Changing the TLER Time

Introduction

Some drives have a feature called Time Limited Error Recovery = TLER. This TLER variable determines the amount of time a drive is allowed to repair bad sectors or perform other repairs. If the TLER time is greater than the preset timeout period for the RAID controller, the RAID controller could mark the drive as defective, even though the drive is just trying to repair bad sectors. The TLER time can be configured with smartctl.

Option 1 - Configuring TLER with an Adaptec controller

Boot into the Hetzner Rescue System.

Activate the sg devices:

modprobe sg

The individual drives can be shown with this command:

ls /dev/sg*

(e.g. sg1)

Change the TLER time:

smartctl -d sat -l scterc,70,70 /dev/sg1

Option 2 - Configuring TLER with a 3ware controller

Boot into the Hetzner Rescue System.

Identify the device:

ls /dev/tw*

(e.g. twa)

Identify the controller number:

tw_cli show | grep ^c | cut -c 2

(e.g. 0)

In this example the device would be /dev/twa0.

Show the drives using the controller number:

tw_cli /c0 show | cut -c 2

(e.g. 0)

Change the TLER time using the drive number and the device:

smartctl -d 3ware,0 -l scterc,70,70 /dev/twa0

Option 3 - Configuring TLER with an LSI controller

Boot into the Hetzner Rescue System.

Identify the device number:

megacli -pdlist -aall | grep "Device Id:" | cut -c 12-

(e.g. 4)

Change the TLER time using the device number:

smartctl -d megaraid,4 -l scterc,70,70 /dev/sda

Conclusion

Now you should have set the TLER time of your drive so that it is no longer marked as defective.