Status of byte-for-byte validation in 2019?

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timg11
Posts: 262
Joined: Sun Oct 02, 2011 4:31 pm

Status of byte-for-byte validation in 2019?

Post by timg11 »

We've had discussions here over the years on SSDs, byte-for-byte validation, and DRAT.
For those new to the topic, Deterministic TRIM (DRAT) is a capability that must be supported by the SSD to prevent byte-for-byte validation failures in TeraByte Image.

I had to replace a drive, and searched everywhere for documentation on whether drives support DRAT. That information is apparently not provided by vendors.
I had to buy on faith, hoping that the more expensive server-grade SSD would support DRAT.
I purchased the Samsung Electronics DAV 883 DCT 240G, and I'm happy to report that it does work with Image and byte for byte validation.

However, this is not really sustainable or scalable.

What are other users doing about this issue?
1) Buying SSDs without knowing whether they support DRAT and hoping for the best? If so, how is it working out?
2) Giving up on byte for byte validation, and hoping Image's "internal consistency checks" are sufficient to detect any errors?

From Terabyte's point of view, do you see byte for byte validation as an less-useful feature that is effectively deprecated in the age of the SSD? If not, is there any way that Image could be extended to accommodate byte-for-byte validation with Non-deterministic TRIM SSDs? For example, when byte discrepancies are found in a disk block, cross reference in the file system, and determine if that block was allocated or unallocated before considering the error as fatal and failing the validation.
TeraByte Support
Posts: 3598
Joined: Thu May 05, 2011 10:37 pm

Re: Status of byte-for-byte validation in 2019?

Post by TeraByte Support »

The purpose of each is covered in
https://www.terabyteunlimited.com/kb/article.php?id=350


"timg11" wrote in message news:16159@public.image...
From Terabyte's point of view, do you see byte for byte validation as an
less-useful feature that is effectively deprecated in the age of the SSD?
If not, is there any way that Image could be extended to accommodate
byte-for-byte validation with Non-deterministic TRIM SSDs? For example,
when byte discrepancies are found in a disk block, cross reference in the
file system, and determine if that block was allocated or unallocated before
considering the error as fatal and failing the validation.

DrTeeth
Posts: 1289
Joined: Fri Aug 12, 2011 6:58 pm

Re: Status of byte-for-byte validation in 2019?

Post by DrTeeth »

On Mon, 24 Dec 2018 07:57:18 PST, just as I was about to take a herb,
timg11 disturbed my reverie and wrote:

>What are other users doing about this issue?

I only use byte-for-byte validation rarely to check up on my hardware.
I always use regular validation. I will be buying an SSD (M.2 PCIe x4)
in the new year and am not worried about the issue. I am looking at
either an Intel QLC 2TB or one of the 1TB offerings from Samsung or
Western Digital.
--
Cheers

DrT

*** Merry Christmas, Happy New Year, and may your God go with you! ***
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