[OT?] How to find out EOL for ATA flash drive?

[Jesper Hansson]

From the manufacturer of the flash drives that we use
(SimpleTech), we have received a document that describes
the ATAPI EOL command, which can be used to find out the
status of the flash-memory cells. They did not, however,
provide a program for performing this check.

Now, do I have to write a program myself that can send and
receive ATAPI commands (how?), or is there a utility "out
there" that for a cheap price can do this for me?

Best regards
Jesper Hansson

 

[Slobodan Brcin]

For utility I don't know but others may know some.

If DDK you can try to read more on SMART_SEND_DRIVE_COMMAND. It should do
something similar but I don't know if it will let command you specified to
pass.
It is strange that there is no standard or extended IOCTL code that will
allow you to request driver to do this operation instead. You should check
in Windows SDK and DDK for IOCTL_DISK_* codes, they may be way to avoid
using ATAPI codes.

Check also this link, although I think it won't be much useful for you with
this problem.
http://www.microsoft.com/whdc/hwdev/resources/specs/storspec.mspx#XSLTsectio
n124121120120


You should also post this question to
microsoft.public.win32.programmer.kernel


Best regards,
Slobodan