1SG_VPD(8) SG3_UTILS SG_VPD(8)
2
6 sg_vpd - fetch Vital Product Data (VPD) pages via a SCSI INQUIRY com‐
7 mand
8
10 sg_vpd [--enumerate] [--help] [--hex] [--ident] [--long] [--maxlen=LEN]
11 [--page=PG] [--quiet] [--raw] [--verbose] [--version] DEVICE
12
14 This utility fetches a Vital Product Data page and decodes it or out‐
15 puts it in ASCII hexadecimal or binary. VPD pages are fetched with a
16 SCSI INQUIRY command.
17 Probably the most important page is the Device Identification VPD page
19 (page number: 0x83). Since SPC-3, support for this page has been
20 flagged as mandatory. This page can be fetched by using the --ident
21 option.
22 The reference document used for interpreting VPD pages (and the INQUIRY
24 standard response) is T10/1713-D Revision 36e (SPC-4, 24 August 2012)
25 found at http://www.t10.org . Obsolete and reserved items in the stan‐
26 dard INQUIRY response output are displayed in square brackets.
27 When no options are given, other than a DEVICE, then the "Supported VPD
29 pages" (0x0) VPD page is fetched and decoded.
30
32 Arguments to long options are mandatory for short options as well. The
33 options are arranged in alphabetical order based on the long option
34 name.
35 -e, --enumerate
37 list the names of the known VPD pages, first the standard pages,
38 then the vendor specific pages. Each group is sorted in abbrevi‐
39 ation order. The DEVICE and other options are ignored and this
40 utility exits after listing the VPD page names.
41 -h, --help
43 outputs the usage message summarizing command line options then
44 exits. Ignores DEVICE if given.
45 -H, --hex
47 outputs the requested VPD page in ASCII hexadecimal. Can be used
48 multiple times, see section on the ATA information vpd page.
49 -i, --ident
51 decode the device identification (0x83) VPD page. When used once
52 this option has the same effect as '--page=di'. When use twice
53 then the short form of the device identification VPD page's log‐
54 ical unit designator is decoded. In the latter case this option
55 has the same effect as '--quiet --page=di_lu'.
56 -l, --long
58 when decoding some VPD pages, give a little more output. For
59 example the ATA Information VPD page only shows the signature
60 (in hex) and the IDENTIFY (PACKET) DEVICE (in hex) when this
61 option is given.
62 -m, --maxlen=LEN
64 where LEN is the (maximum) response length in bytes. It is
65 placed in the cdb's "allocation length" field. If not given (or
66 LEN is zero) then 252 is used (apart from the ATA Information
67 VPD page which defaults to 572) and, if the response indicates
68 this value is insufficient, another INQUIRY command is sent with
69 a larger value in the cdb's "allocation length" field. If this
70 option is given and LEN is greater than 0 then only one INQUIRY
71 command is sent. Since many simple devices implement the INQUIRY
72 command badly (and do not support VPD pages) then the safest
73 value to use for LEN is 36. See the sg_inq man page for the more
74 information.
75 -p, --page=PG
77 where PG is the VPD page to be decoded or output. The PG argu‐
78 ment can either be an abbreviation, a number or a pair or num‐
79 bers separated by a comma. The VPD page abbreviations can be
80 seen by using the --enumerate option. If a number is given it is
81 assumed to be decimal unless it has a hexadecimal indicator
82 which is either a leading '0x' or a trailing 'h'. If one number
83 is given then it is assumed to be a VPD page number. If two num‐
84 bers are given the second number indicates which vendor specific
85 VPD page to decode when several pages share the same VPD page
86 number. If this option is not given (nor '-i', '-l' nor '-V')
87 then the "Supported VPD pages" (0x0) VPD page is fetched and
88 decoded. If PG is '-1' or 'sinq' then the standard INQUIRY
89 response is output.
90 -q, --quiet
92 suppress the amount of decoding output.
93 -r, --raw
95 output requested VPD page in binary. The output should be piped
96 to a file or another utility when this option is used. The
97 binary is sent to stdout, and errors are sent to stderr.
98 -v, --verbose
100 increases the level or verbosity.
101 -V, --version
103 print out version string then exit.
104
106 This VPD page (0x89 or 'ai') is defined by the SCSI to ATA Translation
107 standard. It contains information about the SAT layer, the "signature"
108 of the ATA device and the response to the ATA IDENTIFY (PACKET) DEVICE
109 command. The latter part has 512 bytes of identity, capability and set‐
110 tings data which the hdparm utility is capable of decoding (so this
111 utility doesn't decode it).
