Windows 10 Pro + CF-19 Mk6, infrequent freeze and shutdown

Hello,
I'm trying to troubleshoot a random freeze and crash issue on my CF-19 Mk6 with Windows 10 Pro. I've actually tried to resolve from Windows 10 forums ( https://www.tenforums.com/performan...0-freeze-crash-randomly-but-infrequently.html) but not yet with sucess.

I just wanted to ask people who have CF-19 with Mk6 who have similar issues. Basically freeze and crash every 20 days or so.

I have a number of suspicious things:

1. My ADATA SSD which has been RMA'ed twice that has the W10 installation on, chkdsk/crystaldiskinfo found nothing bad on it.
2. Current W10 is actually a clone from a HDD. Clone made with proprietary AOMEI Backerupper software. AOMEI have failed cloning on my Lenovo T480, so the clone may be bad.
3. My CF-19 itself being compromised but unlikely as it worked well on linux and Windows 7

I am currently trying the in-place upgrade. If that doesn't work, next will be fresh install, then the next step will be fresh install with a new WD Blue SSD (I have a bad history with ADATA and a good history with WD).

I am curious, has anyone with CF-19 have any stability issue on Windows 10? Assuming you have it turned on for 60+ days regularly.

 

WD and a clean install sounds like the right path.

 

I have had a pretty bad batch of ADATA SU360 drives; 4 in a row crapped out. I don't trust the brand either.

 

I bought 2 ADATA SU800 512GB. One failed within 4 months, the other in 2 years. Both replaced under RMA and one of the replaced SU800 was replaced a second time under RMA after 8 months.

For my sanity, I am going to exclusively use WD. As a student I went for the cheapest ADATA and Seagate drives and it seems that I am paying for cheaping out on data storage. Now that I can afford better drives, I have since retired almost all crap drives into external drives.

 

Try to align the drive.

 

AOMEI backer upper offers aligning for SSD and I did do it when I was cloning. I just finished in-place upgrade and testing it out. I'll find out in ~30 days to see if it crashes again.

 

Check whether that backer really did it using another utility.

 

I did from an external linux drive. Backerupper did align it. This is not the first cloning that has gone wrong with backer upper, I typically use dd from linux but dd is not without failure either. I find that linux is typically a lot more resilient to cloning whereas Windows 10, it's not so easy to troubleshoot if and when something goes wrong. For me anyways.

 

Ok, then it's Adata.

 

Or the cloning process. I've had 3/50 clonings gone detectably wrong on Lenovo T480, W530 and T430, twice on Windows and once on Linux.

I'll find out soon enough.. in month

 

I'm not meaning to hijack the thread, but is the Ease-us alignment tool worth using even if you're not experiencing problems? BaRRmaley? I've got a Samsung SSD 860 Evo which is working fine, but have wondered about Ease-us products generally. Thanks. And good luck with your drives SJLPHI.

 

You don't need it after clean install, but you have to after cloning your old hdd to new hdd/ssd.
A week ago I've "repaired" an unbearably slow PC, where old hdd has been cloned to a new hdd (not ssd). 5 minutes to boot Win10 (!!!!!!111oneone). I thought that new HDD was dying.. but checked by alignment tool... 30 seconds to boot now, and it's responsive again!

 

14th day since in-place upgrade repair,the toughbook crashed.

This time, it concided with my AV (Kaspersky IS) update, so I am going to do a recount before fresh install.

 

Do you have any thoughts on what can conclusively tell me that the SSD is failing? I mean chkdsk and crystal disk info have not given me anything that shows sign of failure.

I just don't want to do a fresh install twice and right now I am not 100% convinced that it's not the ADATA SSD.

 

@SJLPHI, try Victoria.

 

Thanks, I'll check out Victoria.

