SSD dead almost "straight out of the box"?

[britechguy]

Hello All,

This is a first for me, so I thought I'd ask here before I started tearing the machine down again and returning things. On my primary laptop I just installed a new keyboard, fan, and Mushkin 1TB SSD a couple of days ago. I cloned the existing drive to it, and everything was hunky-dory up through last night.

I went to bed with my first backup from the SSD to my usual USB backup drive and when I came back downstairs this morning I had a black screen with a "no boot device found" message. Attempts to fire up after a power-button-hold shut down are now just giving black screen. I don't even get the HP splash at the start of boot.

Anyone care to venture a guess as to the root cause? If push comes to shove it's a new computer, but I really hope it doesn't come to that, as I do like the one I've got. I also still have the 2TB HDD that was its system drive that I can plop back in for testing purposes.

I've never had an SSD fail this way this quickly, and I suspect that's what's happened, though.

 

[sapphirescales]

Mushkin

I think I've found the problem. Don't use cheapo drives. A Samsung would've been like $10 more.

 

[britechguy]

Your assistance is duly noted, now go away. I'm perfectly capable of doing my research before purchasing, and did.

 

[Sky-Knight]

All electronics have a 4% failure rate within the first month. Eventually... you get one. Congrats, it's your turn.

I'm not a fan of that brand either, but that's irrelevant. It'd dead jim.

 

[britechguy]

@Sky-Knight,

Thanks, this is what I suspect as well. I plan to yank it today or tomorrow and back it goes to Amazon for an exchange. I will test whether I can read it when connected via USB cable as an external drive, which I fully expect will fail, but I've got to try just for fun.

I far prefer an early and immediate death than one that might have come a couple of months down the road.

 

[Porthos]

than one that might have come a couple of months down the road.

That's why I push image backups so hard to clients.

 

[Markverhyden]

Yep, things fail when new. That being said are you getting the HP splash with the drive removed?

 

[Sky-Knight]

Cite?

It's a rule I was taught by an electrical engineer when I was a child. Nothing out there says that magic number, but the percentage has held true for everything I've sold over my career. So take it for what you will.

 

[britechguy]

Yep, things fail when new. That being said are you getting the HP splash with the drive removed?

I have not tried that, but have removed the failed SSD (which shows a capacity around 1GB, not 1TB, when hooked up as an external drive on another machine and where the initialize dialog is coming up) and dropped the old HDD in. I haven't yet tried firing it up, other things going on today have prevented that. But I will report back.

 

[britechguy]

Fires up entirely normally with the original Seagate HDD. I'm letting it sit for a couple of hours just to see if something flakes out, but I'm chalking this up to "bad SSD." Off to Amazon to initiate a return.

 

[britechguy]

Well, if I do have a "drive killer" I have all my files backed up in File History as well as a complete system image backup taken last month and, if the one from last night completed prior to the flake out, last night.

If it is a drive killer I need to know that, anyway, as I'd then go the "new computer" route immediately.

 

[GTP]

Just a thought as this has happened to me but, did you try booting it without anything plugged into it?
Like, remove all usb devices.

BTW, Muskin are a Texas based company who make their own chips. They seem to have a A+ rating for their products throughout the industry.

 

[britechguy]

@Barcelona,

No, I didn't, but the only thing I had in was an SD card (still a USB device) but the machine boots with that in all the time. Once I pulled the drive and got the "Initialize" behavior when it was plugged in, I considered it dead then and there. But Disk Management was showing "peculiar information" on it as well, so that sealed the deal.

It behaved perfectly normally when plugged in for cloning, so this was a major, sudden change. I could never have trusted it again under the circumstances. It's back to Amazon tomorrow and its replacement is on the way.

Mushkin has been around for a very long time and has generally been considered top-shelf. It's not ever been "the biggest name" in any market it's been in, but it has been consistently well-thought-of.

 

[Sky-Knight]

I don't use Muskin because their warranty is 2 years shorter than WD and Samsung, and they don't provide a utility to maintain the drives.

 

[britechguy]

I don't use Muskin because their warranty is 2 years shorter than WD and Samsung, and they don't provide a utility to maintain the drives.

You're completely correct, and there is a significant price differential for either WD or Samsung.

Also, my experience with electronics in general (and now one SSD in particular), is that they either fail almost right out of the box or go on forever. That's one of the reasons that I absolutely never even think about buying extended warranties, and recommend that others avoid them as well.

We all have our own priorities, and that's perfectly OK. When working with clients, I try to get a sense of what their priorities are and make recommendations accordingly, even if those are not priorities that are my own. This one was for me.

 

[thecomputerguy]

I've only had 2 SSD's fail in all of my SSD replacements, both Mushkin.

Moved to Samsung and since then no failures at all.

 

[Sky-Knight]

@britechguy Fair enough on the warranties, but that still doesn't cover the firmware updating over time. I'm after the support, not the price.

Amazon:
Muskin Source-II 1TB 2.5" SSD $86.99
WD Blue 3D NAND 2.5" SSD $99.99
Samsung EVO 860 1TB 2.5" SSD $129.99

$15 is worth being able to point and click a firmware update. It's also worth being able to use Acronis to image the platform with no complaints.

Obviously my needs are different than yours, but Mushkin is going to have to work to get my business. Those WDs let me be lazy, have a good warranty, and have simply never let me down.