Log and the Self-Test Error Log.
# It also tracks changes in both Prefailure
# and Usage Attributes, apart from Attributes
# 9, 194, and 231, and shows continued lines:
#
/dev/hdd -l error \
-l selftest \
-t \ # Attributes not tracked:
-I 194 \ # temperature
-I 231 \ # also temperature
-I 9 # power-on hours
#
################################################
CONFIGURATION FILE DIRECTIVES
If a non-comment entry in the configuration file is the text string
DEVICESCAN in capital letters, then smartd will ignore any remaining
lines in the configuration file, and will scan for devices. DEVICESCAN
may optionally be followed by Directives that will apply to all devices
that are found in the scan. Please see below for additional details.
The following are the Directives that may appear following the device
name or DEVICESCAN on any line of the /etc/smartd.conf configuration
file. Note that these are NOT command-line options for smartd. The
Directives below may appear in any order, following the device name.
For an ATA device, if no Directives appear, then the device will be
monitored as if the ´-a´ Directive (monitor all SMART properties) had
been given.
If a SCSI disk is listed, it will be monitored at the maximum imple‐
mented level: roughly equivalent to using the ´-H -l selftest´ options
for an ATA disk. So with the exception of ´-d´, ´-m´, ´-l selftest´,
´-s´, and ´-M´, the Directives below are ignored for SCSI disks. For
SCSI disks, the ´-m´ Directive sends a warning email if the SMART sta‐
tus indicates a disk failure or problem, if the SCSI inquiry about disk
status fails, or if new errors appear in the self-test log.
If a 3ware controller is used then the corresponding SCSI (/dev/sd?) or
character device (/dev/twe?, /dev/twa? or /dev/twl?) must be listed,
along with the ´-d 3ware,N´ Directive (see below). The individual ATA
disks hosted by the 3ware controller appear to smartd as normal ATA
devices. Hence all the ATA directives can be used for these disks (but
see note below).
If an Areca controller is used then the corresponding SCSI generic
device (/dev/sg?) must be listed, along with the ´-d areca,N´ Direc‐
tive (see below). The individual SATA disks hosted by the Areca con‐
troller appear to smartd as normal ATA devices. Hence all the ATA
directives can be used for these disks. Areca firmware version 1.46 or
later which supports smartmontools must be used; Please see the
smartctl(8) man page for further details.
-d TYPE
Specifies the type of the device. This Directive may be used
multiple times for one device, but the arguments ata, scsi, sat,
marvell, cciss,N, areca,N, megaraid,N and 3ware,N are mutually-
exclusive. If more than one is given then smartd will use the
last one which appears.
If none of these three arguments is given, then smartd will
first attempt to guess the device type by looking at whether the
sixth character in the device name is an ´s´ or an ´h´. This
will work for device names like /dev/hda or /dev/sdb, and corre‐
sponds to choosing ata or scsi respectively. If smartd can´t
guess from this sixth character, then it will simply try to
access the device using first ATA and then SCSI ioctl()s.
The valid arguments to this Directive are:
ata - the device type is ATA. This prevents smartd from issuing
SCSI commands to an ATA device.
scsi - the device type is SCSI. This prevents smartd from issu‐
ing ATA commands to a SCSI device.
sat - the device type is SCSI to ATA Translation (SAT). smartd
will generate ATA (smart) commands and then package them in the
SAT defined ATA PASS THROUGH SCSI commands. The commands are
then routed through the SCSI pass through interface to the oper‐
ating system. There are two types of ATA PASS THROUGH SCSI com‐
mands: a 12 byte and 16 byte variant. smartd can use either and
defaults to the 16 byte variant. This can be overridden with
this syntax: ´-d sat,12´ or ´-d sat,16´.
marvell - Under Linux, interact with SATA disks behind Marvell
chip-set controllers (using the Marvell rather than libata
driver).
megaraid,N - the device consists of one or more SCSI/SAS/SATA
disks connected to a MegaRAID controller. The non-negative
integer N (in the range of 0 to 127 inclusive) denotes which
disk on the controller is monitored. In log files and email
messages this disk will be identified as megaraid_disk_XXX with
XXX in the range from 000 to 127 inclusive.
3ware,N - the device consists of one or more ATA disks connected
to a 3ware RAID controller. The non-negative integer N (in the
range from 0 to 127 inclusive) denotes which disk on the con‐
troller is monitored. In log files and email messages this disk
will be identified as 3ware_disk_XXX with XXX in the range from
000 to 127 inclusive.
This Directive may at first appear confusing, because the 3ware
controller is a SCSI device (such as /dev/sda) and should be
listed as such in the the configuration file. However when the
´-d 3ware,N´ Directive is used, then the corresponding disk is
addressed using native ATA commands which are ´passed through´
the SCSI driver. All ATA Directives listed in this man page may
be used. Note that while you may use any of the 3ware SCSI log‐
ical devices /dev/sd? to address any of the physical disks
(3ware ports), error and log messages will make the most sense
if you always list the 3ware SCSI logical device corresponding
to the particular physical disks. Please see the smartctl(8)
man page for further details.
ATA disks behind 3ware controllers may alternatively be accessed
via a character device interface /dev/twe0-15 (3ware
6000/7000/8000 controllers), /dev/twa0-15 (3ware 9000 series
controllers) and /dev/twl0-15 (3ware 9750 series controllers).
Note that the 9000 series controllers may only be accessed using
the character device interface /dev/twa0-15 and not the SCSI
device interface /dev/sd?. Please see the smartctl(8) man page
for further details.
