SSD reliability and interface discussion (Previously: HDD issues)

[Per Hansson]

Re: HDD issues.

I agree with everything you said except there is a M.4 you just didn't look hard enough.

Show me a interface for SSD's named M.4 and I will pay you $100
And no, an SSD with the letters "M4" in it's damn name do not count!

[Spork Schivago]

Re: HDD issues.

TLC based flash drives have much stronger ECC algorithms than SLC based ones, so you'll never see the effects of the much higher raw BER. At least that's what the endurance tests seem to be saying.

Also, because the capacity increases as the max P/E cycles decrease, the SSD will still last a very long time before it technically wears out.

For example, if you were to write 10GB of data per day over a period of 10 years, then that amounts to 36.5 TB. A 500GB SSD with perfect wear levelling and 1:1 write amplification would rack up only 73 P/E cycles.

I don't know anything about M.2 or M.4. Sorry.

Okay, thank you. So I'd want TLC. The prices have seemed to drop a good bit. I'd love to buy my wife a terabyte one if I could find it. I'm sure it'd still be expensive being such a high capacity. Can a personal just generally drop them into a laptop? They're around the same size as a laptop drive, right? Or would I need some special hard drive caddy?

[Spork Schivago]

Re: HDD issues.

I could not find the exact article that states what I have stated, either it is not on the web anymore or because I am using a public computer, now, it will not search the same as there is site controls on this computer. I did not say that they are less reliable then hard drives as I was stating one aspect. I think one of the most complete comparisons is found here https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Solid-state_drive. One time I called up Seagate and talk to their Engineering Technical Department. I ask them how long will a hard drive last. The answer I got is they can fail at any time so if you are storing something important you should have as many back ups as you can, at least 3. That is when I researched and found that magnetic reel to reel tape last the longest of all of the storage devices. That is why movie film has lasted so long. So if one whats to retrieve some information it would be best to load it on magnetic tape and store it. If you store it in climate control conditions you might get upwards of 100 years out of it. The only time you would use it is when you have lost all other copies. You could load it up and record it to another device and then put it back into storage. I do not have anything that is that important and most people don't, but for those who are in the extreme mind this might work. The M.2 and M.4 are suppose to be rivaling the solid state drives for speed because they are using solid state components in a parallel bus.

I seen some stuff on movies a few years back when I was looking into how to digitally restore older films. Turns out the stuff they're stored on isn't the best. For example, we can look at the movie Jaws. The guy who made it said he wanted to watch it a few years after he made it. He popped it in and it was ruined. I don't know if the guy was talking about a VHS tape or the actual film it was recorded onto. I guess they have to store the movies in a temperature controlled, humidity controlled room. Because of what happened to Jaws, the guy started some movement or something that involved restoring the old films and then converting them to digital or something like that. I don't remember all the facts and some of this could be incorrect. I'm just going by my memory here.

As for important files, backups are truly the only way to be 100% safe. There's RAID arrays that can help. RAID 5, one drive can die and you don't lose any data. There's even a RAID configuration where you can lose two drives and not lose any data. For important stuff though, it's best to keep a copy off site. At DCSI, we did tape backups and kept a copy in the backup building. When the flood hit, it really saved our butts! Everything in the building was lost. We never knew the water would get so high. When it got up to our necks, we abandoned the building. It just came so quick and without much warning. The river flooded. Lost over a million worth of equipment the papers said.

[Spork Schivago]

Re: HDD issues.

Loved following this thread up to about post 51.
Let me know if you want me to split the discussion of SSD drives into a new thread following that post, to make it easier to follow.

Also some information for you:
AHCI is an improvement for IDE, both support the TRIM command for SSD's.
This is in no way related to the physical interface which can also be IDE or SATA.
The IDE interface is limited to 133MB/sec, SATA 6Gbps is limited to 600MB/sec minus overhead which translates to ca 525MB/sec in the real world.

That is to say a 6Gbps SSD using the physical interface SATA can still have the IDE driver installed and reach the same performance.
Only some things like NCQ and power saving features will be missing.
SSD's have been limited by the SATA 6Gbps interface for years now.
As you can see in the Anandtech review linked above they all run into the same 525MB/sec bottleneck.

That is where the M.2 interface (formerly NGFF) comes into play. (Nothing called M.4 exists btw).
It introduces a new physical interface: PCI Express.
But it can also support SATA as a physical interface for backwards compatibility.
When running on the SATA physical interface M.2 is limited to the same 6Gbps as regular SATA is.
But when running in PCI Express mode the SSD can get up to a PCI Express x4 3.0 interface which translates to 32Gbps or 4000MB/sec.
As you can understand this is quite an improvement over SATA!
The PCI Express interface can also support a new logical interface: NVMe.
It's a driver like IDE or AHCI but developed for SSD's.
Remember AHCI was developed for mechanical HDD's so it has allot of unnecessary overhead for SSD's.

