Cool Mac Gear

The debut of a new Mac OS comprehensive disk utility application is pretty big news. The field in this category is very small, consisting up to now of Apple’s own bundled Disk First Aid in several variants, the venerable Norton Utilities/SystemWorks Suites, AlSoft’s superb “master of one trade” DiskWarrior utility, and MicroMat’s TechTool Pro and Drive 10 applications, all of which are available in OS X native versions.

Now there’s a new kid on the block -- DiskGuardian from New Zealand-based SubRosaSoft, which has hit the ground running in the Mac OS orbit with an extensive line of commercial software, shareware, and freeware applications.

DiskGuardian is SubRosaSoft’s flagship product, and after testing it for the past couple of weeks, I would say that it’s more than up to the task of standard-bearer, well worth checking out if you’re in the market for a Mac OS X disk utility.

Of particular interest is that DiskGuardian not only performs the familiar disk check and repair functions we’re familiar with from Disk First Aid, et al, but also includes the ability to clone, backup, and restore disks, and a performance benchmarking feature, automated “SMART monitoring,” online reporting, and HFS+ journaling. DiskGuardian not only diagnoses and repairs disks, but it can predict many problems long before they occur - hence the “Guardian” in the name.

On the other hand, DiskGuardian does not have the everything but the kitchen sink range of features that you will fine in SystemWorks or the MicroMat programs, but rather fills a gap between their multifeaturedness and DiskWarrior’s single purpose mission, as well as staking out some turf of its own.

Keeping the focus on guarding, DiskGuardian can perform scheduled regular checks on your hard drive no matter where you are, and will report to your email, web server, or to reports on your disk.

DiskGuardian can be configured to start up each time you boot your computer. It will set up background monitor tools that help predict upcoming hardware problems, then display the interface window, which I found very attractive and intuitive to use. The icons and graphics are very classy-looking.

In the left hand column there is a list of all of your currently mounted volumes, and various information about them, such as the volume or partition size, how much of its capacity is used, the number of files and folders it contains, the disk manufacturer and model number, and the volume's current SMART status. You can click on a volume in this column and then select an action to perform on it from the right hand column. The right hand column has a range of features:

• Volume Repair - An advanced diagnostic and repair tool which will usually detect and fix most errors on a volume. It also allows you to enable and disable Apple journaling.

SubRosaSoft DiskGuardian functions in detail:

DiskGuardian utilizes a feature called Self Monitoring Analysis and Reporting Technology, or SMART, that is built into most modern hard drives to monitor and alert users before the drive starts to fail. DiskGuardian will alert the user on screen with sound, eMail, by updating your personal web server, or FTP to a destination of your choice. This allows users to respond before their data is lost no matter where they are.

DiskGuardian not only predicts problems before they occur, but can diagnose and repair disks as well. It includes a comprehensive suite of tests for the physical media of the drive and the drive subsystem. Tests can be set to run for extended period of time to determine consistent performance of a storage subsystem. The tests analyze the overall integrity of the transfer data by writing, reading, and comparing the data. And if you do have a problem with the drive data, you can use DiskGuardian’s Volume Repair feature for repairing most faults.

SubRosaSoft DiskGuardian also features the ability to Backup a partition to an image, and Restore the image to create a volume identical to the original, and can even backup many disks that are known to have physical faults. For example, scratched CDs and disks with bad blocks.

Disk Guardian also includes a benchmarking feature for measuring the performance of hard drives under different types of test and load. The Benchtest feature gives the user the ability to make sure the drive is up to par for usage. The test results can be exported either as a text file for detailed analysis, or a JPEG file which users can easily post online.

Volume Repair

DiskGuardian Volume Repair is a general tool (similar to Disk First Aid or Norton Disk Doctor) for repairing most kinds of hard disk faults, it analyzes the volume for a general for directory corruption then can repair most.

The Volume Repair window can also enable/disable Apple HFS+ journaling.

Volume Repair is the primary tool one runs whenever one of the tests detects that something is wrong, or if crashes occur. Minor errors are frequent, so there is no alarm if some are found, although it is best to catch them in the early stages.

To repair a disk, startup DiskGuardian select the drive you want to repair, then click on the Volume Repair button.

Options for Volume Repair
• Check: Runs a general scan over the volume to detect any errors.
• Repair: Checks the volume for any errors, and attempts to repair them if they are found. If the volume has been having serious problems, it is recommended to repeat Repair until it stops reporting that errors have been fixed.
• Rebuild : This will rebuild the portion of the disk which contains information pertaining to the location of all of the files on the volume. It is a separate utility from the Check and Repair functions, and may be used separately to repair faulty volumes.

