Technical Specifications

DiskSense Ethernet technical specifications:

• Dimensions: 335mm (width) x 267mm (depth) x 58mm (height);
• Weight: 4.3 kg;
• Source ports: SATA and IDE; Target port: SATA
• Ethernet interface: RJ45 / 1Gbe;
• Internal OS: CentOS running a custom Linux kernel;
• Control interface: Atola Insight (Windows application);
• Supported hard drive interfaces: SATA I/II/III, IDE;
• Power consumption: 36 Watt average, 50 Watt peak.

DiskSense Ethernet: under the hood

DiskSense Ethernet is basically a very small computer running a Linux OS. However, neither normal computer's BIOS nor basic Linux kernel are suitable for handling of damaged hard drives, simply because neither was designed to handle hard disk failures very well. We have invested a significant amount of research and development, which allowed us to build a highly customized and fine-tuned Linux kernel that completely overcomes these issues. Additionally, this kernel features:

• Full low-level control over SATA and IDE ports
• Full native SATA support
• Reset and SATA PHY control for best handling of severely damaged hard drives
• High-speed DMA transfers, up to 220 MB/s
• All BIOS and standard kernel functions are disabled

DiskSense also features our proprietary circuitry for ultimate hard drive's power control:

• Current sensor for in-depth hard disk diagnosis
• Automatic overcurrent and short-circuit protection
• Overvoltage protection

These features are a must when dealing with damaged hard drives.

For example, low-level control of the SATA and IDE ports allows Atola Insight to deal with hard drives that do not properly initialize, have many bad sectors, or freeze frequently due to internal (mechanical) failures.

SATA PHY control allows to reset a frozen hard drive without a power cycle which saves quite a bit of time while imaging, and reduces the chances of further hard disk degradation and failure.

Current sensing allows Atola Insight to diagnose a failed hard drive even if it has electronic or mechanical damage. Please see Disk Diagnostics for more details on how this works.

Overcurrent protection detects when the hard drive draws abnormal current and stops the hard drive to prevent any further damage.

Overvoltage protection circuit insures that in the unlikely event of the DiskSense unit malfunction, the attached hard drives are not damaged in any way.

DiskSense unit is fully controlled by Atola Insight software via the Gigabit Ethernet interface, hence no Linux experience is required at all in order to operate it.

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