Hard disk drive condition reporting and error correction

• US 7,802,019 B2
• Filed: 12/08/2005
• Issued: 09/21/2010
• Est. Priority Date: 06/14/2005
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: Microsoft Technology Licensing LLC (Microsoft Corporation)
• Original Assignee: Microsoft Corporation
• Inventors: Meng, Yi, Obr, Nathan S., Shu, Frank J.
• Primary Examiner(s): Kindred; Alford W
• Assistant Examiner(s): TAYLOR, BROOKE JAZMOND
• Application Number:
  US11/297,269
• Publication Number:
  US 20060282709A1
• Time in Patent Office: 1,748 Days
• Field of Search: 710/8
• US Class Current: 710/8
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 11/0727 in a storage system, e.g. in a DASD or network based storage system drivers for digital recording or reproducing units G06F3/06; circuits for error detection or correction within digital recording or reproducing units G11B20/18; for distributed storage of data in networks, e.g. transport arrangements for network file system [NFS], storage area networks [SAN] or network attached storage [NAS], H04L67/1097
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 11/0775 Content or structure details of the error report, e.g. specific table structure, specific error fields
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 11/0793 Remedial or corrective actions recovery from an exception in an instruction pipeline G06F9/3861; by retry G06F11/1402; for recovering from a failure of a protocol instance or entity H04L69/40
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 11/1435 using file system or storage system metadata
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 11/3485 for I/O devices
• CPC Class Codes: G11B 19/048 Testing of disk drives, e.g. to detect defects or prevent sudden failure
• CPC Class Codes: G11B 27/36 Monitoring, i.e. supervising the progress of recording or reproducing for digital recording G11B20/00 and s.gr.; for monitoring, testing or measuring of TV recorders of the type covered by H04N5/76 and subgroups, see H04N17/06

Abstract

A system that facilitates maintaining hard disk drive performance comprises a memory component that includes extensions to at least one protocol associated with a hard disk drive, the extensions enable communications to occur in real-time between an operating system and the hard disk drive. An interface component utilizes the extensions to receive a notification from the hard disk drive and relay the notification to the operating system, the notification relates to an operating parameter of the hard disk drive.

Claims

1. A computer comprising:

an operating system;

a hard disk drive having a sensor to measure a physical operating parameter of the hard disk drive, the hard disk drive configured to compare the physical operating parameter to an expected range of said physical operating parameter and send a notification when the physical operating parameter is determined to be out of the expected range, the expected range being a range of said physical operating parameter in which the hard disk drive is expected to operate without damaging the hard disk drive;

a memory component comprising extensions to at least one protocol associated with the hard disk drive, the extensions enabling communications relating to disk drive diagnostics to occur between the operating system and the hard disk drive;

an interface component that utilizes the extensions to receive the notification from the hard disk drive and relay the notification to the operating system, the notification relating to the physical operating parameter of the hard disk drive determined to be out of the expected range; and

a processor operating under control of the operating system for sending a command to the hard disk drive via the interface component in response to receiving the notification, the command instructing the hard disk drive to send an action to the processor, the action being determined by the hard disk drive in response to the physical operating parameter being outside of the expected range and based at least in part on the physical operating parameter, the action being a corrective/maintenance action related to the hard drive.

2. The computer of claim 1, wherein the hard disk drive comprises a policy component that analyzes the physical operating parameter measured by the sensor and historic performance data of the hard disk drive in connection with determining the at least one action.

3. The computer of claim 2, wherein the operating system further comprises a prioritization component that further determines the action based on a current activity of the operating system, wherein the processor is further configured to perform the action.

4. The computer of claim 1, wherein the sensor of the hard disk drive is configured to measure at least one of temperature, vibration, G force, read speed, write speed, power on time, error rate, power on frequency, and duty cycle information.

5. The computer of claim 1, wherein the operating system comprises a polling component that polls the hard disk drive for the notification, the notification delivered to the operating system upon detection of the notification by the polling component.

