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When should you replace an SSD?
- Thread starter WilyKit
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GoldenTiger
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No need to replace until it's in the single digits. They age linearly unlike car repairs. 
I only replace SSDs when they disappear from the bus. Haven't had one make it to wearing out.
If you've got one of the drives that dies after 40,000 hours of power on time... Maybe befoee then (but that's fixable if you update the firmware before the clock rolls over)
Oh and the Inland 1TB with terrible performance got replaced cause I couldn't live with the awfulness anymore.
If you've got one of the drives that dies after 40,000 hours of power on time... Maybe befoee then (but that's fixable if you update the firmware before the clock rolls over)
Oh and the Inland 1TB with terrible performance got replaced cause I couldn't live with the awfulness anymore.
Zepher
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I have this 840 in my NUC that shows an unusually high number. I don't think this drive was available 11 years ago,
Yeah, so manufacturers can make the raw value for power-on hours anything they want; it's usually just the number of hours, but must be something else on your drive. It's not standard, so yay? Anyway, I don't think I've heard of Samsung SSDs dieing related to power on timers; mostly it's actually enterprise SSDs, usually branded by server OEMs (HPe and Dell?), but made by Sandisk. Also a different line of HPE branded SSDs died at 32,768 hours. Most of the SSDs I've worked with that just disappeared (in managed hosting) didn't have a significant amount of hours on them; mostly we used Intel, so most of our failures were Intel, but other manufacturers of SSDs that we used would fail the same way (just disappear, no early warning we could tell), at I think mostly the same kinds of rates, except for the one batch of SSDs that was just terrible and at least 25% failed in three weeks, and the rest of the batch was replaced with two to four weeks of power on time, so who knows. SSD failures were a lot rarer than rotational drive failures of course, just the failure mode was way worse.
to the OP
When an SSD dies, you get like 0 warning. One day, your system just doesn't boot, and the drive no longer shows up in BIOS. With HDDs, at least you get some warning becasue of bearing noises, etc.
How much is your data worth? How much is your time worth? SSDs are cheaper (and faster) now than ever before. Just get a new, bigger/faster drive. Then you can chill.
When an SSD dies, you get like 0 warning. One day, your system just doesn't boot, and the drive no longer shows up in BIOS. With HDDs, at least you get some warning becasue of bearing noises, etc.
How much is your data worth? How much is your time worth? SSDs are cheaper (and faster) now than ever before. Just get a new, bigger/faster drive. Then you can chill.
I don’t disagree. I understand the failure mode for SSDs and not worried about the cost of replacement. Just wondering when is a good time for replacement before a failure occurs. I don’t want to replace SSDs every month but I probably don’t want one that’s 10 years old housing critical data either.
Zepher
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That critical data should be on two other drives, one of them stored somewhere other than your home. I don't really see the issue if you have your backups in order.
Tsumi
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This. If the SSD is holding critical data, it should be backed up regularly using best backup practices. If it isn't holding critical data but restoring what it is being used for is a pain in the ass, do regular image backups to a local large spinner drive, that way you can restore it quickly when it fails. Otherwise, just leave it alone until it fails.
ochadd
[H]ard|Gawd
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I'd replace it immediately unless it's crazy exotic and expensive. Consumer device SSDs are cheap enough these days that I consider them a disposable part. Some of my SAN SSDs are over $9,500 from Dell and would run them down further. If I'm pulling a fuel filter and see it's a little dirty, I'm just going to replace it. It might be fine for another year but the piece of mind is worth the cost to replace it. The time and effort to recover from a failure sucks too much and you know it's going to happen at the worse possible time. I'd rather just put a new one in and not think about it again for awhile.
I am not sure it is a how much data worth question (any data that fit on an ssd that is worth something should probably be backup and that would remove the question)
How much the operation running on said drive worth ? I have a feeling that in many scenario you can simply replace it if it ever die/start to show any issue and that before that happen the drive will be replaced by a newer one, with it used for something less critical than a boot drive before it's death, to the point of not even having to track health at all.
Edit: and if the operation matter a lot, the backing up of ready to go image like the pics just below is not a crazy idea.
How much the operation running on said drive worth ? I have a feeling that in many scenario you can simply replace it if it ever die/start to show any issue and that before that happen the drive will be replaced by a newer one, with it used for something less critical than a boot drive before it's death, to the point of not even having to track health at all.
Edit: and if the operation matter a lot, the backing up of ready to go image like the pics just below is not a crazy idea.
Last edited:
Zepher
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I store some images of my systems,
The machine in question runs QuickBooks where I do my invoicing and occasional HTPC duties. The company file is stored on the SSD but also backed up to another drive as well as having a cloud based backup. Loss of the drive will not be detrimental and will not cause any consequential data loss. It will mostly be an inconvenience of having to reinstall my OS and applications on this particular machine. Just trying to get a ball park idea of when most people decide to replace their SSD since in it's current state (which is working fine) I can image it to a new drive and have a fresh lease on life.
I run them until they are too small to be useful anymore, or until they break. Ok, so sometimes I don't wait that long because I want something newer and shinier, but I move the old one to a different system and keep using it.
Zepher
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If you look at the image I posted, the HAL-Mobile SSD is the oldest one I have, got it used in 2012, it was powered on 24/7 from 2012 till I put it into my laptop a few years ago and then sold the laptop and pulled the drive out last year.
It's a Crucial 120 or 128GB model.
And I haven't had an SSD fail on me yet, I usually upgrade to a larger one and the smaller one still works fine.
Tsumi
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Keep a backup image of said drive and the image restoration should only cost a few hours of downtime. If 1 or 2 days of downtime is unacceptable, keep a spare SSD on hand that you can image to when your SSD fails.
funkydmunky
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As stated make a backup image asap. Why would you want to go through the pain of a OS and programs re-install! Have some piece of mind bro.