OpenBSD downgrades HDD transfer mode, I want to upgrade it WITHOUT BOOTING


 
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Operating Systems BSD OpenBSD downgrades HDD transfer mode, I want to upgrade it WITHOUT BOOTING
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Old 02-16-2009
OpenBSD downgrades HDD transfer mode, I want to upgrade it WITHOUT BOOTING

Hi,

I have a crappy hard disk and am trying to back up stuff from it onto my newer hopefully less crappy disk. There are dead sectors on the disk and some files can't be read (at all) so OpenBSD downgrades the transfer mode down until PIO mode 4. I noticed the transfer speed slowing down extremely, and I would guess it's due to these downgrades, which are done when reading certain blocks continuously produces errors. But there are files on the disk that ARE READABLE and I don't want to reboot every time I end up on a trashed area on the disk, since the rest is fine and can be read in Ultra-DMA mode 5.

I looked it up a bit, and found out that apparently you can change device flags - including the transfer modes - with the config/UKC (User Kernel Config) utility, but AFAIK that is for rewriting the kernel image without recompiling. When OpenBSD downgrades the DMA modes, it's obviously doing something else, and I just need to do the reverse operation. The point being: if it can be downgraded without booting, it can be changed, and therefore upgraded without booting.

Anyone know how to upgrade from PIO4 without a reboot?
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DMC(1)																	    DMC(1)

NAME
dmc - controls the Disk Mount Conditioner SYNOPSIS
dmc start mount [profile-name|profile-index [-boot]] dmc stop mount dmc status mount [-json] dmc show profile-name|profile-index dmc list dmc select mount profile-name|profile-index dmc configure mount type access-time read-throughput write-throughput [ioqueue-depth maxreadcnt maxwritecnt segreadcnt segwritecnt] dmc help | -h DESCRIPTION
dmc(1) configures the Disk Mount Conditioner. The Disk Mount Conditioner is a kernel provided service that can degrade the disk I/O being issued to specific mount points, providing the illusion that the I/O is executing on a slower device. It can also cause the conditioned mount point to advertise itself as a different device type, e.g. the disk type of an SSD could be set to an HDD. This behavior consequently changes various parameters such as read-ahead settings, disk I/O throttling, etc., which normally have different behavior depending on the underlying device type. COMMANDS
Common command parameters: o mount - the mount point to be used in the command o profile-name - the name of a profile as shown in dmc list o profile-index - the index of a profile as shown in dmc list dmc start mount [profile-name|profile-index [-boot]] Start the Disk Mount Conditioner on the given mount point with the current settings (from dmc status) or the given profile, if pro- vided. Optionally configure the profile to remain enabled across reboots, if -boot is supplied. dmc stop mount Disable the Disk Mount Conditioner on the given mount point. Also disables any settings that persist across reboot via the -boot flag provided to dmc start, if any. dmc status mount [-json] Display the current settings (including on/off state), optionally as JSON dmc show profile-name|profile-index Display the settings of the given profile dmc list Display all profile names and indices dmc select mount profile-name|profile-index Choose a different profile for the given mount point without enabling or disabling the Disk Mount Conditioner dmc configure mount type access-time read-throughput write-throughput [ioqueue-depth maxreadcnt maxwritecnt segreadcnt segwritecnt] Select custom parameters for the given mount point rather than using the settings provided by a default profile. See dmc list for example parameter settings for various disk presets. o type - 'SSD' or 'HDD'. The type determines how various system behaviors like disk I/O throttling and read-ahead algorithms affect the issued I/O. Additionally, choosing 'HDD' will attempt to simulate seek times, including drive spin-up from idle. o access-time - latency in microseconds for a single I/O. For SSD types this latency is applied exactly as specified to all I/O. For HDD types, the latency scales based on a simulated seek time (thus making the access-time the maximum latency or seek penalty). o read-throughput - integer specifying megabytes-per-second maximum throughput for disk reads o write-throughput - integer specifying megabytes-per-second maxmimu throughput for disk writes o ioqueue-depth - maximum number of commands that a device can accept o maxreadcnt - maximum byte count per read o maxwritecnt - maximum byte count per write o segreadcnt - maximum physically disjoint segments processed per read o segwritecnt - maximum physically disjoint segments processed per write dmc help | -h Display help text EXAMPLES
dmc start / '5400 HDD' Turn on the Disk Mount Conditioner for the boot volume, acting like a 5400 RPM hard drive. dmc configure /Volumes/ExtDisk SSD 100 100 50 Configure an external disk to use custom parameters to degrade performance as if it were a slow SSD with 100 microsecond latencies, 100MB/s read throughput, and 50MB/s write throughput. IMPORTANT
The Disk Mount Conditioner is not a 'simulator'. It can only degrade (or 'condition') the I/O such that a faster disk device behaves like a slower device, not vice-versa. For example, a 5400 RPM hard drive cannot be conditioned to act like a SSD that is capable of a higher throughput than the theoretical limitations of the hard disk. In addition to running dmc stop, rebooting is also a sufficient way to clear any existing settings and disable Disk Mount Conditioner on all mount points (unless started with -boot). SEE ALSO
nlc(1) January 2018 DMC(1)