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Reliability of PC Flash SSDs?
An anonymous reader writes "SATA and IDE flash solid-state disks are all the rage these days — faster and, allegedly, more reliable than traditional spinning-rust disks. My organization dipped its toe in the flash-disk waters, buying a handful for some PC and Linux boxes. Out of 8 drives from various manufacturers, 3 have failed in the space of four months! Some are reporting bad blocks, others just crapped out and stopped responding entirely. (And no, this isn't a wear-leveling issue, nor were these machines in particularly harsh environmental conditions, nor were all failed drives from the same manufacturer.) So I ask you, the readers of Slashdot: what has your experience been like with basic, consumer-grade SATA or IDE flash drives? Are they failing for you too, or are we just unlucky? It's starting to remind me of the claims about long-lifetime compact fluorescent light bulbs that, in reality, have turned out to be BS!"
I have avoided investing any money into those types of drives for that very reason. As a small business owner I see customer units come in that make use of those types of devices and I see a lot of failure. I'm still being patient.
You can lead a man with reason but you can't make him think.
The junky 4gb ssd that came with my eee 900 died inside of a month. The 16gb OCZ SSD that I replaced it with has been going strong for a year now though /me crosses fingers
your not saying what chipset and what kind of usage you did.
if you are going to put a MLC drive for a gentoo distribution which is compiling 24/7, you will kill it in no time
if you got first gen micron chipset... you will have bad experience too
try again with indilinx or intel drive with SLC and come again
Make sure you turn of the scheduler for defragging in Windows or whatever OS you are using. Defragging those types of drives will effectively kill them.
in my everyday desktop are working fine since January, and they are the most used drives of the system, the smaller one being used to boot the system and store programs, the other storing program data and some DBs.
then to say "Some are reporting bad blocks, others just crapped out and stopped responding entirely..." is misleading.
You know the numbers, so tell them. If the total is 3, then you can't use a plural for two separate types of failures "some this, others that". That is just logically impossible if the number of failures is 3. Think about it.
Can you at least tell us which 3 of your 8 drives failed ? Perhaps there is some similarity in controller or Flash memory used?
FWIW, I have 2 of the Intel Drives and 1 OCZ drive and I haven't seen any problems.
you mean the real world support for TRIM in Windows 7 and supported in Indilinx and Intel controllers?
the one that has been recently tested out on Anandtech and shown to have very positive results?
oh yeah, that one.
http://torvalds-family.blogspot.com/2008/10/so-i-got-one-of-new-intel-ssds.html
He sorta knows what he's talking about more often than a random average slashdotter.
Well.. maybe. Or Maybe not. But Definitely not sort of.
Cheap SSD drives fail more often then good, expensive ones. This is not shocking news. Or at least it shouldn't be. But the vast majority of consumers never look past the capacity and purchase price.
"Have you ever thought about just turning off the TV, sitting down with your kids, and hitting them?"
I have 7 Transcend SATA SSD's, 3 32GB and 4 192GB, one of the 192GB drives is flakey, random bad blocks and file curruption issues of files that had been fine but gone bad and have not been written to since their creation some months ago. I've reloaded it several times but eventually had to remove it from service because of its poor reliability.
Bad troll. I read the fine article linked in this claim. The claims are not BS... there have just been problems with the supply-chain doing cost-cutting, and with people using cheap CFLs inappropriately. It's important to note that the Energy Star ratings board has been retesting CFLs and revoking use of the label for CFLs that fail to meet the standard.
It's not BS... it just needs some refining. Don't use CFLs on a dimmer switch. Don't use them in poorly ventilated enclosures. Don't use CFLs in fixtures you turn off and on a lot.
A little bit of consumer education goes a long way... but unfortunately so does FUD like the submitter's.
"Trolls they were, but filled with the evil will of their master: a fell race..." -- J.R.R. Tolkien on Olog-hai
My first response would be: "What type of computers are these being used in? Desktops? Servers? Laptops? Netbooks?"
My second response would be: "What systems settings have been changed so the OS is properly set up for an SSD drive?"
