Whos killed a new SSD so far?

I cant find any mention of failure anywhere, so I guess I am the first one. The Samsung 32GB SSD in the Sony TZ review notebook is dead. BIOS wont detect it, linux doesnt see it, gone forever and ever.

The really odd thing is this was not a instantly failure, but a model that worked for about a month and a half before it went south.

 

how odd?

so it just died? no warning?

 

If you had a review model for a month, why didn't you post a review here on NBR?

 

I was playing Half-Life 1 on the machine, and the laptop froze. Upon restart the machine appeared to be frozen at the BIOS screen till a message of "Operating System Not found" was displayed. Restarted again, went into the BIOS, and the drive was not showing up as being attached.

I have had it for a week, the model itself has been passed around before it was sent to us. And a first look review is going up

 

thats quite odd. wonder what killed it? temperature? too much access?

 

Have no experience with SSD. But I guess it has something to do with the "wear levelling" technology? After all, the same flash block can only be write ~100,000 times. So if it is unlucky, it could die very fast. But it is strange that the BIOS couldn't find the SSD, will the failure of a single flash block cause that?

 

Well with the wear leveling tech, it was claimed you could write to the thing for like a few years straight without failure.

 

Pull the card and check for burned parts. I remember a time many years ago when someone managed to burn out a 20GB Flash drive by leaving it plugged in too long. It was poorly designed and the chips got hot enough to discolor the PCB. Warranty took care of it.

 

Haha, well I think they managed to fix that considering its the laptops internal main drive that is at fault. The laptop would have to be torn apart to get to the SSD buried within.

 

Coincidence...I received an email from a company not 10 mintes ago wondering if Ide be interested in reviewing another SSD...at 128Gb.

I hope we dont all follow your suit.

 

My SSD drive have been very consistent and it has been used on a daily basis for 3 1/2 months now. Only had about 2 or 3 crashes using Vista (my first Vista experience). Regardless of how great a product is, there are always bad batches. Its ashame the SSD in the TZ isn't as fast as some of the new 2.5" SSDs out, but then again the TZ isn't built as a speed demon.

 

I'm very curious of what the failure rate is on SSDs. They claim to be more reliable than hard drives, but today's review of the Sony and the dead SSD is kind of scary. SSD vendors should publish stats if they defend the case... otherwise I'd see silence as tacit acknowledgment. I'm still planning on getting a 64GB SSD when these become available (beyond PR with no shipment) despite the high prices, assuming SSD failure stories don't pop left and right.

 

everyone should also keep in mind that regardless of how safe it is, there are still failure rates in just about anything. although this is the first time I have heard an SSD fail on this board, don't let that discourage you from purchasing a computer with an SSD drive. Just like there are numerous threads on conventional hard drives, lcd screens that died, bad ram modules and so on, that doesn't mean we should be afraid of buying a computer. its never 100% gauranteed.

 

because SSD actually stores data and ram and monitors dont.

 

For that matter, what is the failure rate of USB flash drives ?

 

Hey, I've been meaning to ask - where is that critter on your avatar pic from?

- Jordan

 

I'm pretty sure that's the gopher from Caddy Shack.

 

not sure what that has to do with anything.

point being, no electronics devices are 100% reliable, whether they store data or not.

 

The fact that electronic devices will fail someday is something that will hold for almost every one of them. The thing that matters and differs between them is how much they will hold considering their usage.
Mediums that are used for the storage of data undergo many tests (both for durability and reliability for correctness). And what is even more important in case of the SSD is the fact that users pay much more than they do compared to hard-drives at the same capacity and they are aimed at business users who value their data more than anything.
This fact will not change.
However, as Kevin pointed out, this is most hopefully a problem with a pre-production review unit (and with a laptop that might have undergone very bad handling while being handled around between the review sites) and is not the same for the real thing.

 

One of the main selling points of a SSD is its robustness.
If it cant handle bad handling, then we might as well stick to HDDs

 

As with conventional hard drives, there are certain brands recommended by most people as fast and reliable, I'm sure the same goes for SSD drives. Its just that there aren't enough out there right now, at least not affordable for many people to experience. I would like to see more reviews on different types of SSD drives with regards to brands, connections and sizes.

 

So it is! I caught a little of that movie once and I wanted to see it again but could never remember the name - Thanks!

- Jordan

 

Mine just did the exact same thing except I have a VGN-UX390N with a 32GB SSD. BIOS doesn't see it and my restore DVD can't find it. Looks like i'll have to call Sony.

best,
Ken