[TUHS] Might Have a DMERT SCSI Disk, Need Help Preserving

[TUHS] Might Have a DMERT SCSI Disk, Need Help Preserving

[segaloco via TUHS]

Hello everyone, I reach out in my time of need regarding a potential source of DMERT materials.  I've recently come into possession of a hard disk unit from a 5ESS switch, presumably the 5ESS-2000 variant, part UN 375G:

https://i.imgur.com/yQzY5Hs.jpeg

The actual disk itself appears to be a Ultra320 SCSI disk, which I unfortunately do not have the tools to do anything with myself.  After looking into various solutions, I'm not getting the warm fuzzies about finding the necessary hardware on my first shot, these sorts of hardware specifics are not my strong suit.  The story I got is it is from a working system, so could possibly have artifacts, but at the same time, I've already sunk a little over $1,000 into getting this, I'm hesitant to drop more on hardware I'm not 100% confident is correct for the job.

Does anyone have any recommendations, whether a service, hardware, anything, that I could use to try and get at what is on this disk?  Even if it's just sending it off to someone along with enough storage for them to make me a dd image of the thing, I just feel so close yet so far on finally figuring out if I've managed to land a copy of DMERT.

Thanks in advance for any advice, I'm really hoping that the end of this story is I find DMERT artifacts to get archived and preserved, that would be such a satisfying conclusion to all this 3B20/5ESS study as of late.  I wish I had the resources to see the rest through myself but this is getting into an area I have quite a bit of trepidation regarding.  What I don't want to do is inadvertently damage something by getting it wrong.

- Matt G.

[TUHS] Re: Might Have a DMERT SCSI Disk, Need Help Preserving

[Erik E. Fair]

A storage device data recovery service that has been around since 1985:

"Drive Savers"


https://drivesaversdatarecovery.com/data-recovery-services/devices-supported/external-drive-data-recovery/

I have never used their services myself, but they advertised handling SCSI drives back in the day, and given their business, I doubt they throw away outmoded gear - can't hurt to call 'em and ask.

I tried that imgur.com link and got a 404 - no image there.

An Ultra320 SCSI drive should have either a 68-pin or 80-pin SCA connector on the back, and will be "low voltage differential" (LVD) - an Ultra80 or Ultra160 SCSI controller should be able to talk to that, i.e., the drive should be able to negotiate the link speed with the controller and downgrade appropriately. I might be able to cobble something together from the junk I keep too much of to try and read the drive if it will spin up and talk, but an outfit like Drive Savers will be much better equipped than I am.

This might also be a job for the restoration folks at the Computer History Museum in Mountain View, CA.

	Erik Fair

[TUHS] Re: Might Have a DMERT SCSI Disk, Need Help Preserving

[Warner Losh]

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I have an old x86 server that has FreeBSD running on it (an older version)
with a Ultra320 adaptech controller in it (I think a 29320), and all the
cabling etc that has one extra slot on the cable. It's 68 pin, not the 80
pin SCA. I sadly, got rid of my SCA adapters a while ago. I think setting
the drive address is the only config you'd need. But a physical examination
of the drive would help.

I'm near Denver Colorado if that's convenient, but would be happy to ship
stuff to help out. I've imaged dozens of drives.

Warner

On Fri, Mar 8, 2024 at 9:22 PM Erik E. Fair <fair-tuhs@netbsd.org> wrote:

> A storage device data recovery service that has been around since 1985:
>
> "Drive Savers"
>
>
>
> https://drivesaversdatarecovery.com/data-recovery-services/devices-supported/external-drive-data-recovery/
>
> I have never used their services myself, but they advertised handling SCSI
> drives back in the day, and given their business, I doubt they throw away
> outmoded gear - can't hurt to call 'em and ask.
>
> I tried that imgur.com link and got a 404 - no image there.
>
> An Ultra320 SCSI drive should have either a 68-pin or 80-pin SCA connector
> on the back, and will be "low voltage differential" (LVD) - an Ultra80 or
> Ultra160 SCSI controller should be able to talk to that, i.e., the drive
> should be able to negotiate the link speed with the controller and
> downgrade appropriately. I might be able to cobble something together from
> the junk I keep too much of to try and read the drive if it will spin up
> and talk, but an outfit like Drive Savers will be much better equipped than
> I am.
>
> This might also be a job for the restoration folks at the Computer History
> Museum in Mountain View, CA.
>
>         Erik Fair
>

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[TUHS] Re: Might Have a DMERT SCSI Disk, Need Help Preserving

[Kevin Bowling]

On Fri, Mar 8, 2024 at 8:59 PM segaloco via TUHS <tuhs@tuhs.org> wrote:
>
> Hello everyone, I reach out in my time of need regarding a potential source of DMERT materials.  I've recently come into possession of a hard disk unit from a 5ESS switch, presumably the 5ESS-2000 variant, part UN 375G:
>
> https://i.imgur.com/yQzY5Hs.jpeg
>
> The actual disk itself appears to be a Ultra320 SCSI disk, which I unfortunately do not have the tools to do anything with myself.  After looking into various solutions, I'm not getting the warm fuzzies about finding the necessary hardware on my first shot, these sorts of hardware specifics are not my strong suit.  The story I got is it is from a working system, so could possibly have artifacts, but at the same time, I've already sunk a little over $1,000 into getting this, I'm hesitant to drop more on hardware I'm not 100% confident is correct for the job.

The later SCSI specs are pretty forgiving as far as backwards
compatibility goes, a U320 drive will run fine on basically anything
with 68-pins other than HVD which you aren't likely to encounter.
U160 and up are alwasy LVD.  There are some U320 PCIe cards but they
seem to be pricey these days (on the order of $100).  If you have a
system with PCI (or PCI-X) you can pick up a capable card for $10.  An
internal cable with a built in terminator is about $15 and that is the
only other thing you need.

Typically you can just do a 'dd' of the drive to get a raw image from
any fair modern UNIX.  Then you can try 'binwalk' to see what the disk
structure is like.. hard to say where to go from there without seeing
the output of this.

>
> Does anyone have any recommendations, whether a service, hardware, anything, that I could use to try and get at what is on this disk?  Even if it's just sending it off to someone along with enough storage for them to make me a dd image of the thing, I just feel so close yet so far on finally figuring out if I've managed to land a copy of DMERT.

If you really need to outsource it, I have the requisite equipment.
Might take me a couple weeks to turn around due to work pressures.

>
> Thanks in advance for any advice, I'm really hoping that the end of this story is I find DMERT artifacts to get archived and preserved, that would be such a satisfying conclusion to all this 3B20/5ESS study as of late.  I wish I had the resources to see the rest through myself but this is getting into an area I have quite a bit of trepidation regarding.  What I don't want to do is inadvertently damage something by getting it wrong.
>
> - Matt G.