Grant Zhang: Snapshot of life

I got some inquiries on the usage of SCSI mode pages in Solaris. I am posting what I am currently aware of. Mode pages related to removable media are not covered here. In <sys/scsi/generic/mode.h>, the following SCSI-3 mode pages are defined.

• Mode page 0x08--caching mode page: this page is used by sd driver to enable/disable disk write cache.
• Mode page 0x0A--control mode page: this page is used by sd driver to use descriptor sense data (for greater than 2TB lun support). It is also used in format, fma(libdiskstatus), and aac driver.
• Mode page 0x02--disconnect-reconnect mode page: only used by format and emul64 driver.
• Mode page 0x09--peripheral device page, obsolete in SPC-4: only used in format.
• Mode page 0x1A--power condition mode page: only used in sata framework.
• Mode page 0x03--format device page and mode page 0x04--regid disk drive geometry page: these two pages are consumed by sd to initialize the physical geometry.
  

<sys/scsi/impl/mode.h> also defines some SCSI-2 mode pages. One can use the format command to take a quick look at these pages: format->scsi

SCSI MENU:
        p<n>                   - display a mode sense page
        p<n> b<n> <op> [~]<n>  - change a byte and issue mode select
        b<n> <op> [~]<n>       - add an operation to the mode select list
                                     for the current page
       
                where:  p<n> specifies the page with page code <n>
                        b<n> specifies byte <n> of the page
                        <op> can be one of the following operators:
                             =    (set specified value)
                             |=   (bitwise OR with current value)
                             &=   (bitwise AND with current value)
                        <n> can be a decimal value in the range 0-255,
                        or two hexadecimal digits, in the form 0x<xx>.
                        [~] complements the specified value
       
        apply                  - apply mode select list
        cancel                 - cancel mode select list
        display                - display mode select list
        all                    - display all supported mode sense pages
        default p<n>           - mode select page <n> to default values
        default all            - mode select all pages to default values
        format                 - format without standard mode selects
        inquiry                - display device's inquiry response
        list                   - list common SCSI-2 mode pages
        !<cmd>                 - execute <cmd> , then return
        quit
scsi> list

Common SCSI-2 pages applicable to direct-access devices:

Page 0x1   - Read-Write Error Recovery Page
Page 0x2   - Disconnect-Reconnect Page
Page 0x3   - Format Device Page
Page 0x4   - Rigid Disk Geometry Page
Page 0x7   - Verify Error Recovery Page
Page 0x8   - Caching Page
Page 0xA   - Control Mode Page