10TB for $70! How to format 520b sector SAS drives to 512b - EMC, Netapp, HP, Dell, etc.

I got my hands on some EMC SAS SSDs, but they do not show up in the os in sg_scan on a Dell R430 with a H330 HBA. Any idea what else could i try?

Anyone know how to revert the disk from 512 to 520 ? I got some disks that need to be reformatted to 520bytes - but sg3 utils command fails for "--size=520"

thanks alot, this helped me out. I bought two SAS drives HGST and was having the issue finding them on the system. Format is on the way so lets see.

I'm a bit confused. Aren't sectors physical structures on the platter? Because if they are physical, you're not supposed to be able to change their size... ?

I bought a hgst netapp drive it's a sas type but when i tried it, minitool partition wizards detecting it as bad disk is that unfixable?

I've just gotten some X3550 M2s IBM and had one drive working enough to port ProxMox then I got stuck with all the other 500gb drives, duh. This seems to be the answer and I'll try it I even took the drives out and tried to use a PC with a SAS to SATA connector into a normal SATA chan, but of curse (sic) it saw the drive in admin crap and it's outputting "drive not ready" so cannot partition or format (drives didnt spin up too so dont assume your drive is dead its just SATA not telling the drive something) and on the server RAID (LSI) "wrg type" so bearing in mind ALL my drives are EXACTLY the same IBM 2.5 500 GB 7200s then Im going to try this, ON the RAID controller - in the X3660 chassis, so it talks properly to the drives (it already sees them in LSI diag - but even that hates them) ...(....which is why the PC didnt work) I wish you'd outlined the physical machine just for info but I guess it doesnt matter. I hope these commands translate to the version of Linux the latest PrxMox installed - million thanks from Thailand, the home of the server junk yards (and a lot else besides!!)

Lots of great info in this video beyond the original scope. Thanks for sharing!

Along with formatting the drives how have you incorporated them into your build? Is it a SAS motherboard and if not, are you using a SAS controller card? What is the purpose of formatting the drive is it just for SAS or SATA motherboards or do both need it?

I am a newby where it comes to SAS drives. I have 4 2TB Constellation ES.3 drives and have been for hours trying to find the easiest way to connect these drives to my PC. It seems that I must spend a whole lot of $$$ just to connect them. I purchased them not realizing they were SAS drives. Any help would be appreciated... Thanks... One other thing, must they be used in a raid configuration (something else I am not familiar with) or can I use them as individual storage drives?

Thanks for the guide, btw, two questions might also be asked by many people, 1) what does the fmtpinfo=0 parameter do here in the sg_format command, 2) is there anyway to read the SMART info such as drive power on hours out from these SAS drives? Thanks!

i did it but in same driver didnt work i got msg protection disk

format unit: Fixed format, current; Sense key: Data Protect

hi
i got this msh in same drives
Format unit command: Data protect, type: sense key; write protected media?
FORMAT UNIT failed

Excellent ... many thanks

Very good explanation. Thanks

I am running Windows 10, how do I format and install a SAS drive in Windows-10

Great info man! I have a system setup as a "conversion machine" with all types of devices and interfaces on it, from MFM to SCSI1/2/3 to SAS1/2/3 with tape drives, floppy drives, zip and Jaz drives, cdrom/dvdrom/etc. I'll just put this on it and since I externally pull out the cabling I can use it to run those long formats on many drives. I found keeping one "old" system setup like this saves a ton of time with these "new" projects. Thanks again!

Dear how can I connect EMC Harddrive to PC ???

I just purchase some 15k 450gb sas drive for my hba and one of them is stuck at .99% when reformatting to 512 bytes. I’m using sg utils on windows and running the command sg_format —format —size=512 pd(drive number)

I’m new to this whole process so if anyone knows a solution let me know!

I guess im confused, how is everyone getting around the raid controller just blocking the drives so when you scan nothing appears. My dell perc controller puts a blocked annotation on the drive and when i get into ubuntu i see no drives.

Where you bought it bro

This helped A TON! I was trying to create a raid array on a dell perc h700 raid controller with some new (to me) drives from a netapp. It kept saying the drives were defective. This worked! thanks!

What is the advantage of reformatting a disk from 520 to 512 sectors?

its possible with a 10tb sas hdd?

Thank you for sharing the trick. Formatting 30 drives in two enclosures (KTN-STL3) with Dell H200e HBA. Process is slow but working.

could i sotre games on the drive after doing this?

I have 6x 2TB 7200rpm SAS drives from an old EMC VNXe storage system. Would this format process allow for these drives to be used on an IBM x3650 M1 server?

Great video! Not too long! Only the essential! But I still have a doubt!
I have a Dell R610 server with a PERC6/I Controller and it shows the NETAPP drives in there but as Failed drives (they are brand new drives) when I use the sg_util or lsscsi command they don't show de drives , only shows a PERC6/I device as sda.
How to fix it to linux shows the drives directly pure in the OS ??
Which controller did you used??
TKS in advance to anyone

Hello, I heard that if I format EMC Hard Drive from 520b to 512, the drives would be defect in few months, true / false ? Many thanks.

It is also possible with an adaptec 5405 - You just have to make some entries direct into the adapter-bios-configuration (boot etc. all enable)

hd com sed, voce atualiza um firmware

Clean desk compared to mine. I just got 24 4tb drives for 700$

Space is the premium vale and 2tb is a waste of a slot. This is why they are dirt and cheat.

it work like a charm, 9 HDD in my office that we where thinking are bad, now they are fully operational....

This is all great and stuff, but sg3 utils dont even see my sas hard disk drives.
I think it requires a HBA or pass-tru, a feature none of my 6 or 7 controllers that I have available supports I guess.
Any controller (two Adaptec, 4 LSI controllers, 1 Intel controller, all SAS capable, tested with different backplanes dont fucking support my ST4000NM0023 with MS0F firmware)

Sudo sg_scsn - I. Is not working.
Also when I do sudo apt-get upgrade it works for a while then the screen goes black. I turned off hypernate and screen timer.... Uggg thanks in advance

Find out how to do the Samsung Sata SSD's that NetApp / EMC / IBM use. I have one that is stuck in 520 byte mode and I have yet to figure it out.

Hello, what controller are you using on that server? what is the server? thanks for your contribution, greetings

What did you use as a connector? You did not show.

Where I can buy 10TB SAS drives for 70 bucks? :-)

Excellent vid mate tyvm
Using this with Dell Perc H310 flashed to IT mode

maybe theyre cheap and yes theyre enterprise grade but they probably have a shit ton of hours on them, either way cool idea

Will KtN-STL3 work with brand new sata 7.2k hard drives?

This method didn't work with SSD formatted in 520bps.

I’m sure you can do this much easier under Windows.

Thanks for your video! Would you have any estimation how long would it take to format a 600 GB Netapp drive from 520 to 512?

Micron SSD 410m from EMC will not format using sg_format under windows 10, HGST works great.

Does Ubuntu recognizes the drives even if they are not initialized? On a Dell Server the drives failed to initialized, I want to unlock them.