Checking disks behind RAID controllers

RAID controllers typically simulate a (logical) disk for each array of (physical) disks to the OS. Access to SMART functionality relies on ATA or SCSI pass through I/O controls providing direct access to each physical disk. But the standard I/O controls available are usually not designed to make this distinction between logical and physical disks. Therefore, smartmontools has to use vendor specific I/O controls. Support for disks behind RAID controllers is highly dependent on both platform and controller type.

RAID-Controller	Linux	FreeBSD	NetBSD	OpenBSD	MacOS	Solaris	Windows
LSI 3ware SATA RAID controller	-d 3ware,N /dev/twX 1.	-d 3ware,N /dev/twX 2.	-	-	-	-	/dev/sdX,N 3.
Areca SATA RAID controller	-d areca,N /dev/sgX 4.	-d areca,N /dev/arcmsrX 11.	-	-	-	-	-
HighPoint RocketRAID SATA RAID controller	-d hpt,L/M/N /dev/sdX 5.	-d hpt,L/M/N /dev/hptX 6.	-	-	-	-	-
CCISS (HP/Compaq Smart Array Controller)	-d cciss,N /dev/sdX 7.	-d cciss,N /dev/cissX	-	-	-	-	-
LSI MegaRAID SAS RAID controller Dell PERC 5/i,6/i controller	-d megaraid,N /dev/sdX 8.	/dev/passX 9.	-	-	-	-	-
Intel ICHxR RAID (Intel Rapid/Matrix Storage)	/dev/sdX	/dev/adX	?	?	?	?	/dev/csmiX,N 10.

See the notes below and the INSTALL​ file for information about kernel and driver requirements on your platform. Also consult the man pages for controller specific smartmontools options or directives.

Notes:

1. 3ware RAID controllers are supported on Linux since smartmontools release 5.1-18. Support for char devices /dev/twX was added in release 5.33.

2. 3ware support on FreeBSD is available since release 5.33, multiple controller and char device support was added in release 5.36.

3. 3ware 9000 series only (added in release 5.37), requires Windows driver 9.4.0 or later. For older controllers, smartctl and smartd provide limited SMART support through tw_cli tool, see man page. Initially the SMART support was added only to the 32-bit Windows driver. With recent driver versions SMART access works on 64-bit Windows 7 (see ​mailing list) but not on 64-bit XP/2003 (see ticket #172).

4. Areca support on Linux added in release 5.39. The Areca controller must have firmware version 1.46 or later. Earlier versions will not return SMART information but will instead produce (harmless) SCSI error messages. Areca SAS controllers (1680 series) are not supported, see ticket #21.

5. HighPoint RocketRAID support for Linux was added in release 5.37.

6. HighPoint RocketRAID support for FreeBSD was added in release 5.39.

7. CCISS (Compaq Smart Array Controller) support for Linux was added in release 5.37.

8. Support for LSI MegaRAID controller on Linux was added in release 5.39. Please make a note that on some controllers device enumeration starting from 8 (use -d megaraid,8 in such cases).

9. Support of LSI MegaRAID on FreeBSD is implemented with mfip.ko module and /dev/passX devices.

10. Intel ICHxR RAID support for Windows was added in release 5.41. It also works for a cache SSD connected to Z68 chipset. Some older driver versions (8.7.0, see ​mailing list) may return bogus SMART thresholds.

11. Areca support for FreeBSD was added in r3369-r3374 and will be included in release 5.42.