Toshiba MQ01ABD075 - Loud head acitivty after writing data.

[throwaway111]

Hello,

I have a problem with Toshiba MQ01ABD075.

Every time after data is written (and synced) it starts to make really loud head activity noises (like when system is heavily swapping). Duration depends on the amount of data written, for 10GB it can last up to 20 seconds, while for 60GB up to 150-180 seconds.

Swap is turned off, so actual swapping is not really taking place of course.

It happens only after writing, reading is not affected.

If during this time I will try to read/write something, the drive will stop this activity and perform new task at full speed (no performance drop), then once idle head will start going mad again (until X seconds pass).

Testing with:
- iotop
- echo 1 >/proc/sys/vm/block_dump
Does not pick up any disk activity when this happens, which makes it appear to be out of OS scope.

I am trying to figure out what is this related to, and if this is a tweakable behavior (like APM).

Is the drive (on it's own) trying to reposition written data for better read access?
Or maybe some additional data integrity checks?

Overall performance is fine, I have no complaints about it, but this constant head activity noise after (and I mean explicitly after) writing, which can last up to few minutes, can be really annoying.

dmesg output related to the drive:

Code:

[    4.558633] SCSI subsystem initialized
[    4.570269] libata version 3.00 loaded.
[    4.573616] ahci 0000:00:17.0: version 3.0
[    4.573861] ahci 0000:00:17.0: AHCI 0001.0301 32 slots 1 ports 6 Gbps 0x1 impl SATA mode
[    4.573863] ahci 0000:00:17.0: flags: 64bit ncq pm led clo only pio slum part deso sadm sds apst
[    4.574130] scsi host0: ahci
[    4.574275] ata1: SATA max UDMA/133 abar m2048@0xf0136000 port 0xf0136100 irq 123
[    4.890860] ata1: SATA link up 3.0 Gbps (SStatus 123 SControl 300)
[    4.891775] ata1.00: ACPI cmd f5/00:00:00:00:00:e0 (SECURITY FREEZE LOCK) filtered out
[    4.891781] ata1.00: ACPI cmd b1/c1:00:00:00:00:e0 (DEVICE CONFIGURATION OVERLAY) filtered out
[    4.925670] ata1.00: ATA-8: TOSHIBA MQ01ABD075, AX0A4M, max UDMA/100
[    4.925677] ata1.00: 1465149168 sectors, multi 16: LBA48 NCQ (depth 32), AA
[    4.927217] ata1.00: ACPI cmd f5/00:00:00:00:00:e0 (SECURITY FREEZE LOCK) filtered out
[    4.927225] ata1.00: ACPI cmd b1/c1:00:00:00:00:e0 (DEVICE CONFIGURATION OVERLAY) filtered out
[    4.928204] ata1.00: configured for UDMA/100
[    4.929113] scsi 0:0:0:0: Direct-Access     ATA      TOSHIBA MQ01ABD0 4M   PQ: 0 ANSI: 5
[    4.947364] sd 0:0:0:0: [sda] 1465149168 512-byte logical blocks: (750 GB/699 GiB)
[    4.947415] sd 0:0:0:0: [sda] Write Protect is off
[    4.947423] sd 0:0:0:0: [sda] Mode Sense: 00 3a 00 00
[    4.947473] sd 0:0:0:0: [sda] Write cache: enabled, read cache: enabled, doesn't support DPO or FUA
[    5.098647]  sda: sda1 sda2 sda3 sda4 sda5 sda6 sda7 sda8 sda9 sda10
[    5.115598] sd 0:0:0:0: [sda] Attached SCSI disk

SMART appears to be fine:

Code:

=== START OF INFORMATION SECTION ===
Model Family:     Toshiba 2.5" HDD MQ01ABD...
Device Model:     TOSHIBA MQ01ABD075
Firmware Version: AX0A4M
User Capacity:    750,156,374,016 bytes [750 GB]
Sector Size:      512 bytes logical/physical
Rotation Rate:    5400 rpm
Form Factor:      2.5 inches
Device is:        In smartctl database [for details use: -P show]
ATA Version is:   ATA8-ACS (minor revision not indicated)
SATA Version is:  SATA 2.6, 3.0 Gb/s (current: 3.0 Gb/s)
Local Time is:    Thu Mar 24 17:21:39 2022 CET
SMART support is: Available - device has SMART capability.
SMART support is: Enabled

=== START OF READ SMART DATA SECTION ===
SMART overall-health self-assessment test result: PASSED

