SG_RMSN(8) SG3_UTILS SG_RMSN(8)

sg_rmsn - send SCSI READ MEDIA SERIAL NUMBER command

sg_rmsn [--help] [--raw] [--readonly] [--verbose] [--version] DEVICE

Send a SCSI READ MEDIA SERIAL NUMBER command to DEVICE and outputs the response.

This command is described in SPC-3 found at www.t10.org . It was originally added to SPC-3 in revision 11 (2003/2/12). It is not an mandatory command and the author has not seen any SCSI devices that support it.

Arguments to long options are mandatory for short options as well.

output the usage message then exit.
sends the serial number (if found) to stdout. This output may contain non-printable characters (e.g. the serial number is padded with NULLs at the end so its length is a multiple of 4). The default action is to print the serial number out in ASCII-HEX with ASCII characters to the right. All error messages are sent to stderr.
opens the DEVICE read-only rather than read-write which is the default. The Linux sg driver needs read-write access for the SCSI READ MEDIA SERIAL NUMBER command but other access methods may require read-only access.
increase the level of verbosity, (i.e. debug output).
print the version string and then exit.

Device identification information is also found in a standard INQUIRY response and its VPD pages (see sg_vpd). The relevant VPD pages are the "device identification page" (VPD page 0x83) and the "unit serial number" page (VPD page 0x80).

The MMC-4 command set for CD/DVD/HD-DVD/BD drives has a "media serial number" feature (0x109) [and a "logical unit serial number" feature]. These can be viewed with sg_get_config.

The exit status of sg_rmsn is 0 when it is successful. Otherwise see the sg3_utils(8) man page.

Written by Douglas Gilbert.

Report bugs to <dgilbert at interlog dot com>.

Copyright © 2005-2012 Douglas Gilbert
This software is distributed under a FreeBSD license. There is NO warranty; not even for MERCHANTABILITY or FITNESS FOR A PARTICULAR PURPOSE.

sg_vpd(sg3_utils), sg_get_config(sg3_utils)

November 2012 sg3_utils-1.31