Also worth mentioning is that there was another successor planned for SATA.
It is called SATA Express but basically no devices have been released for it and the standard is dead.
The reason is the clunkiness of it's connector and the fact that it's a x2 PCI Express interface so only half the bandwidth that M.2 offers.

But of course a cabled interface is required, and this is where U.2 comes into play. (Formerly SFF-8639).
Basically it's a M.2 interface with a cable attached to it, even passive such adapters exist but also active.

So there's no M.4? I knew I wasn't getting all the facts straight. Maybe what I was trying to remember was M.2 2x and M.2 4x? Does that make more sense? I remember reading up on motherboards that supported it and only a few truly supported it. There was a bunch that claimed to, but like you're saying here, they only went up to 6.0Gbps speed. I thought for those boards, it was more of a gimmick to get users to buy their cheaper boards.

Perhaps it would be best to split this off to a new topic around post #51 or so. Kinda drifted away from the original topic.

On a side note, I'm all about learning and I gotta say, the users here on BadCaps really gave me some great information and filled in some blanks! For that, I thank you all!

[Spork Schivago]

Re: HDD issues.

I agree with everything you said except there is a M.4 you just didn't look hard enough.

I dunno Keeney123, Per Hansson seems to be real knowledgeable in this subject. I googled it just now (hoping I'd get 100$!) and all I could find where drives called M4, like Crucial's M4 and then some IBM drive. Could it be possible you mistook a drive that has M4 in it's name for an M.4 interface?

[keeney123]

Re: HDD issues.

Show me a interface for SSD's named M.4 and I will pay you $100
And no, an SSD with the letters "M4" in it's damn name do not count!

I thought it was Plextor. Perhaps Fzabkar can tell you where he came across the M.4. I do remember seeing this when I was searching for and expess card for my T400. When I was looking for that, there were only two Manufacturing companies that advertised storage chip on the PCIe. One of them was Plextor this is the spec sheet it does not say M.4 in this it say PCIe gen2X2 perhaps they had writing it M.4 before I can't say as that was some 6 months ago.
http://www.goplextor.com/Product/Det..._Edition#/Spec

[keeney123]

Re: HDD issues.

Spork I am going by and article I read on the internet writing by some professor I believe in Physics like at a place like Cal Tech. Please do not ask me to go back and verify this as I have been doing this way to much. I say if you do not believe me that is OK. I am not here for people to believe me. If you have refuting evidence I will take a look at it and decide for myself if it proves your point.

[fzabkar]

Re: HDD issues.

Perhaps Fzabkar can tell you where he came across the M.4.

I wrote ...

"I don't know anything about M.2 or M.4."

Perhaps the reason that I don't know anything about the latter is that it doesn't exist.

[keeney123]

Re: HDD issues.

I dunno Keeney123, Per Hansson seems to be real knowledgeable in this subject. I googled it just now (hoping I'd get 100$!) and all I could find where drives called M4, like Crucial's M4 and then some IBM drive. Could it be possible you mistook a drive that has M4 in it's name for an M.4 interface?

No, I remember the m.4 because no other PCIe card I came across said this and having fzabkar originally stating the m.4 spec. also reaffirms my belief, as I do not agree with many of his concepts. . Usually when I search for something on the internet I might spend 6 to 8 hours looking for one thing and that was when I had private internet. Now on the public internet with a different machine it is almost impossible to retrace my foot steps of 6 months ago. Whether the specifications that I came across was a misprint I do not know as I did not study the m.4 as I was looking for a m.2. The statement I can revise as to the m.4 spec. is something I saw on the internet from one of the two manufacturers at that time. I am not trying to get people upset I am just stating what I have seen and experiences as anyone does. I do not think my beliefs are perfect. I also do not think other peoples beliefs are perfect. We can all strive towards perfection although none of use with ever attain it in this imperfect Universe.

[keeney123]

Re: HDD issues.

I wrote ...

"I don't know anything about M.2 or M.4."

Perhaps the reason that I don't know anything about the latter is that it doesn't exist.

So you would have to know the m.2 and m.4 to say you did not know anything about them. So where did you come across them.

[diif]

Re: HDD issues.

There is no M.4 spec. There's not much need for anything faster at present with the max throughput possible of approximately 32Gb/s or 4GB/s for M.2 with only a few top end motherboards supporting full speed.

[keeney123]

Re: HDD issues.