Aside, I am googling Adata SU800 Windows 10 freezing, and I am thinking maybe this model is just simply bad. Worse yet there is a "field" firmware update available by ADATA which says "
Item Description
1 System compatibility optimization.
"
at the cost of wiping out everything on the drive. I guess I'll do firmware update before fresh install. I have to say, this will be the last ADATA SSD I will ever own.

I'm just hoping that I find something conclusive.

 

FWIW... I had always heard that you should always do a fresh OS install on an SSD and that cloning to an SSD can cause issues like you describe over time. Sometimes chasing the problem in search of a fix can take you 10X longer that just starting over.

Ask me how I know!

 

Well, I'm okay with fresh installing but I'm not okay with fresh installing once then twice because it's due to the SSD.

 

If you do not have confidence in your SSD... Buy another and use your current one in a less demanding area... Or sell it...

 

Well, that's just it. I don't know if I am confident that this SSD is fine for now. Three of this exact model crapped out on me but very obviously. the microprocessor burned out and the SSD "whistled" everytime it was powered with no data coming out of the interface. This particular SSD, I am not sure.

 

You choice to do what you want but if I had 3 all of the same model that went bad, I would look for a different model / brand.

 

Not good track record for an SSD... Try the Samsung Pro 980!

 

I understand you and I agree but I am constantly in a limbo for arguing myself into then out of getting a WD red/blue SSD to replace the Sandisk SU800.

Right now my CF-19 has the low-priority in terms of reliability so I cannot really justify the spending and having a spare semi-reliable SSD.

Regarding the drive that's in there right now. It does have >90 reallocated sectors. I am not sure if that is high or low.

 

Well, in any case... After debating with myself for way too long for ~100USD, I finally ordered WD blue 1TB 2.5". I'll retire the SU800 as an external storage (somelike a dedicated steam drive) until it dies.

 

(Group Cheer!)

 

Bravo

 

Well, I am going to do the upgrade tomorrow when the new SSD arrives but I guess it was in good timing. Reliability of this laptop just jumped off cliff. Three crashes in one day.

A bit of an unrelated question.

I have one fully Aluminum caddy and one half plastic. Which one would you say is better for SSD? I mean aluminum transfer heat faster but the caddy is literally sitting under the heat pipe so the full Aluminum one would actually heat up more at higher load.

I can do a test with my thermal camera but I am feeling a bit lazy.

 

Either one will work fine. The foam padding in the caddy prevents any heat transfer to the aluminum housing or heat pipes.

Just a side thought because everyone focused on the SSD.
Did you test or swap out the memory sticks?
A bad memory stick will cause all sorts of random issues.

 

SJLPHI insists everything else is ok, that's why we focused... )

 

Memory issue is possible like anything else but I did use this laptop on W7 as a router before with the same configurations. Not a single crash in over 300 days.

On side note, it seems that my caddy assembly tape has got stuck to the "void if removed" tape on my ADATA SSD. I guess no more RMA for this thing.

 

I'm betting it is the SSD... I'd do a clean install and I'd almost guarantee that you'll have no issues from here on.

 

It has been installed. Now I'm going to spend the next 48 hours customizing it. I hate to say it but it had 2 BSOD crashses so far since fresh install on the new SSD.

--Addition, BSOD crashes are due to an external HDD that is being used for transferring data. This external HDD has been failing for a long time.

 

Okay, the initial stability issue after fresh install was due to letting Windows 10 deal with the drivers. After running Panasonic Driver Installer for 19120MK6-7x64 bundle, it's stable. I will start the count down after I finish customization and have installed everything.

 

Also, regarding the caddys. The half plasitc caddy runs almost 20 C cooler than full Aluminum one (while CPU is at above 90C). Based on thermal image, when using full Al caddy, the heat pipe heats up the caddy a lot, the half plastic actually has the plastic part on in thermal contact with heat pipe and almost no heat is transferred from heatpipe down to the metal part of the caddy.

From what I can see half-plastic runs cooler simply because of the location of the heatpipes.

