Using smartctl with Samsung F4 EcoGreen drives may result in data loss

A firmware patch is now available from Samsung, see above link for details.

> You should provide an Update with smartctl which does not issue IDENTIFY DEVICE commands.
Information from IDENTIFY DEVICE is essential for smartctl full functionality.

A possible quick fix would be to add the new drive database entry for F4EG (see upstream changesets r3216, r3219). Then smarctl will print a warning if such a drive is detected. Note that the warning will persist even if the firmware patch is installed Samsung decided to keep the version number unchanged ...

A better fix is to upgrade to smartmontools 5.40 and run the new update-smart-drivedb script then.

This bug was fixed in the package smartmontools - 5.40+svn3296-1

---------------
smartmontools (5.40+svn3296-1) unstable; urgency=low

  * [cfbba5b] Imported Upstream version 5.40+svn3296
    - Intel X18-M/X25-M/X25-V G2 SSDs: Add firmware bug warning
      (Closes: #581996)
    - handles missing attributes and prints attributes of SandForce based SSDs
      correctly (Closes: #601258)
    - Added a note about smartctl is unable to print a warning if autosave is
      disabled (Closes: 570892)
    - Print help message if no option is specified (Closes: 435579)
    - Only some of the controller specific parts of the code may still use the
      old ioctl (LP: #658469)
    - New drive database entry for F4EG (LP: #684809)
  * [b5b85ba] Refreshed patches
  * [2b7f0f1] Update to Standards-Version 3.9.1, no changes needed
  * [3ed7206] debian/rules: remove make -C examplescripts
  * [f8250f3] Pass exampledir in configure
  * [0711e68] Install examples files and update-smart-drivedb (Closes: #607689)
    (Closes: #593502)
  * [f36e375] Do not install CHANGELOG COPYING INSTALL and initd files
  * [a76819a] Re-enabled capability-dropping on armel (Closes: #552044)
 -- Ubuntu Archive Auto-Sync <email address hidden> Sat, 30 Apr 2011 13:47:15 +0000