My third response would be: "What exact make and model drives are we talking about here?"
All of this is important in determining whether this is just another typical anecdotal ask slashtards to make me feel better type question, or whether you are seriously asking.
Without specifics, this is nothing more than a waste of time.
If all of the failed drives are of a specific manufacturer's netbook mini pcie based 4GB SSD drives, and all were having the same basic issue, then it's really an indication of a problem with one manufacturer's drives, and not SSD's as a whole now isn't it?
It's like saying all 1.5TB rotational hard drives suck and lose data becuase at one point seagate had tremendous firmware problems with their 1.5TB hdd's.
If on the other hand, it's several different drives, in different environments, from several different manufacturers and across several physically different types of SSD's (mini pcie, full size, etc) utilizing several different types of RAM and several different controllers, then it would suggest a more widespread problem.
You don't even have a large enough data sample to begin to answer these questions.
Me personally, I've got SSD drives in everything from my home desktop, to my work laptop, to a couple of small file servers, to two different Dell Mini 9's running aftermarket Runcore SSD's
All have been in use for at least a year (the work laptop is actually a Dell xps m1330 that is almost 2 years old and has a 64GB Samsung SSD in it).
All are working flawlessly and show no signs of dieing.
I got an OCZ Vertex 5 months and was very happy with the speed increase. Yesterday the laptop blue-screened and wouldn't boot any more. The BIOS test reported a read error. I am waiting for an RMA number from OCZ.
Of course, it also means the vendor gets a copy of whatever is on the drive... Confidential company information, personal data, furry pr0n...
Clever, in a completely unrelated way. What if a company (say they were operating out of a country not completely allied with the US) were to create a SSD device that had logic to "incapacitate" itself at some rate after it had been used to store enough information, before the warranty had expired, and not often enough (across the population) to raise suspicion. The disk could be a sort of new age Trojan horse, sneaking in, and back out with valuable, undetected all the while.
LED bulbs are going to render CFL bulbs a flash in the pan
no toxic mercury, no 30 second wait to dim up completely after turn on, not nearly as fragile, lasts much longer, nicer white glow, similar very low energy usage...
but currently, they are a little pricey and their lighting wattage is low
http://bits.blogs.nytimes.com/2009/05/06/coming-soon-a-40-watt-led-light-bulb/
intellectual property law is philosophically incoherent. it is your moral duty to ignore it or sabotage it
Linus updated his SSD post 5 months later and in the follow-up mentioned, among other things, an AnandTech article he liked at least parts of.
I come here for the love
Thank you. The brands/models were the critical piece of information.
You're probably aware that SSD's have been in the server space, at a very different price point, for a few years now, without any extraordinary reliability debacles. To some extent, this is a case of getting what you pay for. I did a moderate amount of research on SSD drives, relying especially on the independent review sites, and quickly eliminated all of the brands you described.
As is frequent in fairly new markets, there are a few smaller and less well-run companies trying to dive in, and their first customers get to beta test their v0.* and v1.* offerings.
The prevailing wisdom seemed to me (and to people like i.e. Torvalds) that Intel was far and away the top of the heap in terms of performance and reliability, and some drives based on a newer Samsung controller (i.e. OCZ Summit) were a perhaps credible alternative. Other brands were clearly struggling to even be in the game, with frequent firmware updates and outright debacles (i.e. Indilinux, Micron) and we're in the process of shaking out who will make it and who will not.
I have only fielded a few consumer-grade SSDs over about the same amount of time as you, but going with Intel's G1 and G2 MLC products has so far yielded zero failures.
If you are already in the market for an SSD, and you are ready to spend premium money for premium performance, you should go the whole distance and go with Intel, the current market leader. See also the latest news on these models.
Tired of Political Trolls? Opt Out!
A moot point maybe since everyone agrees already..
But I noticed that Windows 7 detects SSD (even in a RAID config with the on-board ICH controller) and automatically turns off defrag on them.
Nice !
There's an obvious reason why it won't work for classified stuff; if a disk on the classified network fails it doesn't go back for warranty repair, it gets smashed with a sledge hammer and then melted with thermite and the failure rate is taken into consideration when deciding to buy from that manufacturer again.