 

Interesting. So from what you're saying, the aluminum caddy soaks off some heat from the pipes, which in a way is not completely a bad thing. It would be also interesting to see how much of that heat affects the drive by checking drive temps.

 

Pretty much, the internal sensors (readfrom HWINFO64) show 20C difference between plastic/aluminum while CPU at higher than 90C for extended period of time. Externally... you can look at my attached thermal image Sp1 is the heat pipe, Sp2 is Plastic top, Sp3 is Aluminum bottom of the caddy.

When I compare to full Aluminum, the bottom of the caddy is at the thermal equilibrium to top which pretty much turns the caddy into a small oven for the HDD/SSD.

 

Here's a comparison. Aluminum caddy at >90C CPU load. Sp2 heat pipe, Sp1 upper side of Al caddy, Sp3 bottom side of Al caddy.

 

I'm betting only Toughgbook guys would have FLIR cameras!

 

Customization has been completed and I will now start counting until the next freeze/crash, hopefully never.

I've also decided to switch to Aluminum caddy because while the half plastic caddy runs the SSD cooler by 20C, CPU also runs hotter by about 5~10C as a consequence. Since the operating temperature of WD Blue is rated for up to 70C, I'm going to switch to Al caddy until I see a reason to do the switch.

 

Ah yes, I was wondering if that would end up as some sort of balancing act between CPU and disk temps. Good to know.

 

Caddy temp, not SSD temp.
Also I hope you are not using CF-19 in workstation role with CPU always at 100%. It's a portable rugged laptop, do not forget

 

No, SSD temp as seen by internal sensors. Caddy temp is typically a bit lower.

I was just fast-installing/compiling for almost 48 hours which pushed the CPU at 100% for a pretty long time.

 

I believe that's a disk load consequence, not CPU. SSD doesn't use caddy as a radiator, and there is no airflow in CF-19. I would believe in 5-7C, but 20C is definitely disk's merit )

 

You're probably right. Both SSD and CPU temps are lower at idle since the upgrade. Something odd that I find is that before the upgrade the core temperature hardly ever went above 100C and now it regularly jumps up to 105C.

I cannot think of a reason other than maybe the thermal pad has worn out over time? It's been less than year since the change.

 

Try Throttlestop

 

Just for reference, if I use the Panasonic Intel iGPU driver from 2015, no problem but with 2020 driver from Intel I got a number of BSOD.

Still counting again, 14 days stable so far.

 

Makes sense. Panasonic tweaks the drivers a good bit especially for the fanless models.
One exception I have found is to use the generic (newer) touchpad and wifi drivers. Many more features for the touchpad.

 

I strongly doubt )
More chances newer drivers have a worse support of older hardware. Added some power management features old hardware just doesn't support and BSOD. It's Intel, they always had problems with drivers )

 

FYI, the Culprit may have been the SSD. I have retired the questionable SSD into an external SSD and have it hooked up to my media center computer 24 hours a day and it seems to disconnect itself then reconnect once every now and then (which probably caused freeze and crash on CF-19). The disconnects are getting more frequent as the time passes.

I guess the microcontroller in there is silently screaming for replacement. Unfortunately I ripped the warraty sticker when I was removing it from CF-19 caddy (apparently 1 year ago me decided to tape over the warranty sticker and 1 month ago me just ripped it off).

I am a bit relieved though because that means I didn't just waste money on the new SSD. I am tempted to order and put on new thermal pads on the CF-19 as well. Also I had a nightmare-ish time dealing with the RMA service through Switzerland (Seagate, never again, short version, they sent me a 2.5" x 15mm HDD to replace a 2.5" x 7mm Firecuda, which I refused to accept and told UPS to return to sender, Seagate sent me almost a bill for the 15mm HDD even though I didn't have it until I threatened them with legal action. On top they eventually sent me a refurbished Barracuda which is showing signs of failure). ADATA has been good in terms of warranty but their SU800s are time bombs waiting to go off every 2 years.