Compact flash endurance diagnostics

Hello, I am using Sandisk Extreme-IV 4 GB Compact Flash card on my embedded system. The card is heavily written/erased, and so i am worried about it's health.

Is there some way to make some sort of diagnostics? Something like:

- read/write/verify sectors

- determine state of wear leveling

- maybe more...?

I've read some CF spec and they say it is possible to get the number of times a CF sector has been written to. The spec says: The IDE "Translate sector" command (87h) apparently allows the host a method of determining the exact number of times a user sector as been erased and programmed.

Is this command supported by sandisk extreme-IV CF ?

Any help will be appreciated!

Rgds, Vinod

I doubt that there is a way to decently define / check the wear-out behavior of a CF card. The card's controller works perfectly to hide this and the manufactures are not willing to disclose any information. (See lots of threads in this newsgroup on that issue.)

The main problem usually is not that the card will totally fail due to wear out (this is perfectly handled by the card's electronics), but the fact that the time the card needs to complete an internal write process is not defined in any way. So there is no knowledge on how long you need to provide power to the card after initializing a write to prevent data loss (which means not only the sector latest written is bad, but the complete memory might be dead.)

AFAI read somewhere, there are some (very few) cards for embedded use that come with extended specifications on that behalf.

-Michael