I am zeroing out some old drive - some may not have secure erase. If I issue the command:
hpparm --security-erase-enhanced
Against a drive that does not have this feature, will it error? Man does not tell me.
I am zeroing out some old drive - some may not have secure erase. If I issue the command:
hpparm --security-erase-enhanced
Against a drive that does not have this feature, will it error? Man does not tell me.
You will get an error
Not in my case.
After I posted :
I ran hdparm --security… and did not get an error.
Then I ran hpparm -I and found that the drive did not have the secure erase feature.
So I did not get the error on a drive that should have errored. I am guessing the Security Erase command just spews the appropriate command at the drive and nothing Is reported back.
Hmm perhaps the drive is responsible for returning the error and your ones are just ignoring invalid commands.
Seems like a valid assessment. Also I am using a USB attached SATA adapter, so that may play into it too.
Very likely. Hdparm must support the bridge chip in order to pass commands through the bridge, now we know that the bridge in some form supported as you are able to query the drive but it might be the bridge is blocking either the security-erase command or the response. The drive would respond to the bridge should there be any errors, the bridge has to pass that on.
The only way to be certain is to plug the drive into a proper AHCI SATA port. Or use eSATA.
Ah well, I switched to a USB3 drive toaster I borrowed. This works much faster. I just did a 3TB drive basically overnight. Not as fast as secure erase but fast enough.