How Does Flash Media Fail?

bhodge writes "Aside from the obvious 'it stops working' answer, how does flash media — such as USB, SD, and CF — fail? Unlike with traditional hard drive, where anyone who's worked with computers for a while knows what a drive failure looks like, I don't know anyone who has experienced such a failure with flash. I've haven't been able to find more than scant evidence of what such failures look like at the OS level. The one account I have found detailed using a small USB drive for /var/log storage; it failed very quickly, and then utterly (0 byte unformatted device), after five years of service in the role. This runs contrary to other anecdotal claims that you should still be able to read the media after you can no longer write to it. So my question is: what have you seen of the nature of flash media failure, if anything?"

Comments

Re:In my case

[AKAImBatman]

Washing machines are pretty harsh places. You get tidal forces that will apply various physical stresses to the components. Rapid heating and cooling can cause expansion problems. Water can wear down contacts. Soaps can contaminate contacts or have negative chemical effects. So on and so forth.

If it makes it to the drier, your card could easily end up at temperatures outside the optimal storage temperature for the device. (Ever read those warnings, "Store between 70F and 100F?" Yeah, me neither.) These extreme temperatures combined with the rapidity at which they're introduced is a cornucopia of ways your device could be damaged.

In short, water isn't the real problem. It's all the stuff above and beyond that.

Re:In my case

[Bakkster]

Don't forget about the extreme static charges built up in a drier. Even though most USB devices have mechanisms to prevent static damage, a drier could overwhelm these protections. Regardless, usually a SSD failure should usually be due to the failure of the suport electronics, not the storage itself.