Note that older 3w-xxxx drivers do not pass the ´Enable
Autosave´ (-S on) and ´Enable Automatic Offline´ (-o on) com‐
mands to the disk, if the SCSI interface is used, and produce
these types of harmless syslog error messages instead: ´3w-xxxx:
tw_ioctl(): Passthru size (123392) too big´. This can be fixed
by upgrading to version 1.02.00.037 or later of the 3w-xxxx
driver, or by applying a patch to older versions. See
http://smartmontools.sourceforge.net/ for instructions. Alter‐
natively use the character device interfaces /dev/twe0-15 (3ware
6/7/8000 series controllers), /dev/twa0-15 (3ware 9000 series
controllers) or /dev/twl0-15 (3ware 9750 series controllers).
areca,N - the device consists of one or more SATA disks con‐
nected to an Areca SATA RAID controller. The positive integer N
(in the range from 1 to 24 inclusive) denotes which disk on the
controller is monitored. In log files and email messages this
disk will be identifed as areca_disk_XX with XX in the range
from 01 to 24 inclusive.
cciss,N - the device consists of one or more SCSI disks con‐
nected to a cciss RAID controller. The non-negative integer N
(in the range from 0 to 15 inclusive) denotes which disk on the
controller is monitored. In log files and email messages this
disk will be identified as cciss_disk_XX with XX in the range
from 00 to 15 inclusive.
3ware, MegaRAID, Areca and cciss controllers are currently ONLY
supported under Linux.
hpt,L/M/N - the device consists of one or more ATA disks con‐
nected to a HighPoint RocketRAID controller. The integer L is
the controller id, the integer M is the channel number, and the
integer N is the PMPort number if it is available. The allowed
values of L are from 1 to 4 inclusive, M are from 1 to 8 inclu‐
sive and N from 1 to 4 if PMPort available. And also these val‐
ues are limited by the model of the HighPoint RocketRAID con‐
troller. In log files and email messages this disk will be
identified as hpt_X/X/X and X/X/X is the same as L/M/N, note if
no N indicated, N set to the default value 1.
HighPoint RocketRAID controllers are currently ONLY supported
under Linux and FreeBSD.
removable - the device or its media is removable. This indi‐
cates to smartd that it should continue (instead of exiting,
which is the default behavior) if the device does not appear to
be present when smartd is started. This Directive may be used
in conjunction with the other ´-d´ Directives.
-n POWERMODE[,N][,q]
This ´nocheck´ Directive is used to prevent a disk from being
spun-up when it is periodically polled by smartd.
ATA disks have five different power states. In order of increas‐
ing power consumption they are: ´OFF´, ´SLEEP´, ´STANDBY´,
´IDLE´, and ´ACTIVE´. Typically in the OFF, SLEEP, and STANDBY
modes the disk´s platters are not spinning. But usually, in
response to SMART commands issued by smartd, the disk platters
are spun up. So if this option is not used, then a disk which
is in a low-power mode may be spun up and put into a
higher-power mode when it is periodically polled by smartd.
Note that if the disk is in SLEEP mode when smartd is started,
then it won't respond to smartd commands, and so the disk won't
be registered as a device for smartd to monitor. If a disk is in
any other low-power mode, then the commands issued by smartd to
register the disk will probably cause it to spin-up.
The ´-n´ (nocheck) Directive specifies if smartd´s periodic
checks should still be carried out when the device is in a
low-power mode. It may be used to prevent a disk from being
spun-up by periodic smartd polling. The allowed values of POW‐
ERMODE are:
never - smartd will poll (check) the device regardless of its
power mode. This may cause a disk which is spun-down to be
spun-up when smartd checks it. This is the default behavior if
the '-n' Directive is not given.
sleep - check the device unless it is in SLEEP mode.
standby - check the device unless it is in SLEEP or STANDBY
mode. In these modes most disks are not spinning, so if you
want to prevent a laptop disk from spinning up each time that
smartd polls, this is probably what you want.
idle - check the device unless it is in SLEEP, STANDBY or IDLE
mode. In the IDLE state, most disks are still spinning, so this
is probably not what you want.
Maximum number of skipped checks (in a row) can be specified by
appending positive number ´,N´ to POWERMODE (like ´-n
standby,15´). After N checks are skipped in a row, powermode is
ignored and the check is performed anyway.
When a periodic test is skipped, smartd normally writes an
informal log message. The message can be suppressed by appending
the option ´,q´ to POWERMODE (like ´-n standby,q´). This pre‐
vents a laptop disk from spinning up due to this message.
Both ´,N´ and ´,q´ can be specified together.
-T TYPE
Specifies how tolerant smartd should be of SMART command fail‐
ures. The valid arguments to this Directive are:
normal - do not try to monitor the disk if a mandatory SMART
command fails, but continue if an optional SMART command fails.
This is the default.
permissive - try to monitor the disk even if it appears to lack
SMART capabilities. This may be required for some old disks
(prior to ATA-3 revision 4) that implemented SMART before the
SMART standards were incorporated into the ATA/ATAPI Specifica‐
tions. This may also be needed for some Maxtor disks which fail
to comply with the ATA Specifications and don't properly indi‐
cate support for error- or self-test logging.
[Please see the smartctl -T command-line option.]
-o VALUE
Enables or disables SMART Automatic Offline Testing when smartd
starts up and has no further effect. The valid arguments to
this Directive are on and off.
The delay between tests is vendor-specific, but is typically
four hours.
Note that SMART Automatic Offline Testing is not part of the ATA
Specification. Please see the smartctl -o command-line option
documentation for further information about this feature.
-S VALUE
Enables or disables Attribute Autosave when smartd starts up and
has no further effect. The valid arguments to this Directive
are on and off. Also affects SCSI devices. [Please see the
smartctl -S command-line option.]
-H Check the SMART health status of the disk. If any Prefailure
Attributes are less than or equal to their threshold values,
then disk failure is predicted in less than 24 hours, and a mes‐
sage at loglevel ´LOG_CRIT´ will be logged to syslog. [Please
see the smartctl -H command-line option.]
-l TYPE
Reports increases in the number of errors in one of three SMART
logs. The valid arguments to this Directive are:
error - report if the number of ATA errors reported in the Sum‐
mary SMART error log has increased since the last check.
xerror - [NEW EXPERIMENTAL SMARTD FEATURE] report if the number
of ATA errors reported in the Extended Comprehensive SMART error
log has increased since the last check.
If both ´-l error´ and ´-l xerror´ are specified, smartd checks
the maximum of both values.
