Ssd Problems

[Daffy D]

Anyone else having problems with their SSD?

A couple of months ago I decided to upgrade my desktop and treat myself to a SSD "to make the computer fly".

After some research decided on the INTEL Series 330 120gb as being in the right price range (affordable) and INTEL being a well known brand. (what could go wrong?)

At first all worked fine, response times were super fast as were startup / shutdown times.

Then a few times strange things started to happen, when clicking select the whole window would be selected and the screen / computer would randomly freeze and only a reboot would get things normal again. Various other niggles would happen that gave the feeling something was not quite right.

I try to keep a fairly clean computer with regular weekly virus / nasties checks but still spent the best part of a day running every check and deep scan that I could think of but nothing showed up.

I also updated the firmware from INTEL and ran their diagnostic scan again everything checked out fine.

I realize there are many things that can make a computer act strange but after upgrading to SSD I did a new clean install and only have a few programs installed, all of which I had before so nothing new that may be causing conflict.

Goggling the problem brought up a couple of forums where others were having the same symptoms and seems there is an inherent fault in the INTEL Series 330 120gb. (Of all the SSD from all the manufacturers in all the world why me? )

I'm guessing, "I think there is something not quite right with this SSD" will not work with a warranty replacement, and I don't really want a replacement of the same "faulty" drive.

Looks like I'll have to buy a new SSD (bummer) so looking for recommendations from satisfied SSD users or any info on a good reliable drive that will do what it says on the box.

Thanks.

[Tywais]

First I would check all drivers, especially video, are the most current and downloaded from the manufacturer and not Microsoft. If you have another computer, you could install it there and see if it has the same issues - bit time consuming but you should be sure it is the SSD before spending more money. I assume you are running Windows 7 and TRIM support is enabled. Also, disable paging/swap for the drive though that is more for improving lifetime then stability.

[Daffy D]

First I would check all drivers, especially video, are the most current and downloaded from the manufacturer and not Microsoft. If you have another computer, you could install it there and see if it has the same issues - bit time consuming but you should be sure it is the SSD before spending more money. I assume you are running Windows 7 and TRIM support is enabled. Also, disable paging/swap for the drive though that is more for improving lifetime then stability.

Yes running Win7 and TRIM is enabled. Have used recommended program called Slim Drivers to check my drivers are up to date. Just noticed another thread about SSD where it says not to have the drive filled more than 90% mine is only just over half full so that can not be a problem.

[RandomSand]

"when clicking select the whole window would be selected"

Could this be a faulty keyboard or mouse ?

If you're running an Intel drive, and it's plugged directly into an Intel chipset; then its likely something else that's causing trouble.

...out of interest; could you provide a link to articles or posts about "inherent fault in the INTEL Series 330 120gb" ?

[IamNotaNumber]

I assume you are running Windows 7 and TRIM support is enabled. Also, disable paging/swap for the drive though that is more for improving lifetime then stability.

Not all BIOSes and motherboards support AHCI/TRIM, even when running Win7. Mine doesn't for a start.

And Windows will not like the swap file being disabled unless you never make any serious demands on the PC.

[rakman]

You can use a USB stick or drive on Win7 for your pagefile location. Easy to setup and disconnect if traveling. From an SSD perspective, pagefile allocates a fixed location, so the SSD would get written to in the same spot. This could lead to premature spot failure.

Also, how much memory do you have in your PC? Are you running a lot of swap activity? ie more memory in use than physically available?

[Tywais]

And Windows will not like the swap file being disabled unless you never make any serious demands on the PC.

Just to clarify, I disable it on the SSD but enable it on a 2nd internal hard drive.

[spacemunk]

maybe should try and isolate the problem first.

Clean out the whole PC , resit all the hardware. Update all drivers.

First time ever heard a SSD acting that way.

[Gary A]

I have that same SSD and have no problems as yet. I did do some research before I bought it and could find nothing that indicated that particular model having any problems.

[IamNotaNumber]

And Windows will not like the swap file being disabled unless you never make any serious demands on the PC.

Just to clarify, I disable it on the SSD but enable it on a 2nd internal hard drive.

This is fine if you have a second drive, of course, though it will slow down the speed of swap activity somewhat.

I'm sure you will agree that anyone using a single SSD in a laptop (as many do) should NOT disable the swap file.

Personally I keep my swap file on the SSD on my desktop.

[h90]

If the computer (mainboard) is older the SSDs tend to make problems.

A Bios update may or may not help......

[barryw52]

I am not 100% convinced Slim drivers is always 100% good as it can give you the wrong drivers sometimes. I would check the drivers for graphics directly from the manufactures web site, I have had some issue with this on Slim driver before I would also use the mother board/laptop manufactures web site for all it drivers. Is it possible things went wrong after you used Slim driver to update the drives?

[Chicog]

I'm sure you will agree that anyone using a single SSD in a laptop (as many do) should NOT disable the swap file.

No, I won't agree. I disabled the swap file on Win 7 on a Netbook with 2Gb RAM about two years ago, and I have never once had a problem because of it.

[spacemunk]

given the lifetime of a SSD , it wont matter if u disable/enable the swapfile.

[IamNotaNumber]

I'm sure you will agree that anyone using a single SSD in a laptop (as many do) should NOT disable the swap file.

No, I won't agree. I disabled the swap file on Win 7 on a Netbook with 2Gb RAM about two years ago, and I have never once had a problem because of it.

That surely means that you never do much with it.

Try and run some big apps simultaneously on it and it will doubtless stop working. Unless of course you are a genius who knows something that MS don't, in which case you should probably be selling them your knowledge.

