Preventing Data Loss

Preventing Data Loss

Preventing Data Loss

Initially implemented for HDD and then adopted by SSD NAND flash memories, ATA Smart Commands address the steady growing demand for the management of reliable data storage. This is especially true if the cost for an unexpected system failure is very high and results in data losses or downtime, impacting a much bigger scale of infrastructure.

The SMART tool (Self-Monitoring Analysis and Reporting Technology) was introduced in 1994 as the evolution of early predecessor Predictive Failure Analysis (PFA) created by IBM. Through the SMART tool the flash controller gathers the necessary health information and reports the vital statistics to alert the user of an imminent failure of the memory device. For every individual use case the parameters of the SMART tool can be set to address the specific requirements. Additionally, a warning can be reported with different levels of margin. This gives the user more time to replace the storage device, preventing an unexpected system failure.

In times of a steady increasing number of systems managing crucial and valuable data, it has also become increasingly critical to foresee impending issues before they happen or reach critical levels. In many areas, a system downtime and data loss may have huge cost impacts. To prevent these losses as far as possible, there is, among other systems, the important system of health monitoring.

As a vital step in managing and maintaining modern data storage systems, especially in industrial environments where the Total Cost of Ownership (TCO) is extremely high in comparison to consumer applications, health monitoring plays an extremely important role in the modern world of data.

Hyperstone developed its own hySMART™ tool. A tool which is a utility to access and decode ATA standards and Hyperstone vendor specific SMART data and lifetime information through a graphical interface.  hySMART™ thereby reads the data from a connected Hyperstone device and displays decoded data as sector values and as readable information and statistics. In detail, it includes information such as spare and erase blocks, as well as ECC error information, and many others.

As an example, the spare block information displays the number of remaining spare blocks and will turn yellow when a certain threshold of free spare blocks is reached. The erase block information gives the user the estimated percentage of the remaining card lifetime. At last, the ECC error information shows the number of uncorrectable errors during operation, which will be highlighted by the tool. This hySMART™ is invaluable in applications relying heavily on the uptime of their NAND flash storage systems. hySMART™ is delivered free of charge with Hyperstone’s controllers as part of our commitment for quality, reliability, and safety.