Most companies have less strict rules, however. You could quite easily write a disk controller that would scan for keywords in every block that was written and fail after a key phrase had been used a certain number of times. This would mean you'd only get failures on disks used for storing commercially sensitive information.
I am TheRaven on Soylent News
I only use them on the outside garage fixtures that our neighborhood covenant requires that I leave on all night. (They're on a light-sensing switch.) Despite the promises, they manage to only last about a year or two.
There's your problem, light sensing switches (and dimmers) will absolutely destroy most CFLs. I'm surprised they lasted over a year. Your typical light sensing switch isn't equivalent to a regular light switch that flips on and off based on the amount of light.
There's a couple of problems with photosensor switches. First, around dusk and dawn it may flicker on and off, which shortens the life of CFLs (but not cold-cathode CFLs, which are ok with rapid cycling). Second, even when completely "off", many photosensor switches will leak a bit of current, which may mess with your CFL's electronics, anything less than full-on / full-off is bad. Third, some photosensors and dimmers may have built-in "bulb saver" features meant to extend the life of incandescents -- they may pass the current through a diode or negativetemperature coefficient (NTC) thermistor (which again will kill CFLs).
Reminds me of some religious types. "If it ain't in the book, I don't believe it."
There's a big difference between religion and relying on a reasonably unbiased testing company like consumer reports.
Your bias against CFLs approaches religion more. I think it was last month that we had quite the discussion about them.
BTW, I just had my first CFL blow on me - it still produced a visible glow, but no longer lit like the 100W equivalent it's supposed to be. It was in the bathroom, and a transplant from the time I lived in an apartment. It saw at least 5 years of usage, it predated the time I started writing the install date on the base in permanent marker.
I don't read AC A human right
That is, unfortunately, absolutely right: you do not save money with CFLs. For that matter, any energy savings is also questionable, once you account for the energy used in production, not to mention disposal.
We have CFLs for various reasons. For example, the big CFL lamps mentioned in the post above are in rooms that are often used by 20-40 people. With that many bodies, they already get too warm. Without CFLs, we would need some 2000 watts of lighting - that would be intolerable.
In the end, forcing CFLs is yet another political scam. So is just about anything touted for its energy conservation potential. Energy is the lifeblood of civilization - we ought to see how cheaply we can generate more of it, not shave pennies like misers.
Enjoy life! This is not a dress rehearsal.
Oh, not this crap again...
you do not save money with CFLs.
Tell that to my electric bill, which dropped roughly 25% when I switched to (almost) all CFLs. And as for lifespan, I still have half of my original set of them fully functional (almost a decade ago now). And quick tip, don't just buy twenty of them and replace all your lights en masse, do it as they burn out (otherwise, you've thrown away a perfectly good $0.50 bulb).
For that matter, any energy savings is also questionable, once you account for the energy used in production
Yup. You caught 'em. All those evil corporations actually sell their products at a loss compared to the cost of energy required to produce them - Because your statement implies exactly that. Same for all those naughty solar panels, dontchaknow. And yes, I appreciate all too well how massively unfairly the utilities favor corporate customers over mere humans - But even considering that, if GE could make more reselling electricity than selling CFLs, don't you think they would?
not to mention disposal.
Ahh, the specter of all that spooooky mercury. That 100% recyclable mercury. Along with the 100% recyclable phosphorus coating the 100% recyclable glass. And the (merely) 99% recyclable fiberglass and plastic in the base, don't forget that.
Yes, CFLs have their shortcomings - And most people get them totally wrong (with the exception of how poorly they work with dimmers, that alone holds true). They start right up, they only take a few seconds to reach full brightness, they do save money, they do last 10x (or more) longer (though they do admittedly have a slightly higher out-of-box failure rate), they come in full-spectrum versions (and something incandescents don't, they come in germicidal versions as well). They even come in every common form factor now, from candelabra to GX53 (I learned that part when I discovered my new house had all candelabra-base lights).