[Please see the smartctl -l xerror command-line option.]
selftest - report if the number of failed tests reported in the
SMART Self-Test Log has increased since the last check, or if
the timestamp associated with the most recent failed test has
increased. Note that such errors will only be logged if you run
self-tests on the disk (and it fails a test!). Self-Tests can
be run automatically by smartd: please see the ´-s´ Directive
below. Self-Tests can also be run manually by using the
´-t short´ and ´-t long´ options of smartctl and the results of
the testing can be observed using the smartctl ´-l selftest´
command-line option.]
[Please see the smartctl -l and -t command-line options.]
-s REGEXP
Run Self-Tests or Offline Immediate Tests, at scheduled times.
A Self- or Offline Immediate Test will be run at the end of
periodic device polling, if all 12 characters of the string
T/MM/DD/d/HH match the extended regular expression REGEXP. Here:
T is the type of the test. The values that smartd will try to
match (in turn) are: ´L´ for a Long Self-Test, ´S´ for a
Short Self-Test, ´C´ for a Conveyance Self-Test (ATA only),
and ´O´ for an Offline Immediate Test (ATA only). As soon
as a match is found, the test will be started and no addi‐
tional matches will be sought for that device and that
polling cycle.
[NEW EXPERIMENTAL SMARTD FEATURE] To run scheduled Selective
Self-Tests, use ´n´ for next span, ´r´ to redo last span, or
´c´ to continue with next span or redo last span based on
status of last test. The LBA range is based on the first
span from the last test. See the smartctl -t
select,[next|redo|cont] options for further info.
MM is the month of the year, expressed with two decimal digits.
The range is from 01 (January) to 12 (December) inclusive.
Do not use a single decimal digit or the match will always
fail!
DD is the day of the month, expressed with two decimal digits.
The range is from 01 to 31 inclusive. Do not use a single
decimal digit or the match will always fail!
d is the day of the week, expressed with one decimal digit.
The range is from 1 (Monday) to 7 (Sunday) inclusive.
HH is the hour of the day, written with two decimal digits, and
given in hours after midnight. The range is 00 (midnight to
just before 1am) to 23 (11pm to just before midnight) inclu‐
sive. Do not use a single decimal digit or the match will
always fail!
Some examples follow. In reading these, keep in mind that in
extended regular expressions a dot ´.´ matches any single char‐
acter, and a parenthetical expression such as ´(A|B|C)´ denotes
any one of the three possibilities A, B, or C.
To schedule a short Self-Test between 2-3am every morning, use:
-s S/../.././02
To schedule a long Self-Test between 4-5am every Sunday morning,
use:
-s L/../../7/04
To schedule a long Self-Test between 10-11pm on the first and
fifteenth day of each month, use:
-s L/../(01|15)/./22
To schedule an Offline Immediate test after every midnight, 6am,
noon,and 6pm, plus a Short Self-Test daily at 1-2am and a Long
Self-Test every Saturday at 3-4am, use:
-s (O/../.././(00|06|12|18)|S/../.././01|L/../../6/03)
If Long Self-Tests of a large disks take longer than the system
uptime, a full disk test can be performed by several Selective
Self-Tests. To setup a full test of a 1TB disk within 20 days
(one 50GB span each day), run this command once:
smartctl -t select,0-99999999 /dev/sda
To run the next test spans on Monday-Friday between 12-13am, run
smartd with this directive:
-s n/../../[1-5]/12
Scheduled tests are run immediately following the regularly-
scheduled device polling, if the current local date, time, and
test type, match REGEXP. By default the regularly-scheduled
device polling occurs every thirty minutes after starting
smartd. Take caution if you use the ´-i´ option to make this
polling interval more than sixty minutes: the poll times may
fail to coincide with any of the testing times that you have
specified with REGEXP. In this case the test will be run fol‐
lowing the next device polling.
Before running an offline or self-test, smartd checks to be sure
that a self-test is not already running. If a self-test is
already running, then this running self test will not be inter‐
rupted to begin another test.
smartd will not attempt to run any type of test if another test
was already started or run in the same hour.
To avoid performance problems during system boot, smartd will
not attempt to run any scheduled tests following the very first
device polling (unless ´-q onecheck´ is specified).
Each time a test is run, smartd will log an entry to SYSLOG.
You can use these or the '-q showtests' command-line option to
verify that you constructed REGEXP correctly. The matching
order (L before S before C before O) ensures that if multiple
test types are all scheduled for the same hour, the longer test
type has precedence. This is usually the desired behavior.
If the scheduled tests are used in conjunction with state per‐
sistence (´-s´ option), smartd will also try to match the hours
since last shutdown (or 90 days at most). If any test would have
been started during downtime, the longest (see above) of these
tests is run after second device polling.
If the ´-n´ directive is used and any test would have been
started during disk standby time, the longest of these tests is
run when the disk is active again.
Unix users: please beware that the rules for extended regular
expressions [regex(7)] are not the same as the rules for
file-name pattern matching by the shell [glob(7)]. smartd will
issue harmless informational warning messages if it detects
characters in REGEXP that appear to indicate that you have made
this mistake.
-m ADD Send a warning email to the email address ADD if the ´-H´, ´-l´,
´-f´, ´-C´, or ´-O´ Directives detect a failure or a new error,
or if a SMART command to the disk fails. This Directive only
works in conjunction with these other Directives (or with the
equivalent default ´-a´ Directive).
To prevent your email in-box from getting filled up with warning
messages, by default only a single warning will be sent for each
of the enabled alert types, ´-H´, ´-l´, ´-f´, ´-C´, or ´-O´ even
if more than one failure or error is detected or if the failure
or error persists. [This behavior can be modified; see the ´-M´
Directive below.]
To send email to more than one user, please use the following
"comma separated" form for the address:
user1@add1,user2@add2,...,userN@addN (with no spaces).
To test that email is being sent correctly, use the ´-M test´
Directive described below to send one test email message on
smartd startup.
By default, email is sent using the system mail command. In
order that smartd find the mail command (normally /bin/mail) an
executable named ´mail´ must be in the path of the shell or
environment from which smartd was started. If you wish to spec‐
ify an explicit path to the mail executable (for example
/usr/local/bin/mail) or a custom script to run, please use the
´-M exec´ Directive below.
