Re: [PATCH v3 0/2] scsi: libsas: Support spinup notification for SAS devices

[yangxingui <yangxingui@huawei.com>]

On 2026/8/4 17:30, yangxingui wrote:
> Hi John
> 
> On 2026/8/4 15:35, John Garry wrote:
>> On 03/08/2026 03:05, Xingui Yang wrote:
>>> When a SAS device is in the Active_Wait or Idle_Wait power state, it
>>> returns NOT_READY with ASC/ASCQ = 0x04/0x11 (notify (enable spinup)
>>> required), indicating that a NOTIFY(ENABLE SPINUP) primitive is 
>>> needed to
>>> trigger media spinup.
>>>
>>> Without handling this condition, the SCSI mid-layer will indefinitely 
>>> retry
>>> the command with ACTION_DELAYED_RETRY, resulting in the disk never 
>>> spinning
>>> up and becoming unusable. A typical manifestation is:
>>>
>>>    sd 4:0:9:0: [sde] Spinning up disk...
>>>    ...not responding...
>>>    sd 4:0:9:0: [sde] Sense Key : Not Ready
>>>    sd 4:0:9:0: [sde] Add. Sense: Logical unit not ready, notify 
>>> (enable spinup) required
>>>
>>> To resolve this, the SAS controller needs to send a NOTIFY(ENABLE 
>>> SPINUP)
>>> primitive to the target phy, which transitions the device out of the
>>> waiting state and allows normal spinup to proceed.
>>>
>>
>> How would other SAS HBAs which use libsas handle this scenario? Since 
>> they have FW, would the FW automatically issue this NOTIFY(ENABLE 
>> SPINUP)?
>>
>> I just wonder why hisi_sas seems to be only driver which would need this.
> 
> Thanks for the question. This affects only SAS HDDs. I checked pm8001, 
> isci, and aic94xx — all handle NOTIFY(ENABLE SPINUP) at the driver level:
> 
> - pm8001: sends once at phy-up, then mdelay(200) — comment: "delay a 
> moment to wait disk to spinup" — before notifying libsas.
> 
> - isci: enables hardware periodic insertion during link idle (ENABLE bit 
> in notify_enable_spinup_control), cleared at phy stop.
> 
> - aic94xx: enables microcode periodic insertion during link idle 
> (NOTIFY_TIMER_TIMEOUT = 500ms interval), stops at phy down.
> 
> hisi_sas also calls sl_notify_ssp() at phy-up, but the NOTIFY_EN bit is 
> held for only 1ms — msleep(1) between setting and clearing — before 
> immediately notifying libsas.
> 
> The root cause appears to be that 1ms is insufficient compared to 
> pm8001's 200ms. An alternative to hisi_sas would be to simply increase 
> the hold time in sl_notify_ssp() to match pm8001's approach, keeping the 
> fix within hisi_sas.

When NOTIFY_EN is configured, the hardware sends only a single spinup 
notify primitive, and adjusting the sleep duration has no effect. 
However, TRI_NOTIFY_EN bit (bit 1), the hardware can send three notify 
primitives, which helps alleviate this issue.

Thanks,
Xingui