Command to check HD performance

Just wanted to share this command to check the HD performance:

Code:

sudo hdparm -t /dev/sda

The result in my old notebook is:
Timing buffered disk reads: 92 MB in 3.04 seconds = 30.25 MB/sec
Share your results

 

Running hdparm is not recommend if you don't know what this command can do as you can easily ruin your data. Second, disk speed benchmarks require being repeated multiple times, testing under different conditions, as well as making sure there's nothing else causing bottleneck or IO activity when testing.

Regards,
Mrk

 

Quite some time ago, when running Ubuntu Gutsy (my first Linux) I had a K3b error
0x04 (KEY_HARDWARE_ERROR)
I wanted to see what happens if I turn DMA off so issued the command:
sudo hdparm -d0 /dev/cdrw1
It made no difference so I turned it on again.

Question: Would this also fall under risky bearing in mind that no drives are being benchmarked ?
You know of course that I don't really know what I am doing most of the time.

 

Can you please explain how that command can ruin my data?
I'm reading a hardware manual, and the author refers that command as a way to quickly show the HD performance
Thanks

 

The specific flag you ran no ... but sudo hdparm against a raw disk device ... think about it, you're using a tool that can make changes to how your device is used/seen while mounted. Wrong flags and poof your data. Not that this will happen, it's just that you must be extra careful with sudo, plus any command that handles hardware.

Cheers,
Mrk

 

After your explanation and reading about hparm in Wikipedia (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hdparm) i can now understand your alert. Thanks