Note that by default under Solaris, in the previous paragraph,
´mailx´ and ´/bin/mailx´ are used, since Solaris ´/bin/mail´
does not accept a ´-s´ (Subject) command-line argument.
On Windows, the ´Blat´ mailer (http://blat.sourceforge.net/) is
used by default. This mailer uses a different command line syn‐
tax, see ´-M exec´ below.
Note also that there is a special argument <nomailer> which can
be given to the ´-m´ Directive in conjunction with the ´-M exec´
Directive. Please see below for an explanation of its effect.
If the mailer or the shell running it produces any STDERR/STDOUT
output, then a snippet of that output will be copied to SYSLOG.
The remainder of the output is discarded. If problems are
encountered in sending mail, this should help you to understand
and fix them. If you have mail problems, we recommend running
smartd in debug mode with the ´-d´ flag, using the ´-M test´
Directive described below.
The following extension is available on Windows: By specifying
´msgbox´ as a mail address, a warning "email" is displayed as a
message box on the screen. Using both ´msgbox´ and regular mail
addresses is possible, if ´msgbox´ is the first word in the
comma separated list. With ´sysmsgbox´, a system modal (always
on top) message box is used. If running as a service, a service
notification message box (always shown on current visible desk‐
top) is used.
-M TYPE
These Directives modify the behavior of the smartd email warn‐
ings enabled with the ´-m´ email Directive described above.
These ´-M´ Directives only work in conjunction with the ´-m´
Directive and can not be used without it.
Multiple -M Directives may be given. If more than one of the
following three -M Directives are given (example: -M once -M
daily) then the final one (in the example, -M daily) is used.
The valid arguments to the -M Directive are (one of the follow‐
ing three):
once - send only one warning email for each type of disk problem
detected. This is the default.
daily - send additional warning reminder emails, once per day,
for each type of disk problem detected.
diminishing - send additional warning reminder emails, after a
one-day interval, then a two-day interval, then a four-day
interval, and so on for each type of disk problem detected. Each
interval is twice as long as the previous interval.
In addition, one may add zero or more of the following Direc‐
tives:
test - send a single test email immediately upon smartd startup.
This allows one to verify that email is delivered correctly.
Note that if this Directive is used, smartd will also send the
normal email warnings that were enabled with the ´-m´ Directive,
in addition to the single test email!
exec PATH - run the executable PATH instead of the default mail
command, when smartd needs to send email. PATH must point to an
executable binary file or script.
By setting PATH to point to a customized script, you can make
smartd perform useful tricks when a disk problem is detected
(beeping the console, shutting down the machine, broadcasting
warnings to all logged-in users, etc.) But please be careful.
smartd will block until the executable PATH returns, so if your
executable hangs, then smartd will also hang. Some sample
scripts are included in /usr/share/doc/smartmontools/example‐
scripts/.
The return status of the executable is recorded by smartd in
SYSLOG. The executable is not expected to write to STDOUT or
STDERR. If it does, then this is interpreted as indicating that
something is going wrong with your executable, and a fragment of
this output is logged to SYSLOG to help you to understand the
problem. Normally, if you wish to leave some record behind, the
executable should send mail or write to a file or device.
Before running the executable, smartd sets a number of environ‐
ment variables. These environment variables may be used to con‐
trol the executable´s behavior. The environment variables
exported by smartd are:
SMARTD_MAILER
is set to the argument of -M exec, if present or else to
´mail´ (examples: /bin/mail, mail).
SMARTD_DEVICE
is set to the device path (examples: /dev/hda, /dev/sdb).
SMARTD_DEVICETYPE
is set to the device type (possible values: ata, scsi,
3ware, cciss, N, areca,N, hpt,L/M/N). Here N=0,...,127
denotes the ATA disk behind a 3ware or cciss RAID controller
and L/M/N denotes the SATA disk behind a HighPoint Rocke‐
tRAID controller.
SMARTD_DEVICESTRING
is set to the device description. For SMARTD_DEVICETYPE of
ata or scsi, this is the same as SMARTD_DEVICE. For 3ware
RAID controllers, the form used is ´/dev/sdc
[3ware_disk_01]´. For HighPoint RocketRAID controller, the
form is ´/dev/sdd [hpt_1/1/1]´ under Linux or ´/dev/hptrr
[hpt_1/1/1]´ under FreeBSD. For Areca controllers, the form
is ´/dev/sg2 [areca_disk_09]´. In these cases the device
string contains a space and is NOT quoted. So to use
$SMARTD_DEVICESTRING in a bash script you should probably
enclose it in double quotes.
SMARTD_FAILTYPE
gives the reason for the warning or message email. The pos‐
sible values that it takes and their meanings are:
EmailTest: this is an email test message.
Health: the SMART health status indicates imminent failure.
Usage: a usage Attribute has failed.
SelfTest: the number of self-test failures has increased.
ErrorCount: the number of errors in the ATA error log has
increased.
CurrentPendingSector: one of more disk sectors could not be
read and are marked to be reallocated (replaced with spare
sectors).
OfflineUncorrectableSector: during off-line testing, or
self-testing, one or more disk sectors could not be read.
Temperature: Temperature reached critical limit (see -W
directive).
FailedHealthCheck: the SMART health status command failed.
FailedReadSmartData: the command to read SMART Attribute
data failed.
FailedReadSmartErrorLog: the command to read the SMART error
log failed.
FailedReadSmartSelfTestLog: the command to read the SMART
self-test log failed.
FailedOpenDevice: the open() command to the device failed.
SMARTD_ADDRESS
is determined by the address argument ADD of the ´-m´ Direc‐
tive. If ADD is <nomailer>, then SMARTD_ADDRESS is not set.
Otherwise, it is set to the comma-separated-list of email
addresses given by the argument ADD, with the commas
replaced by spaces (example:admin@example.com root). If
more than one email address is given, then this string will
contain space characters and is NOT quoted, so to use it in
a bash script you may want to enclose it in double quotes.