General SMART Values:
Offline data collection status:  (0x00)   Offline data collection activity
               was never started.
               Auto Offline Data Collection: Disabled.
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:       (  120) 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:     (   2) minutes.
Extended self-test routine
recommended polling time:     ( 189) 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   050    Pre-fail  Always       -       0
  2 Throughput_Performance  0x0005   100   100   050    Pre-fail  Offline      -       0
  3 Spin_Up_Time            0x0027   100   100   001    Pre-fail  Always       -       1676
  4 Start_Stop_Count        0x0032   100   100   000    Old_age   Always       -       3426
  5 Reallocated_Sector_Ct   0x0033   100   100   050    Pre-fail  Always       -       0
  7 Seek_Error_Rate         0x000b   100   100   050    Pre-fail  Always       -       0
  8 Seek_Time_Performance   0x0005   100   100   050    Pre-fail  Offline      -       0
  9 Power_On_Hours          0x0032   077   077   000    Old_age   Always       -       9347
10 Spin_Retry_Count        0x0033   168   100   030    Pre-fail  Always       -       0
12 Power_Cycle_Count       0x0032   100   100   000    Old_age   Always       -       3384
191 G-Sense_Error_Rate      0x0032   100   100   000    Old_age   Always       -       779
192 Power-Off_Retract_Count 0x0032   100   100   000    Old_age   Always       -       308
193 Load_Cycle_Count        0x0032   098   098   000    Old_age   Always       -       26723
194 Temperature_Celsius     0x0022   100   100   000    Old_age   Always       -       32 (Min/Max 6/52)
196 Reallocated_Event_Count 0x0032   100   100   000    Old_age   Always       -       0
197 Current_Pending_Sector  0x0032   100   100   000    Old_age   Always       -       0
198 Offline_Uncorrectable   0x0030   100   100   000    Old_age   Offline      -       0
199 UDMA_CRC_Error_Count    0x0032   200   200   000    Old_age   Always       -       0
220 Disk_Shift              0x0002   100   100   000    Old_age   Always       -       0
222 Loaded_Hours            0x0032   083   083   000    Old_age   Always       -       7043
223 Load_Retry_Count        0x0032   100   100   000    Old_age   Always       -       0
224 Load_Friction           0x0022   100   100   000    Old_age   Always       -       0
226 Load-in_Time            0x0026   100   100   000    Old_age   Always       -       266
240 Head_Flying_Hours       0x0001   100   100   001    Pre-fail  Offline      -       0

SMART Error Log Version: 1
No Errors Logged

SMART Self-test log structure revision number 1
Num  Test_Description    Status                  Remaining  LifeTime(hours)  LBA_of_first_error
# 1  Extended offline    Completed without error       00%      9223         -
# 2  Short offline       Completed without error       00%      9221         -
# 3  Extended offline    Completed without error       00%      8968         -
# 4  Short offline       Completed without error       00%      8965         -
# 5  Short offline       Completed without error       00%      8965         -

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.

[michael chiklis]

SMART is not fine !

Code:

191 G-Sense_Error_Rate      0x0032   100   100   000    Old_age   Always       -       779

779 errors on G-Sense

[throwaway111]

SMART is not fine !

Code:

191 G-Sense_Error_Rate      0x0032   100   100   000    Old_age   Always       -       779

779 errors on G-Sense

I have also looked at this attribute, and was a bit worried, but it remains stable, and is not increasing.

Very likely previous owner either was doing weird stuff, or the drive was not mounted properly.

My bad for not mentioning this in my first post.

Either way, performance wise this drive is about what I would expect it to be for a 5400 2.5 drive from a previous decade.

Code:

# dd if=/dev/sda8 of=/dev/null bs=10M status=progress
64424509440 bytes (64 GB, 60 GiB) copied, 640 s, 101 MB/s
# dd if=/dev/sda8 of=/dev/sda9 bs=10M status=progress; sync
64424509440 bytes (64 GB, 60 GiB) copied, 1316.57 s, 48.9 MB/s

I have also found that the value of "Transition from drive PhyRdy to drive PhyNRdy", from extended smartctl output (smartctl -x), was very high, and increasing.

It turned out that it was related to SATA power management:

Code:

/sys/class/scsi_host/host0/link_power_management_policy

Which by default was being set to "med_power_with_dipm".

I got rid of this issue by setting "ahci.mobile_lpm_policy=1" kernel boot parameter, which now automatically sets it to "max_performance".

Unfortunately it did not have any impact on the post-write head activity issue from my first post.