A new patch series from an NXP engineer optimizes the secure erase performance for certain Kingston eMMC devices. Currently with the Linux kernel performing a secure erase on 1GB of data can take around ten minutes. With these new patches that 1GB secure erase can be done in around two seconds.
Some Kingston eMMC devices will consume a fixed two seconds per secure erase operation regardless of the erase size. When the Linux kernel is currently performing a secure erase it is limited by the max discard size and thus will issue around 300 operations to erase 1GB. Today’s patches from NXP engineer Luke Wang will drop that secure erase process into a single command and thus consuming just around two seconds of time.
The patches separate out the logic of the the maximum secure erase sectors size rather than just being limited to the max discard size. The Kingston IY2964 and IB2932 eMMC devices are the ones whitelisted so far for behaving fine with the new quirk code path to enjoy much faster eMMC secure erase. It will be interesting to see how many other eMMC devices end up being relevant for this quirk to significantly speed-up secure erase speeds.
Those dealing with eMMC storage on Linux and wanting to learn more can do so via this patch series.