SMARTD_MESSAGE
is set to the one sentence summary warning email message
string from smartd. This message string contains space
characters and is NOT quoted. So to use $SMARTD_MESSAGE in a
bash script you should probably enclose it in double quotes.
SMARTD_FULLMESSAGE
is set to the contents of the entire email warning message
string from smartd. This message string contains space and
return characters and is NOT quoted. So to use
$SMARTD_FULLMESSAGE in a bash script you should probably
enclose it in double quotes.
SMARTD_TFIRST
is a text string giving the time and date at which the first
problem of this type was reported. This text string contains
space characters and no newlines, and is NOT quoted. For
example:
Sun Feb 9 14:58:19 2003 CST
SMARTD_TFIRSTEPOCH
is an integer, which is the unix epoch (number of seconds
since Jan 1, 1970) for SMARTD_TFIRST.
The shell which is used to run PATH is system-dependent. For
vanilla Linux/glibc it´s bash. For other systems, the man page
for popen(3) should say what shell is used.
If the ´-m ADD´ Directive is given with a normal address argu‐
ment, then the executable pointed to by PATH will be run in a
shell with STDIN receiving the body of the email message, and
with the same command-line arguments:
-s "$SMARTD_SUBJECT" $SMARTD_ADDRESS
that would normally be provided to ´mail´. Examples include:
-m user@home -M exec /bin/mail
-m admin@work -M exec /usr/local/bin/mailto
-m root -M exec /Example_1/bash/script/below
Note that on Windows, the syntax of the ´Blat´ mailer is used:
- -q -subject "$SMARTD_SUBJECT" -to "$SMARTD_ADDRESS"
If the ´-m ADD´ Directive is given with the special address
argument <nomailer> then the executable pointed to by PATH is
run in a shell with no STDIN and no command-line arguments, for
example:
-m <nomailer> -M exec /Example_2/bash/script/below
If the executable produces any STDERR/STDOUT output, then smartd
assumes that something is going wrong, and a snippet of that
output will be copied to SYSLOG. The remainder of the output is
then discarded.
Some EXAMPLES of scripts that can be used with the ´-M exec´
Directive are given below. Some sample scripts are also included
in /usr/share/doc/smartmontools/examplescripts/.
-f Check for ´failure´ of any Usage Attributes. If these
Attributes are less than or equal to the threshold, it does NOT
indicate imminent disk failure. It "indicates an advisory con‐
dition where the usage or age of the device has exceeded its
intended design life period." [Please see the smartctl -A com‐
mand-line option.]
-p Report anytime that a Prefail Attribute has changed its value
since the last check, 30 minutes ago. [Please see the smartctl
-A command-line option.]
-u Report anytime that a Usage Attribute has changed its value
since the last check, 30 minutes ago. [Please see the smartctl
-A command-line option.]
-t Equivalent to turning on the two previous flags ´-p´ and ´-u´.
Tracks changes in all device Attributes (both Prefailure and
Usage). [Please see the smartctl -A command-line option.]
-i ID Ignore device Attribute number ID when checking for failure of
Usage Attributes. ID must be a decimal integer in the range
from 1 to 255. This Directive modifies the behavior of the ´-f´
Directive and has no effect without it.
This is useful, for example, if you have a very old disk and
don´t want to keep getting messages about the hours-on-lifetime
Attribute (usually Attribute 9) failing. This Directive may
appear multiple times for a single device, if you want to ignore
multiple Attributes.
-I ID Ignore device Attribute ID when tracking changes in the
Attribute values. ID must be a decimal integer in the range
from 1 to 255. This Directive modifies the behavior of the
´-p´, ´-u´, and ´-t´ tracking Directives and has no effect with‐
out one of them.
This is useful, for example, if one of the device Attributes is
the disk temperature (usually Attribute 194 or 231). It´s annoy‐
ing to get reports each time the temperature changes. This
Directive may appear multiple times for a single device, if you
want to ignore multiple Attributes.
-r ID[!]
When tracking, report the Raw value of Attribute ID along with
its (normally reported) Normalized value. ID must be a decimal
integer in the range from 1 to 255. This Directive modifies the
behavior of the ´-p´, ´-u´, and ´-t´ tracking Directives and has
no effect without one of them. This Directive may be given mul‐
tiple times.
A common use of this Directive is to track the device Tempera‐
ture (often ID=194 or 231).
If the optional flag ´!´ is appended, a change of the Normalized
value is considered critical. The report will be logged as
LOG_CRIT and a warning email will be sent if ´-m´ is specified.
-R ID[!]
When tracking, report whenever the Raw value of Attribute ID
changes. (Normally smartd only tracks/reports changes of the
Normalized Attribute values.) ID must be a decimal integer in
the range from 1 to 255. This Directive modifies the behavior
of the ´-p´, ´-u´, and ´-t´ tracking Directives and has no
effect without one of them. This Directive may be given multi‐
ple times.
If this Directive is given, it automatically implies the ´-r´
Directive for the same Attribute, so that the Raw value of the
Attribute is reported.
A common use of this Directive is to track the device Tempera‐
ture (often ID=194 or 231). It is also useful for understanding
how different types of system behavior affects the values of
certain Attributes.
If the optional flag ´!´ is appended, a change of the Raw value
is considered critical. The report will be logged as LOG_CRIT
and a warning email will be sent if ´-m´ is specified. An exam‐
ple is ´-R 5!´ to warn when new sectors are reallocated.
-C ID[+]
[ATA only] Report if the current number of pending sectors is
non-zero. Here ID is the id number of the Attribute whose raw
value is the Current Pending Sector count. The allowed range of
ID is 0 to 255 inclusive. To turn off this reporting, use
ID = 0. If the -C ID option is not given, then it defaults to
-C 197 (since Attribute 197 is generally used to monitor pending
sectors). If the name of this Attribute is changed by a ´-v
197,FORMAT,NAME´ directive, the default is changed to -C 0.
If ´+´ is specified, a report is only printed if the number of
sectors has increased between two check cycles. Some disks do
not reset this attribute when a bad sector is reallocated. See
also ´-v 197,increasing´ below.
