Re: smartctl on an USB disk

[Jon Dowland <lists@alcopop.org>]

On Thu, Dec 14, 2006 at 07:34:00AM -0600, Hugo Vanwoerkom wrote:
> Smartctl: Device Read Identity Failed (not an ATA/ATAPI device)
> But it *is* an ATA disk.

I'd be interested in a solution for this, too. Yes, it's an
ATA disk, but the -d thing only works in the SATA case for
drivers supporting "ATA pass-through". I think that's only
the libata set of drivers.

So what you need is to find out what lower-level driver the
USB disk is using (It'll be usb-storage), and see if ATA
pass-through support is likely to be implemented there.

Initial searches suggest the likelyhood is slim. See e.g.
<http://lkml.org/lkml/2006/5/24/239>.


Yours,


-- 
Jon Dowland