ATA Commands

Functional Description

 

 

2.4.3Optional ATA Command Support

2.4.3.1SMART (Self-Monitoring, Analysis and Reporting Technology)

Zeus SSDs are designed to operate in mission-critical systems where remote monitoring of the drives’s internal status is required, but removal of the drive for status checking is unacceptable. To provide remote monitoring support, Zeus SSDs can be programmed with the optional SMART feature. SMART enables the SSD to perform internal system monitoring, and report on the status of the drive. SMART is also used to analyze the SSD’s bad-block status. The total number of bad blocks accumulated from the date of manufacture; relative to the disk total capacity, is returned as status information. Monitoring accumulated bad blocks over time provides an indication of drive reliability and the expected life span of the drive in the system in which the it is installed.

2.4.3.2Identify Drive Information

The Identify Drive command enables the host to receive parameter information from the SSD. When the Identify Drive command executes, the SSD sets the BSY bit, prepares to transfer the 256 words of SSD identification data to the host, sets the DRQ bit, clears the BSY bit, and then generates an interrupt. The host can then transfer the data by reading the Data register. All reserved bits or words are all zero. Table 8 contains typical Identify Drive Information for the Zeus SSD.

 

 

Table 8. SSD Identify Drive Information

 

 

 

 

Word

Data

Total

Description

Bytes

 

 

 

08040h

1XXXXha

20000h

3XXXXh (a)

4XXXXh (a)

5XXXXh (a)

6XXXXh (a)

7-8

XXXXh(a)

9

0000h

10-19

XXXXh (a)

2General configuration bit-significant information (value fixed by CFA)

2Default number of cylinders

2

Reserved

2

Default number of heads

2Number of unformatted bytes per track (not used)

2Number of unformatted bytes per sector (not used)

2Default number of sectors per track

4Number of sectors per drive (Word7 = MSW, Word8 = LSW)

2

Reserved

20

Serial number

continued

Zeus Ultra DMA Solid State Drives

23