A pending sector is a disk sector (containing 512 bytes of your
data) which the device would like to mark as ``bad" and reallo‐
cate. Typically this is because your computer tried to read
that sector, and the read failed because the data on it has been
corrupted and has inconsistent Error Checking and Correction
(ECC) codes. This is important to know, because it means that
there is some unreadable data on the disk. The problem of fig‐
uring out what file this data belongs to is operating system and
file system specific. You can typically force the sector to
reallocate by writing to it (translation: make the device sub‐
stitute a spare good sector for the bad one) but at the price of
losing the 512 bytes of data stored there.
-U ID[+]
[ATA only] Report if the number of offline uncorrectable sectors
is non-zero. Here ID is the id number of the Attribute whose
raw value is the Offline Uncorrectable Sector count. The
allowed range of ID is 0 to 255 inclusive. To turn off this
reporting, use ID = 0. If the -U ID option is not given, then
it defaults to -U 198 (since Attribute 198 is generally used to
monitor offline uncorrectable sectors). If the name of this
Attribute is changed by a ´-v 198,FORMAT,NAME´ (except ´-v
198,FORMAT,Offline_Scan_UNC_SectCt´), directive, the default is
changed to -U 0.
If ´+´ is specified, a report is only printed if the number of
sectors has increased since the last check cycle. Some disks do
not reset this attribute when a bad sector is reallocated. See
also ´-v 198,increasing´ below.
An offline uncorrectable sector is a disk sector which was not
readable during an off-line scan or a self-test. This is impor‐
tant to know, because if you have data stored in this disk sec‐
tor, and you need to read it, the read will fail. Please see
the previous ´-C´ option for more details.
-W DIFF[,INFO[,CRIT]]
Report if the current temperature had changed by at least DIFF
degrees since last report, or if new min or max temperature is
detected. Report or Warn if the temperature is greater or equal
than one of INFO or CRIT degrees Celsius. If the limit CRIT is
reached, a message with loglevel ´LOG_CRIT´ will be logged to
syslog and a warning email will be send if '-m' is specified. If
only the limit INFO is reached, a message with loglevel
´LOG_INFO´ will be logged.
If this directive is used in conjunction with state persistence
(´-s´ option), the min and max temperature values are preserved
across boot cycles. The minimum temperature value is not updated
during the first 30 minutes after startup.
To disable any of the 3 reports, set the corresponding limit to
0. Trailing zero arguments may be omitted. By default, all tem‐
perature reports are disabled (´-W 0´).
To track temperature changes of at least 2 degrees, use:
-W 2
To log informal messages on temperatures of at least 40 degrees,
use:
-W 0,40
For warning messages/mails on temperatures of at least 45
degrees, use:
-W 0,0,45
To combine all of the above reports, use:
-W 2,40,45
For ATA devices, smartd interprets Attribute 194 as Temperature
Celsius by default. This can be changed to Attribute 9 or 220 by
the drive database or by the ´-v´ directive, see below.
-F TYPE
[ATA only] Modifies the behavior of smartd to compensate for
some known and understood device firmware bug. The arguments to
this Directive are exclusive, so that only the final Directive
given is used. The valid values are:
none - Assume that the device firmware obeys the ATA specifica‐
tions. This is the default, unless the device has presets for
´-F´ in the device database.
samsung - In some Samsung disks (example: model SV4012H Firmware
Version: RM100-08) some of the two- and four-byte quantities in
the SMART data structures are byte-swapped (relative to the ATA
specification). Enabling this option tells smartd to evaluate
these quantities in byte-reversed order. Some signs that your
disk needs this option are (1) no self-test log printed, even
though you have run self-tests; (2) very large numbers of ATA
errors reported in the ATA error log; (3) strange and impossible
values for the ATA error log timestamps.
samsung2 - In some Samsung disks the number of ATA errors
reported is byte swapped. Enabling this option tells smartd to
evaluate this quantity in byte-reversed order.
samsung3 - Some Samsung disks (at least SP2514N with Firmware
VF100-37) report a self-test still in progress with 0% remaining
when the test was already completed. If this directive is speci‐
fied, smartd will not skip the next scheduled self-test (see
Directive ´-s´ above) in this case.
Note that an explicit ´-F´ Directive will over-ride any preset
values for ´-F´ (see the ´-P´ option below).
[Please see the smartctl -F command-line option.]
-v ID,FORMAT[:BYTEORDER][,NAME]
[ATA only] Sets a vendor-specific raw value print FORMAT, an
optional BYTEORDER and an optional NAME for Attribute ID. This
directive may be used multiple times. Please see smartctl -v
command-line option for further details.
The following arguments affect smartd warning output:
197,increasing - Raw Attribute number 197 (Current Pending Sec‐
tor Count) is not reset if uncorrectable sectors are reallo‐
cated. This sets ´-C 197+´ if no other ´-C´ directive is speci‐
fied.
198,increasing - Raw Attribute number 198 (Offline Uncorrectable
Sector Count) is not reset if uncorrectable sector are reallo‐
cated. This sets ´-U 198+´ if no other ´-U´ directive is speci‐
fied.
-P TYPE
Specifies whether smartd should use any preset options that are
available for this drive. The valid arguments to this Directive
are:
use - use any presets that are available for this drive. This
is the default.
ignore - do not use any presets for this drive.
show - show the presets listed for this drive in the database.
showall - show the presets that are available for all drives and
then exit.
[Please see the smartctl -P command-line option.]
-a Equivalent to turning on all of the following Directives: ´-H´
to check the SMART health status, ´-f´ to report failures of
Usage (rather than Prefail) Attributes, ´-t´ to track changes in
both Prefailure and Usage Attributes, ´-l selftest´ to report
increases in the number of Self-Test Log errors, ´-l error´ to
report increases in the number of ATA errors, ´-C 197´ to report
nonzero values of the current pending sector count, and ´-U 198´
to report nonzero values of the offline pending sector count.
Note that -a is the default for ATA devices. If none of these
other Directives is given, then -a is assumed.
# Comment: ignore the remainder of the line.
\ Continuation character: if this is the last non-white or non-
comment character on a line, then the following line is a con‐
tinuation of the current one.