[JimShortz]

I've had one of these running for a few months with no problems (on a Hackintosh, running OSx Lion). I love the super fast access times and would not want to have to use a HDD for programmes again, although I do use one for storage.

I also did research before buying this and didn't identify any pattern of issues amongst owners. Does anyone have a link to forums discussing this problem?

The one odd thing about using an SSD is that you KNOW it is heading towards being worn out, at what is basically a known amount of write cycles (actually, a huge number). This can be kind of unnerving, but what I like about it is that it is actually very slow, and more importantly it is predictable - unlike HDDs, which in reality are also on a path to destruction, but far more randomly!

[Chicog]

I'm sure you will agree that anyone using a single SSD in a laptop (as many do) should NOT disable the swap file.

No, I won't agree. I disabled the swap file on Win 7 on a Netbook with 2Gb RAM about two years ago, and I have never once had a problem because of it.

That surely means that you never do much with it.

Try and run some big apps simultaneously on it and it will doubtless stop working. Unless of course you are a genius who knows something that MS don't, in which case you should probably be selling them your knowledge.

You mean like Excel & Firefox? I do, all the time. But I mostly watch movies and TV when travelling.

There is no need for virtual memory if you have adequate RAM, and even though MS do not call it best practice, it works. So I prefer not to waste the hard disk space.

Microsoft will also tell you .NET is a good thing, you don't have to believe every piece of s**t they come out with.

[IamNotaNumber]

You mean like Excel & Firefox? I do, all the time. But I mostly watch movies and TV when travelling.

There is no need for virtual memory if you have adequate RAM, and even though MS do not call it best practice, it works. So I prefer not to waste the hard disk space.

As I said, you just dont do much with your PC.

Start the task manager, check your memory usage, then start opening up apps and see what happens to the numbers.

No swap file is fine for people who never do anything with their PC, but not for anything approaching serious use.

[Dork]

Not all BIOSes and motherboards support AHCI/TRIM, even when running Win7. Mine doesn't for a start.

I didn't know that TRIM required BIOS support but I've never installed on anything without AHCI.

What effect does that have?

[Tywais]

Not all BIOSes and motherboards support AHCI/TRIM, even when running Win7. Mine doesn't for a start.

I didn't know that TRIM required BIOS support but I've never installed on anything without AHCI.

TRIM requires AHCI support in the BIOS, there is nothing else specific to TRIM in the BIOS.

[Dork]

Not all BIOSes and motherboards support AHCI/TRIM, even when running Win7. Mine doesn't for a start.

I didn't know that TRIM required BIOS support but I've never installed on anything without AHCI.

TRIM requires AHCI support in the BIOS, there is nothing else specific to TRIM in the BIOS.

I understand that but I meant what negative effect is there from not having TRIM?

[Tywais]

Not all BIOSes and motherboards support AHCI/TRIM, even when running Win7. Mine doesn't for a start.

I didn't know that TRIM required BIOS support but I've never installed on anything without AHCI.

TRIM requires AHCI support in the BIOS, there is nothing else specific to TRIM in the BIOS.

I understand that but I meant what negative effect is there from not having TRIM?

Life expectancy can be shortened.

[Dork]

Life expectancy can be shortened.

OK, thanks.

[Chicog]

You mean like Excel & Firefox? I do, all the time. But I mostly watch movies and TV when travelling.

There is no need for virtual memory if you have adequate RAM, and even though MS do not call it best practice, it works. So I prefer not to waste the hard disk space.

As I said, you just dont do much with your PC.

Start the task manager, check your memory usage, then start opening up apps and see what happens to the numbers.

No swap file is fine for people who never do anything with their PC, but not for anything approaching serious use.

What is this "Serious use" stuff?

I don't exceed 2Gb of RAM, simple as.

If you call "serious use" using lots of RAM, I have lots of serious users. They have 20 IE Windows open, 15 documents, 12 emails and they bitch about their PC's being slow (and that's *with* swapfiles).

Again, if you don't need it, bin the swapfile.

[Daffy D]

Thanks to everyone for your input recommendations suggestions and general thoughts.

Delving a little deeper into my problem it only seems to happen when I'm watching movies or TV downloads. At the end of a movie I would close the media player screen and behind that would be the open folder of my movies with the last movie that I had just watched still highlighted / selected.

What would normally happen is I select another movie and it would start to play but what in fact happens is that my clicking does not select just another movie but a whole bunch of movies which don't unselected no matter what I do.

Closing the folder and getting back to desktop is no problem (so guess the mouse is working OK) but when I click and open the movie folder again all the files are still selected / highlighted, so as I said in the OP the only way get back control is a reboot.

Since my OP my "movie" drive, which is not the SSD drive, has died. "Crystal Disk Info" threw up a caution on that drive so ran HDD Regenerator overnight that repaired 26 bad sectors, was OK for a day then more problems on the drive. Running another HDD Regenerator again overnight threw up couple of hundred bad sectors so guess the drive is "bricked" as they say.

Fortunately I managed to save most of my movie collection onto another drive before the drive refused to give up any more and die completely.

So my thinking is that the original problem was not with the INTEL SSD but a result of a dying SATA hard drive.

Everything seems to be working fine now, fingers crossed, but only time will tell if indeed there is a problem with the INTEL SSD.

When I first Googled the problem I did find some forums that mentioned having similar problems with this particular SSD but I was more interested in finding solutions so did not take much notice at the time. Googling back I can't find those references. I think Google is awsome but why is it that putting in the same search words the next day brings up a different set of web pages?