There is no M.4 spec. There's not much need for anything faster at present with the max throughput possible of approximately 32Gb/s or 4GB/s for M.2 with only a few top end motherboards supporting full speed.

I can except that there is no M.4 spec. Do you all except that I saw on one of these manufacturer sites 6 months ago a M.4 spec, or not? I guess it does not really matter. As my father use to say in 100 years it really won't matter any how. I looked for about 4 hours through everything I could think off to find the M.4 spec. on the internet and was unable to find the original. As I said I thought it was on the Plextor site or it could had been the Kingston site.These were the two site in remember that had the PCIe card for the laptop. I did not find any of the M.4 on either of those sites. What I remember was that it showed the PCIe storage cards for all of the desktops and at the very end of them there where PCIe storage card for a laptop and there was one more card one could click on and that card had the M.4 listing. After looking through everything I can think of on the web I am in agreement that there is no M.4. However, I still would like to know where fzabkar came up with the M.4 if he never saw a M.4 listing.

[Spork Schivago]

Re: HDD issues.

Spork I am going by and article I read on the internet writing by some professor I believe in Physics like at a place like Cal Tech. Please do not ask me to go back and verify this as I have been doing this way to much. I say if you do not believe me that is OK. I am not here for people to believe me. If you have refuting evidence I will take a look at it and decide for myself if it proves your point.

I won't ask you to find proof or anything. I wasn't trying to imply that you where wrong. I was just trying to point out, for movies, the environment seems to be key. Without the humidity controlled, temperature controlled rooms, they tend not to last long. I'm sure VHS tapes are a bit different than the stuff they actually record movies onto when they make them at the studio's or whatever, but I know VHS tapes don't last very long at all. Floppy disks don't either. I've had some sitting on a shelf since 1999 or so, at my parents house, in a closet. 1.44MB 3 1/4 inch floppies. They all worked back then, but when I went to grab something off them a month or so back, maybe 1/4 of them where still readable in Linux. Most of the bad ones, I couldn't even format.

I was told by a professor in college, with solid state, even a thumb drive, you could put a file on it and just leave it some place on a shelf and in 100 years, it should still be readable. Do you know if this is true or not? He didn't say you could use the thumb drive for 100 years, just if you where to put a file on it and then store the thumb drive, 100 years later, it should still be recoverable.

Your explanation about the M.4 makes a lot of sense. I know here in the USA, we tend to outsource to other companies for motherboards and stuff like that because it's cheaper than paying American workers. I've noticed over the years, when dealing with people who speak a different language, stuff always seems to get lost in translation. I could easily see someone mistaking PCIe gen2X2 or whatever it was for M.4.

I really enjoy discussing this stuff, lot a fun

[fzabkar]

Re: HDD issues.

However, I still would like to know where fzabkar came up with the M.4 if he never saw a M.4 listing.

Man, you have a serious ego problem. For the second and final time, the reason that I know nothing about M.4 is because there is no such thing. You "came up with the M.4", nobody else did.

[keeney123]

Re: HDD issues.

I won't ask you to find proof or anything. I wasn't trying to imply that you where wrong. I was just trying to point out, for movies, the environment seems to be key. Without the humidity controlled, temperature controlled rooms, they tend not to last long. I'm sure VHS tapes are a bit different than the stuff they actually record movies onto when they make them at the studio's or whatever, but I know VHS tapes don't last very long at all. Floppy disks don't either. I've had some sitting on a shelf since 1999 or so, at my parents house, in a closet. 1.44MB 3 1/4 inch floppies. They all worked back then, but when I went to grab something off them a month or so back, maybe 1/4 of them where still readable in Linux. Most of the bad ones, I couldn't even format.

I was told by a professor in college, with solid state, even a thumb drive, you could put a file on it and just leave it some place on a shelf and in 100 years, it should still be readable. Do you know if this is true or not? He didn't say you could use the thumb drive for 100 years, just if you where to put a file on it and then store the thumb drive, 100 years later, it should still be recoverable.

Your explanation about the M.4 makes a lot of sense. I know here in the USA, we tend to outsource to other companies for motherboards and stuff like that because it's cheaper than paying American workers. I've noticed over the years, when dealing with people who speak a different language, stuff always seems to get lost in translation. I could easily see someone mistaking PCIe gen2X2 or whatever it was for M.4.

I really enjoy discussing this stuff, lot a fun

No, I have never thought that you were calling me wrong. I find you to be a kind person. From what I read the solid state drives have a shelf life less than the hard drives. What I read about the hard drives is their self life is about 15 years. Of course none of that matters if you plug in the hard drive and it has a mechanical failure. I think the thumb drives have a charged cell as I remember and I would think it is a matter of time before that charge dissipates. Now, do not hold me to that like my life depended on it as some people would do. However, if do find that is contrary to something you come across I would appreciated it if you would present me that information so I might read it.

