Date: Sun, 28 Aug 2011 07:30:51 +0200 From: Polytropon <freebsd@edvax.de> To: FreeBSD Questions <freebsd-questions@freebsd.org> Subject: Identifying disk activity Message-ID: <20110828073051.1ec5b66a.freebsd@edvax.de>
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Since I have installed my new system (FreeBSD/i386 8.2-STABLE), I have found some kind of disk activity I've never had before on my home system. As this PC is a very cheap product, it doesn't have a HDD LED. Instead I have to listen to the disk. This is the strange sound: four groups of short "brrrrt" sounds within a second, with a short pause between them. #####-----#####-----#####-----#####----- = 1 s This can be heared over several seconds, then silence. From time to time, a "brrrt" sound appears for 3 seconds in one long rush. I am not sure this is related to a program, but I'd like to find it out. As FreeBSD's I/O subsystem does not work in real-time, I cannot conclude from actual program file I/O to physical disk I/O. Is there a way to force "synchronous disk activity"? I don't mind if this makes the system run slower, because it's just for diagnostics, but I'd like file I/O done by a program to cause immediate disk activity. My idea is to watch open files and running programs as precise as possible (as root: "top -St -s 0"). Which tools (e. g. top, htop, lsof) would you suggest to narrow down _which_ program is accessing _which_ file, causing the sound? I already do suspect Opera (due to opera-linuxplugins-11.50, linux-f10-flashplugin-10.3r183.5, nspluginwrapper-1.4.4 maybe), but I'd like to know _where_ exactly this strange sound came from, as there is no 1:1 relation (running Opera does not imply the sound to appear). I have already checked "smartctl -a /dev/ad4" which doesn't show any malicious behaviour of the disk itself (sometimes also the reason for strange sounds). -- Polytropon Magdeburg, Germany Happy FreeBSD user since 4.0 Andra moi ennepe, Mousa, ...
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