If you are not sure which Directives to use, I suggest experimenting
for a few minutes with smartctl to see what SMART functionality your
disk(s)support(s). If you do not like voluminous syslog messages, a
good choice of smartd configuration file Directives might be:
-H -l selftest -l error -f.
If you want more frequent information, use: -a.
If a cciss controller is used then the corresponding block device
(/dev/cciss/c?d?) must be listed, along with the ´-d cciss,N´ Directive
(see below).
ADDITIONAL DETAILS ABOUT DEVICESCAN
If a non-comment entry in the configuration file is the text
string DEVICESCAN in capital letters, then smartd will ignore
any remaining lines in the configuration file, and will scan for
devices.
[NEW EXPERIMENTAL SMARTD FEATURE] Configuration entries for
devices not found by the platform-specific device scanning may
precede the DEVICESCAN entry.
If DEVICESCAN is not followed by any Directives, then smartd
will scan for both ATA and SCSI devices, and will monitor all
possible SMART properties of any devices that are found.
DEVICESCAN may optionally be followed by any valid Directives,
which will be applied to all devices that are found in the scan.
For example
DEVICESCAN -m root@example.com
will scan for all devices, and then monitor them. It will send
one email warning per device for any problems that are found.
DEVICESCAN -d ata -m root@example.com
will do the same, but restricts the scan to ATA devices only.
DEVICESCAN -H -d ata -m root@example.com
will do the same, but only monitors the SMART health status of
the devices, (rather than the default -a, which monitors all
SMART properties).
EXAMPLES OF SHELL SCRIPTS FOR ´-M exec´
These are two examples of shell scripts that can be used with
the ´-M exec PATH´ Directive described previously. The paths to
these scripts and similar executables is the PATH argument to
the ´-M exec PATH´ Directive.
Example 1: This script is for use with ´-m ADDRESS -M exec
PATH´. It appends the output of smartctl -a to the output of
the smartd email warning message and sends it to ADDRESS.
#! /bin/bash
# Save the email message (STDIN) to a file:
cat > /root/msg
# Append the output of smartctl -a to the message:
/usr/sbin/smartctl -a -d $SMART_DEVICETYPE $SMARTD_DEVICE >> /root/msg
# Now email the message to the user at address ADD:
/bin/mail -s "$SMARTD_SUBJECT" $SMARTD_ADDRESS < /root/msg
Example 2: This script is for use with ´-m <nomailer> -M exec
PATH´. It warns all users about a disk problem, waits 30 sec‐
onds, and then powers down the machine.
#! /bin/bash
# Warn all users of a problem
wall ´Problem detected with disk: ´ "$SMARTD_DEVICESTRING"
wall ´Warning message from smartd is: ´ "$SMARTD_MESSAGE"
wall ´Shutting down machine in 30 seconds... ´
# Wait half a minute
sleep 30
# Power down the machine
/sbin/shutdown -hf now
Some example scripts are distributed with the smartmontools
package, in /usr/share/doc/smartmontools/examples/.
Please note that these scripts typically run as root, so any
files that they read/write should not be writable by ordinary
users or reside in directories like /tmp that are writable by
ordinary users and may expose your system to symlink attacks.
As previously described, if the scripts write to STDOUT or
STDERR, this is interpreted as indicating that there was an
internal error within the script, and a snippet of STDOUT/STDERR
is logged to SYSLOG. The remainder is flushed.
NOTESsmartd will make log entries at loglevel LOG_INFO if the Normalized
SMART Attribute values have changed, as reported using the ´-t´, ´-p´,
or ´-u´ Directives. For example:
´Device: /dev/hda, SMART Attribute: 194 Temperature_Celsius changed from 94 to 93´
Note that in this message, the value given is the ´Normalized´ not the
´Raw´ Attribute value (the disk temperature in this case is about 22
Celsius). The ´-R´ and ´-r´ Directives modify this behavior, so that
the information is printed with the Raw values as well, for example:
´Device: /dev/hda, SMART Attribute: 194 Temperature_Celsius changed from 94 [Raw 22] to 93 [Raw 23]´
Here the Raw values are the actual disk temperatures in Celsius. The
way in which the Raw values are printed, and the names under which the
Attributes are reported, is governed by the various ´-v Num,Descrip‐
tion´ Directives described previously.
Please see the smartctl manual page for further explanation of the dif‐
ferences between Normalized and Raw Attribute values.
smartd will make log entries at loglevel LOG_CRIT if a SMART Attribute
has failed, for example:
´Device: /dev/hdc, Failed SMART Attribute: 5 Reallocated_Sector_Ct´
This loglevel is used for reporting enabled by the ´-H´, -f´,
´-l selftest´, and ´-l error´ Directives. Entries reporting failure of
SMART Prefailure Attributes should not be ignored: they mean that the
disk is failing. Use the smartctl utility to investigate.
Under Solaris with the default /etc/syslog.conf configuration, messages
below loglevel LOG_NOTICE will not be recorded. Hence all smartd mes‐
sages with loglevel LOG_INFO will be lost. If you want to use the
existing daemon facility to log all messages from smartd, you should
change /etc/syslog.conf from:
...;daemon.notice;... /var/adm/messages
to read:
...;daemon.info;... /var/adm/messages
Alternatively, you can use a local facility to log messages: please see
the smartd '-l' command-line option described above.
On Cygwin and Windows, the log messages are written to the event log or
to a file. See documentation of the '-l FACILITY' option above for
details.
On Windows, the following built-in commands can be used to control
smartd, if running as a daemon:
´smartd status´ - check status
´smartd stop´ - stop smartd
´smartd reload´ - reread config file
´smartd restart´ - restart smartd
´smartd sigusr1´ - check disks now
´smartd sigusr2´ - toggle debug mode
On WinNT4/2000/XP, smartd can also be run as a Windows service:
The Cygwin Version of smartd can be run as a service via the cygrunsrv
tool. The start-up script provides Cygwin-specific commands to install
and remove the service:
/etc/init.d/smartd install [options]
/etc/init.d/smartd remove
The service can be started and stopped by the start-up script as usual
(see EXAMPLES above).
