• Re: How does hot swap work?

    From wasbit@21:1/5 to Jeff Gaines on Sat Oct 26 09:51:30 2024
    On 26/10/2024 09:41, Jeff Gaines wrote:

    I Googled "how does hot swap work" and got a variety of contradictory answers!

    I am unclear as to whether it is a function of the drive, the caddy or
    the OS (or something else, or perhaps a combination).

    What I would like to do is have a caddy built into the computer case
    that I can slot an SSD in and to be able to press a switch/button
    whatever and pull it out without corrupting it.

    Is that possible or am I asking for the unobtainable?


    Try changing your search terms to 'hot swap caddy' or 'hot swap drive bay'.


    --
    Regards
    wasbit

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  • From Jeff Gaines@21:1/5 to All on Sat Oct 26 08:41:23 2024
    I Googled "how does hot swap work" and got a variety of contradictory
    answers!

    I am unclear as to whether it is a function of the drive, the caddy or the
    OS (or something else, or perhaps a combination).

    What I would like to do is have a caddy built into the computer case that
    I can slot an SSD in and to be able to press a switch/button whatever and
    pull it out without corrupting it.

    Is that possible or am I asking for the unobtainable?

    --
    Jeff Gaines Dorset UK
    Every day is a good day for chicken, unless you're a chicken.

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  • From Theo@21:1/5 to Jeff Gaines on Sat Oct 26 10:39:43 2024
    Jeff Gaines <jgnewsid@outlook.com> wrote:

    I Googled "how does hot swap work" and got a variety of contradictory answers!

    I am unclear as to whether it is a function of the drive, the caddy or the
    OS (or something else, or perhaps a combination).

    What I would like to do is have a caddy built into the computer case that
    I can slot an SSD in and to be able to press a switch/button whatever and pull it out without corrupting it.

    Is that possible or am I asking for the unobtainable?

    First you need to unmount the drive. That's up to your OS.

    Then you need a drive bay that supports pulling the drive without causing electrical complications. The SATA connector is designed for this, but it's possible the mobo is not (although it'll probably still work).

    Then you need a controller and an OS driver that is happy for drives to come and go. I think most controllers will support that, but eg RAID cards have fancier features here.

    I don't think there is anything different from a drive perspective - hotswap looks just like power loss like turning off at the wall. It should be OK as long as there is no writing in progress. Some drives (eg enterprise SSDs
    and probably HDDs) have Power Loss Protection that tidies things away
    while the power is going down.

    Some chassis have hotswap features where pushing the button tells the OS to unmount (so you can just walk into the server room and pull drives) but
    that's not necessary if you've told the OS to unmount ahead of time.


    TL;DR: if you have a drive in a caddy, unmount it and pull it. It should be fine. After all, they sell caddies for this purpose and it's what happens
    to USB drives all the time.

    Theo

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  • From Jeff Gaines@21:1/5 to Theo on Sun Oct 27 14:33:17 2024
    On 26/10/2024 in message <d+f*34YXz@news.chiark.greenend.org.uk> Theo wrote:

    [snipped]

    TL;DR: if you have a drive in a caddy, unmount it and pull it. It should
    be
    fine. After all, they sell caddies for this purpose and it's what happens
    to USB drives all the time.

    Many thanks, Theo, I did read!

    It seems that unless I unmount the drive I may have a corruption problem.
    I think I will go back to my external USB drive as my "grab it and run"
    drive.

    --
    Jeff Gaines Dorset UK
    I can please only one person per day. Today is not your day.
    Tomorrow, isn't looking good either.

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  • From Jeff Gaines@21:1/5 to wasbit on Sun Oct 27 14:30:32 2024
    On 26/10/2024 in message <vfiaii$3lbc4$1@dont-email.me> wasbit wrote:

    On 26/10/2024 09:41, Jeff Gaines wrote:

    I Googled "how does hot swap work" and got a variety of contradictory >>answers!

    I am unclear as to whether it is a function of the drive, the caddy or
    the OS (or something else, or perhaps a combination).

    What I would like to do is have a caddy built into the computer case that >>I can slot an SSD in and to be able to press a switch/button whatever and >>pull it out without corrupting it.

    Is that possible or am I asking for the unobtainable?


    Try changing your search terms to 'hot swap caddy' or 'hot swap drive bay'.

    Thanks, I am crap at Googling :-)

    --
    Jeff Gaines Dorset UK
    You can't tell which way the train went by looking at the tracks

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  • From Andy Burns@21:1/5 to Theo on Sun Oct 27 15:45:24 2024
    Theo wrote:

    if you have a drive in a caddy, unmount it and pull it. It should be
    fine. After all, they sell caddies for this purpose and it's what happens
    to USB drives all the time.

    Check System Event Log to see if you get "Surprise removal" event 157

    Also in Device Manager, consider disabling write-cache under device policy

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