Assistance - Calling all Samsung EVO owners

Gunslinger · 20 Mar 2015 at 23:27

hmm, i will have to do some research, i'm about to build a new machine for my old man, and i'm leaning heavily towards not using any HDD's in it at all, m.2 for the OS and the onboard msata for storage, as he doesn't need a whole heap of storage.

Dervious · 21 Mar 2015 at 09:09

rodt99 said:
Is there any news on a date for the fix? Last I read was it would be during March.

I posted this yesterday......

Dervious said:
I`ve just spoken to Samsung about this problem, and they're going to get it picked up and sorted (good service).

I asked the chap on the phone about the performance issue. He confirmed that by the end of the month there should be a new version of Magician which will include a firmware update that they hope will cure the problem, and I quote "or Samsung will have a problem".

It sounds promising.

bliss · 21 Mar 2015 at 16:23

The "fix" can't come soon enough. Really noticing the performance drop of my drive now.

rodt99 · 21 Mar 2015 at 18:06

OK cheers. Will look forward to the update at the end of the month.

ED209 · 22 Mar 2015 at 19:27

well I gave up with waiting.

one of my evos went back for RMA due to disconnecting randomly for no reason (waiting to hear back from scam) and today I took back my other 840 evo to my local store who where fine with me changing it when explaining the issues with the drive for a 850 evo and paying the £3 more.

Cold_And_Miserable · 22 Mar 2015 at 20:13

Dervious said:
I don't think now is the time to do anything with an 840 EVO. Only a week or two before we should get an update. Then it's a case a waiting a few weeks (or even months) to see if the issue is truly sorted.

I now think Samsung will come good on this, one way or the other.

I think the TLC NAND is fundamentally flawed and just dies too quickly. Cells have to be re-read due to errors and performance decreases. There's no fix for hardware-level faults.

Maybe you should just intentionally write the ~600Tb needed to kill off the drives and RMA?

Dervious · 22 Mar 2015 at 21:55

PanMaster said:
I think the TLC NAND is fundamentally flawed and just dies too quickly. Cells have to be re-read due to errors and performance decreases. There's no fix for hardware-level faults.

Maybe you should just intentionally write the ~600Tb needed to kill off the drives and RMA?

So why does at least one of my customers have an 840 EVO that performs perfectly, several months after the last firmware update ?

Maybe some of the TLC NAND is flawed, and maybe Samsung has a firmware update that will sort out the remaining flawed NAND ?

If they don't sort it, I think that they'll offer a replacement SSD.

welshdragon · 22 Mar 2015 at 22:03

I've given in and dumped my 840 Evo back through the retailer. Whats the next best SSD? Intel?

wazza300 · 22 Mar 2015 at 22:06

Crucial IMO,mx100 or newer mx200

welshdragon · 22 Mar 2015 at 22:11

Ok, I'll take a look. Is the 850 Evo spared this issue?

wazza300 · 22 Mar 2015 at 22:23

I think so,but personally I wouldn't buy an ssd that uses TLC nand ATM,its not fully proven like mlc nand is

welshdragon · 22 Mar 2015 at 22:34

I'm really annoyed with myself as I had an MX200 too. BAH lol

ED209 · 22 Mar 2015 at 22:56

welshdragon said:
Ok, I'll take a look. Is the 850 Evo spared this issue?

well I have just changed my 840 to a 850 through my retailer I brought my 840 from. cost me £3 extra.

no firmware updates after installing the software and as usual only time will tell

Dervious · 23 Mar 2015 at 08:53

welshdragon said:
I've given in and dumped my 840 Evo back through the retailer. Whats the next best SSD? Intel?

Unless the drop in performance is causing a significant problem, I don't think there's any harm in waiting to see what Samsung do. They've said that there should be another firmware update by the end of March, so not long to wait.

Even 840 EVOs that were purchased at launch will still have about 18 months of warranty remaining, which gives us plenty of time to see if they do fix the issue properly.

Having said that, if the next update doesn't do the trick, then mine's going back.

Gunslinger · 23 Mar 2015 at 10:28

looks like the mSATA drives were affected

Samsung is releasing a new firmware and performance restoration software package for the 840 EVO and 840 EVO mSATA.
The firmware update is recommended to users who may have experienced any drop in read performance of the mentioned drives.
Running the software packages provided will first update the firmware(840 EVO : EXT0CB6Q, 840 EVO mSATA : EXT42B6Q), then scan and calibrate all existing data on the drive.

Note that the update time can be more than an hour depending on the amount of data. Please wait for the firmware update to complete before starting any other operations.

that came from here
http://www.samsung.com/global/business/semiconductor/minisite/SSD/us/html/support/downloads.html

Also this guy reports the same issue on his laptop...
https://tinkertry.com/my-1tb-msata-samsung-840-evo-ssd-read-speed-slowdown-no-regrets-theres-a-fix

John24 · 23 Mar 2015 at 11:02

welshdragon said:
Ok, I'll take a look. Is the 850 Evo spared this issue?

Most likely yes. Not all TLC is the same and the 850 EVO uses a different implementation.

Wazza, Saying TLC is bad and avoiding it altogether isn't a good idea. As I've said to you before, if you educate yourself on the facts by reading the reviews and articles on V-NAND it's clear that the TLC NAND in the 850 EVOs is unlikely to be effected by the 840 EVO issue. You should stop giving out advise on a subject you refuse to learn all the facts on. It's the opposite of helpful which is all I beleive you genuinely are trying to be.

John24 · 23 Mar 2015 at 11:05

Gunslinger said:
looks like the mSATA drives were affected

Yep I've seen a few reports of the mSATA version being effected aswell, not nearly as much as the SATA version but that's probably down to the mSATA version being less widely used.

wazza300 · 23 Mar 2015 at 13:30

John24 said:
Most likely yes. Not all TLC is the same and the 850 EVO uses a different implementation.

Wazza, Saying TLC is bad and avoiding it altogether isn't a good idea. As I've said to you before, if you educate yourself on the facts by reading the reviews and articles on V-NAND it's clear that the TLC NAND in the 850 EVOs is unlikely to be effected by the 840 EVO issue. You should stop giving out advise on a subject you refuse to learn all the facts on. It's the opposite of helpful which is all I beleive you genuinely are trying to be.

show me a good working tlc nand ssd then?? doesn't matter what reviews say if its not tested for a few years like the current 840 evo

I wont recommend the 850 evo now,not unless I can see real world proof that they are ok and to do that you need atleast a year or two usage since release

Rroff · 23 Mar 2015 at 13:36

Mine is starting to go again

still "ok" a the moment but seeing drops to 400MB/s that weren't there before.

Top image from the last time I ran a test a couple of months back - 2nd one from today - the system hasn't been used that much other than running windows update and a couple of small game updates.

Planning on a system refresh in a couple of months time (the cooler needs binning and looks like the evo will be joining it).

Gunslinger · 23 Mar 2015 at 13:40

The trouble is that these have not been around long enough to have that sort of testing period, best you can do is aim for the makes that produce the most of the components rather than just buying in drives pre-built.

The crucial are not a bad bet, but, if you want to avoid TLC nand, your going to have to pay for it, because just like the MLC/SLC choices the manufacturers had a while ago, if they can find a way to use the cheaper nanad and a gimmick to bring their speeds closer together for less money, then that will always be the way they go.

Mushkin has had a couple of m.2 drives announced, but nothing substantial has come to market yet