Method and apparatus for automated analysis of hard disk drive performance

An apparatus for performing in-situ performance testing of a disk drive during a manufacturing process, the apparatus comprising:

• a disk drive controller/interface processor for translating data and commands sent to and from the disk drive;
• a memory coupled to the disk drive controller/interface processor, the memory including self-test firmware which is executed by the disk drive controller/interface processor during the manufacturing process to perform in-situ performance testing;
• a command generation routine residing within self-test firmware for generating an in-situ set of read/write commands representative of a typical workload for the disk drive to test command execution firmware of the disk drive;
• a command simulation routine for emulating data transfer operations between the disk drive and an associated computer system;
• a routine for measuring disk drive performance results during concurrent execution of the command simulation routine and the command generation routine;
• a routine for determining if the disk drive performance results meet performance parameters, and if the disk drive performance results do not meet the performance parameters, then
• automatically identifying a set of new servo parameter values to apply to the disk drive in each subsequent iteration of in-situ tests of the disk drive,
• setting servo parameters of the disk drive to the new servo parameter values, and
• iteratively performing in-situ tests of the disk drive using the command simulation routine for each set of the new servo parameter values;
• and
• a routine for logging the disk drive performance results if the disk drive performance results fall within a performance range defined by the performance parameters, and marking the disk drive as a failed drive if the disk drive performance results fail to fall within a predetermined mean performance interval.

A disk drive, comprising:

• a magnetic disk for storing data;
• a disk drive controller/interface processor coupled to the magnetic disk for translating data and commands sent to and from the magnetic disk;
• a memory coupled to the disk drive controller/interface processor, the memory including self-test firmware which is executed by the disk drive controller/interface processor during a manufacturing process to perform in-situ performance testing;
• a command generation routine residing within self-test firmware for generating an in-situ set of read/write commands representative of a typical workload for the disk drive to test command execution firmware of the disk drive;
• a command simulation routine for emulating data transfer operations between the disk drive and an associated computer system;
• a routine for measuring disk drive performance results during concurrent execution of the command simulation routine and the command generation routine;
• a routine for determining if the disk drive performance results meet performance parameters, and if the disk drive performance results do not meet the performance parameters, then
• automatically identifying a set of new servo parameter values to apply to the disk drive in each additional iteration of in-situ tests of the disk drive,
• setting servo parameters of the disk drive to the new servo parameter values, and
• iteratively performing additional in-situ tests of the disk drive using the command simulation routine for each set of the new servo parameter values;
• and
• a routine for logging the disk drive performance results if the disk drive performance results fall within a performance range defined by the performance parameters, and marking the disk drive as a failed drive if the disk drive performance results fail to fall within the performance range.

A program product stored on a recordable media, comprising wherein the program product comprises:

• an in-situ performance testing mechanism for a disk drive during a manufacturing process that emulates data transfer operations between the disk drive and an associated computer system via a command simulation routine, generates an in-situ set of read/write commands representative of a typical workload within the disk drive via a command generation routine to test command execution firmware of the disk drive, measures disk drive performance results during concurrent execution of the command simulation routine and the command generation routine, determines if the disk drive performance results meet performance parameters, and if the disk drive performance results do not meet the performance parameters, automatically identifies a set of new servo parameter values to apply to the disk drive in each iteration of in-situ tests of the disk drive, sets servo parameters of the disk drive to the new servo parameter values, and iteratively performs in-situ tests of the disk drive using the command simulation routine for each set of the new servo parameter values, wherein the in-situ performance testing mechanism logs the disk drive performance results if the disk drive performance results fall within a performance range defined by the performance parameters, and marks the disk drive as a failed drive if the disk drive performance results fail to fall within a predetermined mean performance interval.