[Spork Schivago]

Re: SSD reliability and interface discussion (Previously: HDD issues)

Here's an article that talks a little bit about the restoration project with Jaws. I don't know if this was the article I had read originally or not and I don't know if they talk about the producer talking about how the film was ruined when he went to play it off his shelf a few years later or whatever it was. My memory is all messed up so I might be remembering it incorrectly. Also, they're talking about 35mm film. Maybe you where talking about a different type of media and I just assumed it was the same? Anyway, here's the article. From what I've read, it's pretty interesting stuff. If this was the article I had read originally (and it appears to be in a similar format at least, from what I remember), it's what discouraged me from trying to digitally restore Top Cat. The one I read talked about how many people worked on, 24x7, for like two years or something! Going frame by frame or something like that. It kinda put things into perspective for me. Made me realize just doing 30 minutes of one Top Cat show would probably take my whole life!!!

https://library.creativecow.net/kauf...S-Resoration/1

[Spork Schivago]

Re: HDD issues.

No, I have never thought that you were calling me wrong. I find you to be a kind person. From what I read the solid state drives have a shelf life less than the hard drives. What I read about the hard drives is their self life is about 15 years. Of course none of that matters if you plug in the hard drive and it has a mechanical failure. I think the thumb drives have a charged cell as I remember and I would think it is a matter of time before that charge dissipates. Now, do not hold me to that like my life depended on it as some people would do. However, if do find that is contrary to something you come across I would appreciated it if you would present me that information so I might read it.

Thanks for the kind words. I try to be real nice now a days, ever since I left the Marine Corps. I try really hard to avoid violence for some reason. I guess I just don't like seeing people fight and stuff. Anyway, at the time, Solid State HDD's where extremely expensive and just coming out. This was around 2005 or so if I remember, maybe 2006. I think the professors reasoning behind it was something like this:

Mechanical hard drives have moving parts
Solid State hard drives have no moving parts
Moving parts will always fail, sooner or later.
With no moving parts, there's nothing to break, therefore, Solid State hard drives should last a life time, if you weren't using it (ie, the electronics will fail eventually, if you use them, etc).

Now though, more is known about solid states. I always try to "update" my information in my head when new information is available. I figured here would be the place to ask. I know I got a thumb drive, 1GB, my wife found, one of the first thumb drives I ever owned. I was shocked when she popped it in and we were able to successfully read the files. Then we found some smaller ones, 512MB for sure, but I want to say there was a 256MB as well! The 1GB one is a Lexar thumb drive. http://www.geeks.com/details.asp?inv...MC1GB-431-BULK

it's a weird one though, it must have some fancy internal power supply, because it has a little bar showing you how full it is.

[diif]

Re: SSD reliability and interface discussion (Previously: HDD issues)

There isn't normally a power supply in thumb drives. Perhaps it's an e-ink display that only requires power to change?

Seems so http://www.lexar.com/about/newsroom/...paper-display-

Flash memory suffers from wear and has a finite life span.

[keeney123]

Re: SSD reliability and interface discussion (Previously: HDD issues)

Here is an article on electronic paper displays if you are interested. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Electronic_paper

[keeney123]

Re: SSD reliability and interface discussion (Previously: HDD issues)

Here's an article that talks a little bit about the restoration project with Jaws. I don't know if this was the article I had read originally or not and I don't know if they talk about the producer talking about how the film was ruined when he went to play it off his shelf a few years later or whatever it was. My memory is all messed up so I might be remembering it incorrectly. Also, they're talking about 35mm film. Maybe you where talking about a different type of media and I just assumed it was the same? Anyway, here's the article. From what I've read, it's pretty interesting stuff. If this was the article I had read originally (and it appears to be in a similar format at least, from what I remember), it's what discouraged me from trying to digitally restore Top Cat. The one I read talked about how many people worked on, 24x7, for like two years or something! Going frame by frame or something like that. It kinda put things into perspective for me. Made me realize just doing 30 minutes of one Top Cat show would probably take my whole life!!!

https://library.creativecow.net/kaufman_debra/JAWS-Resoration

Yea, the article I read was talking about reel to reel tape. It seems to me some very old movies are still intact. They are black and white and do not entail color. They may also had a different a process to make them. I would think storing digital signals on tape would be a very basic process unless one first converted them to a analog signal before recording. So there is a lot of unknowns and that is usually the case when people make statements. I guess one would have to have a control test to verify these statements.