fstrim fails with “thediscard operation is not supported”

Question

I am running ubuntu 18.04. No lvm or encryption. I am attempting to run trim on a brand new external sdd, western digital wd green 120 gb in a usb external case ADATA ED600 that shows trim available on hdparm.

yet fstrim reports

sudo fstrim -v /media/****/644f7d88-df12-4d0e-9423-bdf787d0fd78 

fstrim: /media/****/644f7d88-df12-4d0e-9423-bdf787d0fd78: the discard operation is not supported

I cannot figure out what else I could do to get fstrim to run.

hdparm output below.

****:~$ sudo hdparm  -I /dev/sdb

/dev/sdb:

ATA device, with non-removable media
    Model Number:       WDC WDS120G2G0A-00JH30                  
    Serial Number:      1821B3802831        
    Firmware Revision:  UE450000
    Media Serial Num:   
    Media Manufacturer: 
    Transport:          Serial, ATA8-AST, SATA 1.0a, SATA II Extensions, SATA Rev 2.5, SATA Rev 2.6, SATA Rev 3.0
Standards:
    Used: unknown (minor revision code 0x0110) 
    Supported: 9 8 7 6 5 
    Likely used: 9
Configuration:
    Logical     max current
    cylinders   16383   0
    heads       16  0
    sectors/track   63  0
    --
    LBA    user addressable sectors:   234455040
    LBA48  user addressable sectors:   234455040
    Logical  Sector size:                   512 bytes
    Physical Sector size:                   512 bytes
    Logical Sector-0 offset:                  0 bytes
    device size with M = 1024*1024:      114480 MBytes
    device size with M = 1000*1000:      120040 MBytes (120 GB)
    cache/buffer size  = unknown
    Form Factor: 2.5 inch
    Nominal Media Rotation Rate: Solid State Device
Capabilities:
    LBA, IORDY(can be disabled)
    Queue depth: 32
    Standby timer values: spec'd by Standard, no device specific minimum
    R/W multiple sector transfer: Max = 1   Current = 1
    Advanced power management level: disabled
    DMA: mdma0 mdma1 mdma2 udma0 udma1 udma2 udma3 udma4 udma5 *udma6 
         Cycle time: min=120ns recommended=120ns
    PIO: pio0 pio1 pio2 pio3 pio4 
         Cycle time: no flow control=120ns  IORDY flow control=120ns
Commands/features:
    Enabled Supported:
       *    SMART feature set
            Security Mode feature set
       *    Power Management feature set
       *    Write cache
       *    Look-ahead
       *    Host Protected Area feature set
       *    WRITE_BUFFER command
       *    READ_BUFFER command
       *    DOWNLOAD_MICROCODE
            Advanced Power Management feature set
            SET_MAX security extension
       *    48-bit Address feature set
       *    Device Configuration Overlay feature set
       *    Mandatory FLUSH_CACHE
       *    FLUSH_CACHE_EXT
       *    SMART error logging
       *    SMART self-test
       *    General Purpose Logging feature set
       *    64-bit World wide name
       *    WRITE_UNCORRECTABLE_EXT command
       *    {READ,WRITE}_DMA_EXT_GPL commands
       *    Segmented DOWNLOAD_MICROCODE
            unknown 119[8]
       *    Gen1 signaling speed (1.5Gb/s)
       *    Gen2 signaling speed (3.0Gb/s)
       *    Gen3 signaling speed (6.0Gb/s)
       *    Native Command Queueing (NCQ)
       *    Phy event counters
       *    READ_LOG_DMA_EXT equivalent to READ_LOG_EXT
            Device-initiated interface power management
            Software settings preservation
            Device Sleep (DEVSLP)
       *    SANITIZE feature set
       *    BLOCK_ERASE_EXT command
       *    SET MAX SETPASSWORD/UNLOCK DMA commands
       *    WRITE BUFFER DMA command
       *    READ BUFFER DMA command
       *    DEVICE CONFIGURATION SET/IDENTIFY DMA commands
       *    Data Set Management TRIM supported (limit 8 blocks)
       *    Deterministic read data after TRIM
Security: 
    Master password revision code = 65534
        supported
    not enabled
    not locked
    not frozen
    not expired: security count
    not supported: enhanced erase
    2min for SECURITY ERASE UNIT.
Logical Unit WWN Device Identifier: 5001b448b60a0235
    NAA     : 5
    IEEE OUI    : 001b44
    Unique ID   : 8b60a0235
Device Sleep:
    DEVSLP Exit Timeout (DETO): 50 ms (drive)
    Minimum DEVSLP Assertion Time (MDAT): 31 ms (drive)
Checksum: correct

additional comments

eventually got it to work.

****:/media$ sudo hdparm --user-master u --security-set-pass 123456 /dev/sdb
security_password: "123456"

/dev/sdb:
 Issuing SECURITY_SET_PASS command, password="123456", user=user, mode=high
****:/media$ sudo hdparm --user-master u --security-erase 123456 /dev/sdb
security_password: "123456"

/dev/sdb:
 Issuing SECURITY_ERASE command, password="123456", user=user
SG_IO: bad/missing sense data, sb[]:  70 00 01 00 00 00 00 0a 00 00 00 00 00 1d 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00

It waits for some 10 seconds and returns with no further information. The security "enabled" flag turns to "not enabled". I am assuming that does the trick.

Answer 1

There are USB enclosures on the market that support trim. For example if your enclosure uses the JMICRON JMS583 chip then it supports trim. I don't know if yours does or not, but if it does:

Hare are the steps required to get it to work if it is supported, but if you want a more detailed walk-through see the source link below.

1. Get the vendor and product ids from lsusb
2. Create /etc/udev/rules.d/50-usb-ssd-trim.rules with the following content, but change the vendor and product ids to match the ones found in step 1:

ACTION=="add|change", ATTRS{idVendor}=="152d", ATTRS{idProduct}=="0583", SUBSYSTEM=="scsi_disk", ATTR{provisioning_mode}="unmap"

3. Reload the udev configuration sudo service udev force-reload
4. Make sure you don't have the USB enclosure mounted and then replug the USB enclosure.
5. You can check if trim is supported with lsblk --discard /dev/sda

See: https://www.glump.net/howto/desktop/enable-trim-on-an-external-ssd-on-linux