Yesterday, 12:12 PM
Thank you for reaching out with this important question! SMART tests and data scrubbing are critical for maintaining the health of your NAS and ensuring data integrity. Here’s a recommended schedule and the reasoning behind it, based on best practices and experience:
SMART Tests Schedule
1. Short SMART Test
Frequency: Weekly
Why?
The short test takes only a few minutes and checks for immediate, critical issues like read/write errors or disk surface defects.
This frequency strikes a balance between regular monitoring and not overloading the drives unnecessarily.
2. Long SMART Test
Frequency: Monthly
Why?
The long test performs an in-depth scan of the drive surface, identifying bad sectors or other potential issues.
Since this is a resource-intensive process, running it monthly is sufficient to catch early signs of disk degradation.
Data Scrubbing Schedule
Frequency: Every 1–2 months
Why?
Data scrubbing ensures data integrity by scanning and verifying data blocks for corruption, particularly important in RAID configurations like SHR or RAID 5/6.
Running it every 1–2 months minimizes risk without adding unnecessary stress to the drives.
Synology recommends data scrubbing at least quarterly, but for WD Red Plus drives and your mixed-capacity setup, a slightly more frequent schedule can be beneficial.
Additional Considerations
Stagger Tasks:
Avoid scheduling SMART tests and data scrubbing simultaneously, as both are disk-intensive operations.
For example:
Short SMART Test: Every Sunday at 2 AM.
Long SMART Test: First Saturday of the month at 2 AM.
Data Scrubbing: Second Sunday of the month at 2 AM.
Drive Usage and Environment:
If your NAS experiences heavy usage or operates in a high-temperature environment, you may want to run tests and scrubbing more frequently.
Monitor Results:
Regularly check the results of SMART tests and data scrubbing in Synology DSM.
If errors or warnings appear, investigate immediately and consider replacing the affected drive.
SMART Tests Schedule
1. Short SMART Test
Frequency: Weekly
Why?
The short test takes only a few minutes and checks for immediate, critical issues like read/write errors or disk surface defects.
This frequency strikes a balance between regular monitoring and not overloading the drives unnecessarily.
2. Long SMART Test
Frequency: Monthly
Why?
The long test performs an in-depth scan of the drive surface, identifying bad sectors or other potential issues.
Since this is a resource-intensive process, running it monthly is sufficient to catch early signs of disk degradation.
Data Scrubbing Schedule
Frequency: Every 1–2 months
Why?
Data scrubbing ensures data integrity by scanning and verifying data blocks for corruption, particularly important in RAID configurations like SHR or RAID 5/6.
Running it every 1–2 months minimizes risk without adding unnecessary stress to the drives.
Synology recommends data scrubbing at least quarterly, but for WD Red Plus drives and your mixed-capacity setup, a slightly more frequent schedule can be beneficial.
Additional Considerations
Stagger Tasks:
Avoid scheduling SMART tests and data scrubbing simultaneously, as both are disk-intensive operations.
For example:
Short SMART Test: Every Sunday at 2 AM.
Long SMART Test: First Saturday of the month at 2 AM.
Data Scrubbing: Second Sunday of the month at 2 AM.
Drive Usage and Environment:
If your NAS experiences heavy usage or operates in a high-temperature environment, you may want to run tests and scrubbing more frequently.
Monitor Results:
Regularly check the results of SMART tests and data scrubbing in Synology DSM.
If errors or warnings appear, investigate immediately and consider replacing the affected drive.