Smartmontools Explained

Smartmontools
Developer:	Bruce Allen, Christian Franke, Guido Guenther^[1]
Latest Release Version:	7.4^[2]
Programming Language:	C, C++
Operating System:	Unix-like (Linux, Mac OS X, BSD, others) and Microsoft Windows
Size:	1.3 MB
Genre:	Hard Disk utility
License:	GNU GPL

Smartmontools (S.M.A.R.T. Monitoring Tools) is a set of utility programs (smartctl and smartd) to control and monitor computer storage systems using the Self-Monitoring, Analysis and Reporting Technology (S.M.A.R.T.) system built into most modern (P)ATA, Serial ATA, SCSI/SAS and NVMe hard drives.^{[3] [4]}

Smartmontools displays early warning signs of hard drive problems detected by S.M.A.R.T., often giving notice of impending failure while it is still possible to back data up.^[5]

From late 2010 ATA Error Recovery Control configuration has been supported by Smartmontools, allowing it to configure many desktop-and laptop-class hard drives for use in a RAID array and vice versa.^[6]

Most Linux distributions provide the smartmontools package.^[7]

User interface

Native

smartctl and smartd have a command-line interface. By default the output of smartctl is in human readable form; to aid logic trying to parse this output, JSON output is also available.

Third-party GUI

• GSmartControl is an open-source multi-platform graphical user interface (GUI) for smartctl developed by Alexander Shaduri.^[8]
• SMART Utility is a program for Mac OS X with a GUI based on smartmontools.^[9]
• HDD Guardian was an open-source Windows-only GUI for smartctl,^[10] discontinued on 28 April 2017. The author said that the program could still be downloaded from various sites, but that the entire HDD Guardian project (source code, builds and documentation) had been retired.^[11]

See also

• System monitor
• Comparison of S.M.A.R.T. tools

External links

• Official website The domain has expired
• Smartmontools on Ubuntu Wiki
• Large collection of smartctl reports for various hard drives

Notes and References

1. Web site: smartmontools wiki . 2017-11-28.
2. https://www.smartmontools.org/ Official website
3. Book: https://books.google.com/books?id=iAh6mU_sjgsC&pg=PA346. Linux Server Hacks, Volume Two . Hack 78: Avoid Catastrophic Disk Failure . William . von Hagen . Brian K. . Jones . 346–350 . O'Reilly Media, Inc. . 2005 . 978-0-596-10082-7. via Google Books
4. Book: Unix and Linux System Administration Handbook . Evi . Nemeth . Garth . Snyder . Trent R. . Hein . Ben . Whaley . Pearson Education . 2010 . 366 . 9780132117364 .
5. Web site: Monitoring Hard Disks with SMART . . 2004-01-01 . 2010-07-26 . Bruce Allen (physicist). Bruce. Allen .
6. Web site: Error recovery control with smartmontools . Richard . Gregory . Liverpool University Department of Computer Science . 2013-11-26 . dead . https://web.archive.org/web/20110928190045/http://www.csc.liv.ac.uk/~greg/projects/erc/ . 2011-09-28 .
7. Web site: Using smartctl to get SMART status information on your hard drives . . 2010-03-30 . Vincent . Danen . 2010-07-26 . https://archive.today/20120707014133/http://www.techrepublic.com/blog/opensource/using-smartctl-to-get-smart-status-information-on-your-hard-drives/1389 . 2012-07-07 . dead .
8. Web site: How S.M.A.R.T. are your disks? . LinuxInsight . 2009-02-08 . 2010-07-26.
9. Web site: SMART Utility Monitors Hard Drives' Health . Dan . Frakes . . 2009-10-29 . 2010-07-26.
10. Web site: HDD Guardian 0.7.1 (archived). hddguardian.codeplex.com. 5 January 2017. 14 May 2017. dead. https://web.archive.org/web/20170108190610/https://hddguardian.codeplex.com/. 8 January 2017.
11. Web site: HDD Guardian - Home . https://web.archive.org/web/20170514213433/http://hddguardian.codeplex.com/. 14 May 2017. dead. hddguardian.codeplex.com. 28 April 2017. 14 May 2017.