HWiNF064 does not like SAS drives

[ExGANDI]

Hi,

I have very annoying problem with HWiNF064 - it does not "like" my SAS drives.
I'm using ASUS P6T Workstation Pro motherboard with Intel XEON W3680 processor. Motherboard itself has integrated SAS controller but i'm using Supermicro 8-Port SAS/SATA Card - (AOC-SAS2LP-MV8). I have 6 disks: 4 SATA + 2 SAS and all of them are attached to extension card. When SAS drives are attached to extension card HWiNF064 just don't read SMART status from these drives.

And if somehow it can be acceptable with not so standard Hitachi HUSMM8020ASS200 with another Seagate ST32000445SS that's the opposite case: one of most commonly used SAS HDD's. So in both cases no SMART, no Temperature readings... nothing. In fact when same 2 disks are connected to integrated SAS connector HWiNF064 shows SAMRT correctly. In that case extension card is one to blame but... it's not the card because HDSentinel shows SMART, Temperature, Performance, Info e.t.c. correctly when attached to extension.

So can anyone help with solving this issue? It's very annoying to not be able to monitor my 2 most important drives.

P.S. Ofcourse Debug and Report files attached.
P.P.S. There are other errors in HWiNF064 but they are not so critical /for example stating that my mobo supports USB 3.0/

 

[Martin]

Does HDSentinel show full SMART information for those drives similar to SATA drives, or just a few like temperature? I can't see the full set on the screenshot above.

Regarding the issue with USB - HWiNFO found that your system contains a "Renesas Electronics uPD720201 USB 3.0 xHCI Host Controller", which is USB 3.0-compliant

 

[ExGANDI]

Well... HDSentinel shows full info. Here are the screens:

http://www.gat-bg.com/ExGANDI/Bugs/HWProblem5.PNG

http://www.gat-bg.com/ExGANDI/Bugs/HWProblem6.PNG

http://www.gat-bg.com/ExGANDI/Bugs/HWProblem7.PNG

Same with the other SAS drive. All info shown as supposed to. 

P.S. Reneseas Device is a PCIe x1 extension card so i don't think that is correct to address it as a mobo specification.

 

[Martin]

Thanks for the information.
I'm working on this and will hopefully soon have some version to test

 

[Martin]

I have added reporting of some parameters for SCSI/SAS drives (controller, temperature, self-test result).
Please try this build: www.hwinfo.com/beta/hwi64_607_3812.zip
and let me know if/how it works.
It would be great if you could post a few screenshots and upload a new Debug File for my analysis if all is well.

 

[ExGANDI]

First of all let me say this: for the first time in my life someone is releasing beta concerning my problem so i'm flattered!!!  :blush:
That's why i decided to be as helpfull as possible so for the sake of this test i switched one of the SAS drives to the Integrated SAS Controller. Now HGST drive is connected to SAS/SATA Extension Card and Seagate drive is connected to Integrated SAS Controller. That way you can observe both cases in one pass.

Now for the Beta: short version is YES - it works!
As you can see from attached screens even at Summary screen there is an improvement: now you can see green dot (Self-Test Failure indicator) in front of the SAS drives (called ATA for unknown reason - they are anything but ATA). Also there is now more info in Drive panel. Pretty basic but present. And two drives are now show even in the Sensor panel. Just Self-Test Failure and Temperature but... HEY they are there!!!!

P.S. Report and Debug files attached as requested.

 

[ExGANDI]

Oh... and for purpose of comparison: made some tests with AIDA64.
You are WAY ahead of them!!! 

Their software is complete mismatch... for example they have much more info for both drives BUT: in the SMART section drive connected to Integrated SAS Controller is NOT present at all /only showing device attached to Extension SAS Controller with completely wrong temperature reading/. But afterwards in Sensor panel there is temperature info /correct one!/ only for this device that is missing from SMART?!?!?!? 

As you can see complete mess. So keep up the good work!!!

P.S. Only thing that i like about their software though... ability to creatively place sensors and sensor readings on LCD displays. Bars, graphs, gauges, labels e.t.c.

 

[Martin]

Thanks for your feedback
I'm currently working on some additional improvements including the appearance in summary window.
A new test build should be ready soon

 

[Martin]

OK, so here just another build with a few improvements: reporting SAS, drive capacity, etc.
www.hwinfo.com/beta/hwi64_607_3817.zip
Please let me know how it works...

 

[ExGANDI]

Hi. Everything seems to work correctly. New infos, SCSI labels   e.t.c.

P.S. Just one thing: noticed that previously correct Work On Hours for drives now show some weird data. Previous versions 40K+/50K+, now one of the drives 169 hours, another one 255 hours /and values are not changing/.

 

[Martin]

Thanks for the feedback.
Is the SAS label now shown in summary and does the temperature work properly?

 

[Martin]

OK, I found the bug in reporting of Power-on hours, shall be fixed in the next build.

 

[ExGANDI]

Imho everything look fine. It now shows SCSI in Summary and temperature readings are correct.

 

[Martin]

Thanks. I expected them to appear as SAS in summary. Can you please attach a new Debug File from the latest Beta version?

 

[ExGANDI]

Here are the files: Debug + Summary.

For the summary screen: I don't know if it's suppose to show SAS version of the drive or SAS characteristic [font=Tahoma, Verdana, Arial, sans-serif]of the port [/font]/real negotiated working speed/ they are attached to. Because Seagate drive is SAS-2 6Gbps [font=Tahoma, Verdana, Arial, sans-serif]drive [/font]attached to [font=Tahoma, Verdana, Arial, sans-serif]SAS-2 6Gbps[/font] port, but HGST is SAS-3 12Gbps drive attached to [font=Tahoma, Verdana, Arial, sans-serif]SAS-2 6Gbps[/font] port. And for the HGST drive it get's even more complicated because it can be connected as 6Gbps 9W, 6Gbps 11W but also can be connected to same SAS-2 interface trough special cable using 2 ports to simulate SAS-3 12Gbps also 9W or 11W. I suppose that will be too complicated to address all of the cases. So just info about the specs of the drive itself will be much more easy to implement.

Regards.

 

[Martin]

Thanks for the feedback.
I don't know how to retrieve those SAS capabilities and it looks like some of my assumptions about SAS don't work here.
I guess I will leave it as is for now, it's already reporting much better than it did initially.