At Fri, 12 Aug 2011 20:36:25 +0100 (BST) CentOS mailing list <centos@xxxxxxxxxx> wrote:
>
> On Fri, 12 Aug 2011, Robert Heller wrote:
>
> > The disk's *firmware* updated itself. So long as the *disk* is powered
> > up and spinning, its *firmware* is 'running' (or runs when the disk is
> > accessed or something like that). Modern disks are a long, long way
> > from the simple MFM drives of the 1970s (which presented little more
> > than a buffered interface to the drive mechanism and read/write heads
> > to the host controller -- eg little more than a simple floppy disk
> > drive) -- modern disks have actual embedded micro-processors on them
> > doing various stuff, including monitoring and logging things like
> > sector errors, drive temp., and so on.
>
> So does accessing some of the smart data cause any disk i/o
> at all, or is this all done from directly firmware?
Depends. Some of the SMART information is stored on special sectors of
the platter (sectors that are not part of the sectors available for
normal use). Some of the information is fixed burned into the
(E*)ROM(s) (eg serial numbers) on the disk's logic board and some
information is 'live' (eg current disk temperature). There IS I/O
between the host system and the disk's logic board.
>
> Kind Regards,
>
> Keith Roberts
>
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--
Robert Heller -- 978-544-6933 / heller@xxxxxxxxxxxx
Deepwoods Software -- http://www.deepsoft.com/
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