The Windows Version of smartd has buildin support for services:
´smartd install [options]´ installs a service named "smartd" (display
name "SmartD Service") using the command line ´/installpath/smartd.exe
--service [options]´.
´smartd remove´ can later be used to remove the service entry from reg‐
istry.
Upon startup, the smartd service changes the working directory to its
own installation path. If smartd.conf and blat.exe are stored in this
directory, no ´-c´ option and ´-M exec´ directive is needed.
The debug mode (´-d´, ´-q onecheck´) does not work if smartd is running
as service.
The service can be controlled as usual with Windows commands ´net´ or
´sc´ (´net start smartd´, ´net stop smartd´).
Pausing the service (´net pause smartd´) sets the interval between disk
checks (´-i N´) to infinite.
Continuing the paused service (´net continue smartd´) resets the inter‐
val and rereads the configuration file immediately (like SIGHUP):
Continuing a still running service (´net continue smartd´ without pre‐
ceding ´net pause smartd´) does not reread configuration but checks
disks immediately (like SIGUSR1).
LOG TIMESTAMP TIMEZONE
When smartd makes log entries, these are time-stamped. The time stamps
are in the computer's local time zone, which is generally set using
either the environment variable ´TZ´ or using a time-zone file such as
/etc/localtime. You may wish to change the timezone while smartd is
running (for example, if you carry a laptop to a new time-zone and
don't reboot it). Due to a bug in the tzset(3) function of many unix
standard C libraries, the time-zone stamps of smartd might not change.
For some systems, smartd will work around this problem if the time-zone
is set using /etc/localtime. The work-around fails if the time-zone is
set using the ´TZ´ variable (or a file that it points to).
RETURN VALUES
The return value (exit status) of smartd can have the following values:
0: Daemon startup successful, or smartd was killed by a SIGTERM (or
in debug mode, a SIGQUIT).
1: Commandline did not parse.
2: There was a syntax error in the config file.
3: Forking the daemon failed.
4: Couldn´t create PID file.
5: Config file does not exist (only returned in conjunction with
the ´-c´ option).
6: Config file exists, but cannot be read.
8: smartd ran out of memory during startup.
9: A compile time constant of smartd was too small. This can be
caused by an excessive number of disks, or by lines in
/etc/smartd.conf that are too long. Please report this problem
to smartmontools-support@lists.sourceforge.net.
10 An inconsistency was found in smartd´s internal data structures.
This should never happen. It must be due to either a coding or
compiler bug. Please report such failures to smartmontools-sup‐
port@lists.sourceforge.net.
16: A device explicitly listed in /etc/smartd.conf can´t be moni‐
tored.
17: smartd didn´t find any devices to monitor.
254: When in daemon mode, smartd received a SIGINT or SIGQUIT. (Note
that in debug mode, SIGINT has the same effect as SIGHUP, and
makes smartd reload its configuration file. SIGQUIT has the same
effect as SIGTERM and causes smartd to exit with zero exit sta‐
tus.
132 and above
smartd was killed by a signal that is not explicitly listed
above. The exit status is then 128 plus the signal number. For
example if smartd is killed by SIGKILL (signal 9) then the exit
status is 137.
AUTHOR
Bruce Allen smartmontools-support@lists.sourceforge.net
University of Wisconsin - Milwaukee Physics Department
CONTRIBUTORS
The following have made large contributions to smartmontools:
Casper Dik (Solaris SCSI interface)
Christian Franke (Windows interface, C++ redesign, USB support, ...)
Douglas Gilbert (SCSI subsystem)
Guido Guenther (Autoconf/Automake packaging)
Geoffrey Keating (Darwin ATA interface)
Eduard Martinescu (FreeBSD interface)
Frederic L. W. Meunier (Web site and Mailing list)
Gabriele Pohl (Web site and Wiki, conversion from CVS to SVN)
Keiji Sawada (Solaris ATA interface)
Manfred Schwarb (Drive database)
Sergey Svishchev (NetBSD interface)
David Snyder and Sergey Svishchev (OpenBSD interface)
Phil Williams (User interface and drive database)
Shengfeng Zhou (Linux/FreeBSD HighPoint RocketRAID interface)
Many other individuals have made smaller contributions and corrections.
CREDITS
This code was derived from the smartsuite package, written by Michael
Cornwell, and from the previous UCSC smartsuite package. It extends
these to cover ATA-5 disks. This code was originally developed as a
Senior Thesis by Michael Cornwell at the Concurrent Systems Laboratory
(now part of the Storage Systems Research Center), Jack Baskin School
of Engineering, University of California, Santa Cruz.
http://ssrc.soe.ucsc.edu/ .
HOME PAGE FOR SMARTMONTOOLS:
Please see the following web site for updates, further documentation,
bug reports and patches: http://smartmontools.sourceforge.net/
SEE ALSO:smartd.conf(5), smartctl(8), syslogd(8), syslog.conf(5), badblocks(8),
ide-smart(8), regex(7).
REFERENCES FOR SMART
An introductory article about smartmontools is Monitoring Hard Disks
with SMART, by Bruce Allen, Linux Journal, January 2004, pages 74-77.
This is http://www.linuxjournal.com/article/6983 online.
If you would like to understand better how SMART works, and what it
does, a good place to start is with Sections 4.8 and 6.54 of the first
volume of the ´AT Attachment with Packet Interface-7´ (ATA/ATAPI-7)
specification Revision 4b. This documents the SMART functionality
which the smartmontools utilities provide access to. This and other
versions of this Specification are available from the T13 web site
http://www.t13.org/ .
The functioning of SMART was originally defined by the SFF-8035i revi‐
sion 2 and the SFF-8055i revision 1.4 specifications. These are publi‐
cations of the Small Form Factors (SFF) Committee.
Links to these and other documents may be found on the Links page of
the smartmontools Wiki at http://sourceforge.net/apps/trac/smartmon‐
tools/wiki/Links .
SVN ID OF THIS PAGE:
$Id: smartd.8.in 3117 2010-06-08 15:41:04Z chrfranke $
smartmontools-5.40 2010-07-12 SMARTD(8)