6. The computer of claim 1, wherein the at least one protocol is selected from the group consisting of a small computer system interface (SCSI), serial attached SCSI (SAS), parallel ATA (PATA), and serial ATA (SATA) protocol.

7. The computer of claim 1, wherein the hard disk drive comprises a reminder component that resends the notification after a threshold amount of time passes without response from the operating system.

8. The computer of claim 1, wherein the operating system further comprises a presentation component that presents information relating to the notification to a user.

9. The computer of claim 8, wherein the presentation component creates an email and delivers such email to an account associated with the user.

10. The computer of claim 3, wherein the action comprises at least one of powering off the hard disk drive, performing load balancing, and initiating backup of the hard disk.

11. The computer of claim 1, further comprising a data store component that includes historical performance information relating to the hard disk drive, and the notification is based at least in part upon an analysis of the historical performance information.

19. The computer of claim 1, wherein:

the sensor is a temperature sensor;

the physical operating parameter is a temperature;

the expected range is of the temperature is defined by a threshold temperature; and

the notification from the hard disk drive received by the interface component indicates that a temperature sensed by the temperature sensor of the hard disk drive exceeds the threshold temperature for safely operating the hard disk drive.

20. The computer of claim 1, wherein the physical operating parameter is a duty cycle of operation of the hard disk drive, and the expected range of said duty cycle is defined by at least an upper limit.

12. A method for maintaining hard disk drive performance comprising acts of:

with an operating system of a computer having a hard disk drive;

receiving a diagnostic error notification from the hard disk drive by way of a protocol extension associated with the hard disk drive, the diagnostic error notification based at least in part upon an environmental parameter relating to the hard disk drive, the diagnostic error notification indicating the environmental parameter is outside of an expected range, wherein the expected range is a range of said environmental parameter in which the hard disk drive is expected to operate without damage to the hard disk drive, wherein the expected range of the environmental parameter is defined by at least one threshold;

responding to the diagnostic error notification by sending at least one command to the hard disk drive, the command requesting an action determined by the hard disk drive, the action determined in response to the environmental parameter being outside of the expected range, and the action correcting a sensed problem with the hard disk drive or mitigating damage to the hard disk drive;

after sending the at least one command to the hard disk drive, receiving from the hard disk drive an indication of the action to be performed; and

controlling performance of the action indicated by the hard disk drive.

13. The method of claim 12, further comprising configuring the operating system to poll the hard disk drive for the diagnostic error notification.

14. The method of claim 12, wherein the diagnostic error notification is based at least in part upon the operating parameter sensed by at least one sensor.

15. The method of claim 12, further comprising generating a user notification in response to the diagnostic error notification, the user notification comprising at least one of a warning and selectable actions to a user of the hard disk drive.

16. The method of claim 12, further comprising reminding the operating system of the diagnostic error notification if the operating system has not responded to the diagnostic error notification after passage of a threshold amount of time.

17. A computer-readable storage device having computer usable instructions stored thereon for execution by a processor to perform a method comprising acts of:

at an operating system, receiving a diagnostic error notification from a hard disk drive, the diagnostic error notification indicating a physical operating parameter of the hard disk drive is outside of an expected ranged, the expected range defined by at least one threshold;

responding to the diagnostic error notification by the operating system by sending at least one command to the hard disk drive, the command requesting an action determined by the hard disk drive the action determined in response to the physical operating parameter being outside of the expected range;

after sending the at least one command from the operating system, receiving from the hard disk drive an indication of the action to be performed; and

performing the action by the operating system, the action correcting a sensed problem with the hard disk drive or mitigating damage to the hard disk drive.

18. The computer-readable storage device of claim 17, wherein the act of receiving the diagnostic error notification indicates a temperature sensed in the hard disk drive exceeds a threshold temperature for a safe operating environment of the hard disk drive.