Other Reliability of eMMC onboard storage

Phishfry

Phishfry

What are fellow users thoughts about the reliability of eMMC built into many platforms these days?

The normal metrics of SMART are not used but there is a wear indicator available in sysutils/mmc-utils/ but not as detailed as SMART.

I have a BeagleBone with eMMC that has some good life on it. I wonder about its life cycle.

Has anybody had eMMC fail on them? I see that San Disk seems to be a frequent supplier.
 
My thoughts: eMMC is flash, so it shares the same properties, like a not unlimited amount of write operations. When the eMMC fails, you can't easily replace it. If your board doesn't have another storage device it can boot from, your board is bricked.
 
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EXT_CSD_DEVICE_LIFE_TIME_EST_TYP_A is wear in 10% increments
mine is

mmcsd0: 31GB <MMCHC hB8aP> 0.2 SN A0F596ED MFG 11/2019 by 144 0x004a> at mmc0 200.0MHz/8bit/8192-block and seems pretty unused
Code: 
# mmc extcsd read /dev/mmcsd0|egrep 'PRE|LIFE'
eMMC Life Time Estimation A [EXT_CSD_DEVICE_LIFE_TIME_EST_TYP_A]: 0x00
eMMC Life Time Estimation B [EXT_CSD_DEVICE_LIFE_TIME_EST_TYP_B]: 0x01
eMMC Pre EOL information [EXT_CSD_PRE_EOL_INFO]: 0x01

# mmc extcsd read /dev/mmcblk2|egrep 'PRE|LIFE'
eMMC Life Time Estimation A [EXT_CSD_DEVICE_LIFE_TIME_EST_TYP_A]: 0x02
eMMC Life Time Estimation B [EXT_CSD_DEVICE_LIFE_TIME_EST_TYP_B]: 0x00
eMMC Pre EOL information [EXT_CSD_PRE_EOL_INFO]: 0x01
1st is on an hp thin client, the other one on a android tv box (which runs armbian)
the android tv seems to be made by toshiba, the hp one i don't know
both are 32gb
 
tingo said:
When the eMMC fails, you can't easily replace it.
Click to expand...
The Pine64 people(Quartz64/RockPro64/Pine64/Rock64) are using a replaceable module as is Odroid.
It is a flimsly connector. Earlier Odroid used eMMC ver 4.5 standard which was slower.
pine64.com

32GB eMMC Module - PINE STORE

32GB eMMC module for PINE64 SBC.
pine64.com pine64.com
I am using these on Rock64 and RockPro64 and I like the USB fob for writing the eMMC.
They are seen as mmcsd0 devices so pretty seemless.

The Raxda rock Pi 3 uses a newer connector for its eMMC. I think Rock Pi4 too.
Same form factor but double connectors.

Rockpi4/hardware/emmc - Radxa Wiki

wiki.radxa.com wiki.radxa.com
 
covacat said:
mmc extcsd read /dev/mmcsd0
Click to expand...
I can't seem to get status with drives.

Code: 
root@Edge3003:~ # mmc extcsd read /dev/mmcsd0
open: Operation not permitted
root@Edge3003:~ # mount
/dev/mmcsd0p2 on / (ufs, local, soft-updates, journaled soft-updates)
devfs on /dev (devfs)
/dev/mmcsd0p1 on /boot/efi (msdosfs, local)

I assume it cannot be mounted to check???
 
I booted off USB stick.

Code: 
eMMC Firmware Version:
eMMC Life Time Estimation A [EXT_CSD_DEVICE_LIFE_TIME_EST_TYP_A]: 0x01
eMMC Life Time Estimation B [EXT_CSD_DEVICE_LIFE_TIME_EST_TYP_B]: 0x01
eMMC Pre EOL information [EXT_CSD_PRE_EOL_INFO]: 0x01

This is brand new out of sealed box.
 
These parts of eMMC interest me:

Write reliability parameter register [WR_REL_PARAM]: 0x15
Device supports writing EXT_CSD_WR_REL_SET
Device supports the enhanced def. of reliable write

Max Enhanced Area Size [MAX_ENH_SIZE_MULT]: 0x0001c8
i.e. 14942208 KiB

RPMB and the special 4MB partitions.
mmcsd0boot0
mmcsd0boot1
 
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