I found that Volume Repair was very speedy, comparing favorably to the other applications’ performance in this category.

Surface Scan

SubRosaSoft DiskGuardian Surface Scan is a tool to read every block (every piece of available storage space, split into segments known as “sectors”) on your disk, to determine whether they are able to be read or not. At the end of this test, you get a report of any sectors on the volume which could not be read.

This test should be used if it you suspect that there is a physical error on the disk when reading/writing operations are occurring.

To perform a Surface Scan:
1. In the Disk Guardian window, click on the volume you want to perform a Surface Scan on.
2. Click on the Surface Scan icon on the right hand panel.
3. The Surface Scan window opens (see below).
4. Click on the Start button.

Benchtest

SubRosaSoft DiskGuardian Benchtest will test your disk speed, using different block sizes, and report the results.

You can save the results as data files. SubRosaSoft DiskGuardian comes with a set of saved data files from other systems you can use for on-screen comparison between your system and others.

To perform a Benchtest:
In the main window, click on the volume you want to perform a benchtest on.
Click on the Benchtest icon on the right hand panel.
The Benchtest window will open(see picture below).
Click on the Start button.

Options for the Benchtest:

Comparison Device: Select a device from the list of saved past results to compare your drive performance to. Saved results come with Disk Guardian, and you can also import other results from any other user of DiskGuardian who has saved their results and provide them to you.

Test Type:
Sustained Speed - Read data at the maximum possible rate, and graph it.
Sustained Write - Write data at the maximum possible rate, and graph it.
Random Read - Read an industry standard semi-random pattern from the drive, and graph it. This tends to be more applicable for testing real-world situations.
Random Write - Write an industry standard semi-random pattern from the drive, and graph it. This tends to be more applicable for testing real-world situations.

Graph Type:
Bar graph Draws a bar graph comparing your disk with your choice of a comparison disk.
Line graph Draws a line graph comparing your disk with your choice of a comparison disk.
Raw data Displays the numerical figures rather than representing the information graphically.

Hardware Integrity

SubRosaSoft DiskGuardian Hardware Integrity is a tool to test the overall integrity of the disk drive by writing and reading various block sizes to and from the drive and/or reading, writing, and comparing the read and write data, Verify tests various aspects of the drive including the driver, the drive controller, the cabling, the drive’s motherboard, and the head seek mechanism.

To perform a Hardware Integrity test:
1. In the Disk Guardian window, click on the volume you want to perform a Hardware Integrity test on.
2. Click on the Hardware Integrity icon on the right hand panel.
3. The Hardware Integrity window opens (see below).
4. Click on the Start button.

Options for the Hardware Integrity test:

Block Size: Different drives operate at superior speeds for different block sizes. DiskGuardian allows you to test with block sizes ranging from 2KB to 16MB. A size such as 2KB would be a more suitable speed test for a drive that is used in a situation such as a webserver environment, where many small blocks such as small files and database queries have to be read, whereas a 16MB block size test may be more appropriate for a Digital Video drive, where large contiguous blocks of data have to be read in chunks.

Test Duration: The longer the duration given to the test, the more reliable the results are. Start with smaller time frames, and give it a longer period to detect more subtle flaws through statistical analysis. Times ranging from 1 minute to an entire day are available.

Test Type:
Raw Read Speed - Read data at the maximum possible rate, with large blocks of data to detect dips in the speed of reading data, which may indicate bad areas on the drive.
Raw Write Speed - Write data at the maximum possible rate, to detect dips in the speed of writing data, which may indicate bad areas on the drive.
Raw Throughput - A combination of Raw Read Speed and Raw Write Speed, by writing the data and then reading it again.
CRC Checksum - Verified Write data to the drive, and then read it again. The “checksum” part of the operation determines that the data it reads back, is the same as the data that it originally wrote. This allows you to verify the general integrity of the read/write operations, along with measuring for any speed deficiency.

Graph Type: Allows you to select the graphical way that the information related to the speed of the operations is displayed. There are 3 options available: bar graph, line graph, and raw data. Raw data displays the numerical figures rather than representing the information graphically.

Backup/Restore

SubRosaSoft DiskGuardian backup/restore is a tool to backup and restore every block (every piece of available storage space, split into segments known as “sectors”) on your disk. Unlike most backup systems SubRosaSoft DiskGuardian can even backup many disks that are known to have physical faults (like scratched CDs, damaged hard drives, etc).