112 To unclutter the output for this page, the signature and the IDENTIFY
114 (PACKET) DEVICE response are not output unless the --long option (or
115 --hex or --raw) are given. When the --long option is given the IDENTIFY
116 (PACKET) DEVICE response is output as 256 (16 bit) words as is the
117 fashion for ATA devices. To see that response as a string of bytes use
118 the '-HH' option. To format the output suitable for hdparm to decode
119 use either the '-HHH' or '-rr' option. For example if 'dev/sdb' is a
120 SATA disk behind a SAT layer then this command: 'sg_vpd -p ai -HHH
121 /dev/sdb | hdparm --Istdin' should decode the ATA IDENTIFY (PACKET)
122 DEVICE response.
123
125 Since some VPD pages (e.g. the Extended INQUIRY page) depend on set‐
126 tings in the standard INQUIRY response, then the standard INQUIRY
127 response is output as a pseudo VPD page when PG is set to '-1' or
128 'sinq'. Also the decoding of some fields (e.g. the Extended INQUIRY
129 page's SPT field) is expanded when the '--long' option is given using
130 the standard INQUIRY response information (e.g. the PDT and the PROTECT
131 fields).
132 In the 2.4 series of Linux kernels the DEVICE must be a SCSI generic
134 (sg) device. In the 2.6 series block devices (e.g. disks and ATAPI
135 DVDs) can also be specified. For example "sg_inq /dev/sda" will work in
136 the 2.6 series kernels. From lk 2.6.6 other SCSI "char" device names
137 may be used as well (e.g. "/dev/st0m").
138
140 The exit status of sg_vpd is 0 when it is successful. Otherwise see the
141 sg3_utils(8) man page.
142
144 The examples in this page use Linux device names. For suitable device
145 names in other supported Operating Systems see the sg3_utils(8) man
146 page.
147 To see the VPD pages that a device supports, use with no options. The
149 command line invocation is shown first followed by a typical response:
150 # sg_vpd /dev/sdb
152 Supported VPD pages VPD page:
153 Supported VPD pages [sv]
154 Unit serial number [sn]
155 Device identification [di]
156 Extended inquiry data [ei]
157 Block limits (SBC) [bl]
158 To see the VPD page numbers associated with each supported page then
160 add the '--long' option to the above command line. To view a VPD page
161 either its number or abbreviation can be given to the '--page=' option.
162 The page name abbreviations are shown within square brackets above. In
163 the next example the Extended inquiry data VPD page is listed:
164 # sg_vpd --page=ei /dev/sdb
166 extended INQUIRY data VPD page:
167 ACTIVATE_MICROCODE=0 SPT=0 GRD_CHK=0 APP_CHK=0 REF_CHK=0
168 UASK_SUP=0 GROUP_SUP=0 PRIOR_SUP=0 HEADSUP=1 ORDSUP=1 SIMPSUP=1
169 WU_SUP=0 CRD_SUP=0 NV_SUP=0 V_SUP=0
170 P_I_I_SUP=0 LUICLR=0 R_SUP=0 CBCS=0
171 Multi I_T nexus microcode download=0
172 Extended self-test completion minutes=0
173 POA_SUP=0 HRA_SUP=0 VSA_SUP=0
174 To check if any protection types are supported by a disk use the
176 '--long' option on the Extended inquiry data VPD page:
177 # sg_vpd --page=ei --long /dev/sdb
179 extended INQUIRY data VPD page:
180 ACTIVATE_MICROCODE=0
181 SPT=1 [protection types 1 and 2 supported]
182 GRD_CHK=1
183 ....
184 Further examples can be found on the
186 http://sg.danny.cz/sg/sg3_utils.html web page.
187
189 Written by Douglas Gilbert
190
192 Report bugs to <dgilbert at interlog dot com>.
193
195 Copyright © 2006-2012 Douglas Gilbert
196 This software is distributed under a FreeBSD license. There is NO war‐
197 ranty; not even for MERCHANTABILITY or FITNESS FOR A PARTICULAR PUR‐
198 POSE.
199
201 sg_inq(sg3_utils), sg3_utils(sg3_utils), sdparm(sdparm), hdparm(hdparm)
202sg3_utils-1.35 November 2012 SG_VPD(8)