Backup Volume copies all the information from the source volume to a disk image file on the destination volume. An exact copy of the volume is made to a file on your destination disk, so if you backup your startup disk a bootable copy of it is created, with all information such as file permissions preserved.

Restore Volume allows you to select a disk image to replicate onto your volume. It is an exact copy so a bootable disk image’s information is preserved, and this feature can be used to copy a bootable copy of your data back onto your volume with all information such as file permissions preserved. The destination volume’s current data is replaced with the selected disk image in the Restore Volume operation. Use this feature with caution.

To backup a volume to a disk file:
1. In the Disk Guardian window, click on the volume you want to backup.
2. Click on the Backup/Restore icon.
3. The Backup/Restore window opens (see below).
4. Select “Backup Volume” from the popup menu.
5. Click on the Start button.
6. In the resulting dialog box, navigate to the location where want to save the disk image.
7. Click on the Save button

Settings

SubRosaSoft DiskGuardian has extensive reporting functions built-in to let you know at all times the status of your disks. These reports can be set to be generated only if a S.M.A.R.T. fault is detected and/or on a regular basis.

If an upcoming drive failure is detected, DiskGuardian can perform the following:
• Display a standard Notification box on the screen with your selection of sound
• eMail a report to your address.
• Update your personal web server
• FTP to your web server (mainly for remote monitoring)

You can access the settings by clicking on the Settings button.
In the settings window, you will see four tabs. They represent the methods of alerting you on the status of your drives.

On Screen
If you select Onscreen reporting, at the selected time DiskGuardian will start if it’s not already running, and will display the main screen showing the status of all your disks.

eMail
If you select eMail reporting, DiskGuardian will email you with all status reports of your disks.

FTP
If you select FTP reporting, DiskGuardian will upload the status report to an FTP site. This would normally be used to update your homepages web server, so you can check on your disks from anywhere.

Web
If you select Web reporting, DiskGuardian will use the Personal Web Server built into OS X to give you access at all times to your system status details. You can login to your computer with your favorite web browser.

disk journaling

SubRosaSoft DiskGuardian is able to enable and disable HFS+ journaling on your hard disk.

Apple’s new journaled file system keeps a log of the hard disk’s main data activity.

In case of a crash or other system failure, the file system can retrieve lost data by consulting the “journal” log, restoring the system to its previous state instead of having to go through the lengthy process of rebuilding it.

SMART Monitoring

SubRosaSoft DiskGuardian uses a feature called S.M.A.R.T. (Self Monitoring, Analysis and Reporting Technology) to transparently check the health of your drives from the time your computer starts up, until it shuts down. The S.M.A.R.T. check is always running in the background, and Disk Guardian will be started automatically if a problem is detected. S.M.A.R.T. checking does not affect on the performance of your drive (as may be determined with the “Benchtest” feature in DiskGuardian).

S.M.A.R.T. is standard in IDE hard drives, and it is widely supported. The technology was created and adopted by the industry due to the understanding that most hard drives sometime fail, and that it is usually possible for a drive to be able to predict that it will fail before it does. By monitoring various aspects of itself such as its motor, media heads, spin up time, and other manufacturer-specific parameters, S.M.A.R.T. checking has become an effective tool to predict a failure before it occurs, giving you enough time to backup your valuable data. The S.M.A.R.T. software built into Disk Guardian asks the drives on the computer for their S.M.A.R.T. status every 5 minutes, and alerts you if a problem has been detected. The S.M.A.R.T. background helper program that comes with DiskGuardian is lightweight, and use very little system resources.

There are also thorough and helpful online help files in html format.

DiskGuardian is an impressive new tool in the armory of Mac OS disk maintenance programs. The interface is spectacular, and the feature set is innovative and even fun. I have thus far encountered no obvious bugginess, and all of the functions worked as they should, although I did not try the backup/restore feature yet. SubRosaSoft has hit a home run ( or whatever the Kiwi equivalent is in cricket ;-) ) with DiskGuardian. If you’re in the market for a disk utility, it deserves a spot on your short list.

System requirements:
• Mac OS X 10.0 or higher
• SMART functions require 10.2 or higher

DiskGuardian sells for $69.95

Competitive upgrades are available. Utilities such as Drive10, TechTools Pro, SMART Toolkit, Norton Utilities, and Disk Warrior all qualify for the $54.95 crossgrade.

For more information, visit:
http://subrosasoft.com/thestore/product_info.php?products_id=3

Charles W. Moore