Samsung 870 EVO - Beware, certain batches prone to failure!

[revin]

Wow, now the 1Tb 870 EVO are Under $65 They are Giving them Away or trying

That's 1/2 what it cost me April 20, 2021

 

[ThrashZone]

Hi,
Think it was said one page back 970 evo plus also 1tb are around 65.us.

 

[amiens80]

Wow, now the 1Tb 870 EVO are Under $65 They are Giving them Away or trying

That's 1/2 what it cost me April 20, 2021

i give you one GOOD reason to buy one :
in 3 years, samsung won't have any stock, so just send a RMA at day-15 end warranti, and i'm pretty sure there will offer your a better model! 'like 4 or 8tb or next generation)

 

[SPDIF]

Samsung 980 1Tb for 60 dollars, guess Sammy want to make it good again...

And WD SN850X 1 Tb for 100 dollars.

Also an Samsung 970 EVO plus 2Tb for 119 dollar.

 

[80251]

@amiens80
But what if Samsung sends you a next gen replacement from a line that is just as buggy and unreliable as the 870 EVO?

 

[vortexiur]

So i just bought on amazon and it came with manufacter date from 2023, hope this have no problems.
If any i will tell you later.
Serial is: S6PPNX0W from China. (It's not listened in those who failed)

And here i'am.
The 2023 model i bought recently just hit 99% on crystal disk with just 2 TB of written data.
Is this normal?
Also the full scan with samsung magician took more than 7+ hours to complete (it didn't find anything), while my m.2 970 evo makes it in 40 minutes max. (i know the speed are so different, 500 mb/s vs 3000 mb/s, but i don't think this needed 7+ hours.)
btw I have already sent it back and get another one and see if it happens again.
CrystalDisk:

https://imgur.com/M1LJEzu

 

[Daytrader]

And here i'am.
The 2023 model i bought recently just hit 99% on crystal disk with just 2 TB of written data lol.
Is this normal?
Also the full scan with samsung magician took more than 7+ hours to complete (it didn't find anything), while my m.2 970 evo makes it in 40 minutes max. (i know the speed are so different, 500 mb/s vs 3000 mb/s, but i don't think this needed 7+ hours.)
btw I have already sent it back and get another one and see if it happens again.
CrystalDisk:

https://imgur.com/M1LJEzu

Well that image is perfect, shows nothing wrong, my drive went to 99% instantly after 500GB just written to it, i don't see any problem myself, still at 99% after 2 years and 5TB written to it now.

 

[vortexiur]

Well that image is perfect, shows nothing wrong, my drive went to 99% instantly after 500GB just written to it, i don't see any problem myself, still at 99% after 2 years and 5TB written to it now.

Thanks for the feedback, sadly i already sent it back because i was worried.
Can someone explain why it goes to 99% like this very easily? My m.2 has 10 tb written and still at 100%
Maybe the type of memory?

 

[Daytrader]

Not sure but you had zero errors on drive also, remember 99% is almost 100% regardless, it would have stayed at 99% for a very long time i reckon, mine did, also your 2023 drive would have been ok i reckon anyway, as long as it had latest firmware on, i am surprised they even allowed rma of the drive myself.

 

[amiens80]

And here i'am.
The 2023 model i bought recently just hit 99% on crystal disk with just 2 TB of written data.
Is this normal?
Also the full scan with samsung magician took more than 7+ hours to complete (it didn't find anything), while my m.2 970 evo makes it in 40 minutes max. (i know the speed are so different, 500 mb/s vs 3000 mb/s, but i don't think this needed 7+ hours.)
btw I have already sent it back and get another one and see if it happens again.
CrystalDisk:

https://imgur.com/M1LJEzu

ain't you paranoïd ?
do you know the logicial computer of the 99% score ? maybe it is just because it not brand new. If after 2TB of writting, it would write a "100%" score, i would doubt a lot of the efficiency score of benchmark.
For me, 99% it normal
Mine is in bader old-shape than yours but your temp is curiously higher...

 

[SPDIF]

That drive you did RMA whas 100 percent okay! Why they go fast to 99 percent only Sammy knows. But anyway it's the same whith any 870EVO i have here, it goes to 99 percent and then stays there for years...

You have a good change that Samsung just return the same SSD back to you. It happened with me many times, because i thought it would die again. But after some time i see it did stay at 99 percent for very very long time. You just did send back an 100 percent healthy drive... There are no errors to see like the SSD from amiens80.

I cannot explain why the 870EVO is doing this, after an very short time it goes to 99 percent, then it stays there for a very long time. Only Samsung can explain this behavior.

What you have is POR Recovery count at 7. This means your SSD was powered off 7 times unexpected while it was busy working. Yes 40 degrees is a little high, i think it was mounted in an Laptop?

 

[vortexiur]

That drive you did RMA whas 100 percent okay! Why they go fast to 99 percent only Sammy knows. But anyway it's the same whith any 870EVO i have here, it goes to 99 percent and then stays there for years...

You have a good change that Samsung just return the same SSD back to you. It happened with me many times, because i thought it would die again. But after some time i see it did stay at 99 percent for very very long time. You just did send back an 100 percent healthy drive... There are no errors to see like the SSD from amiens80.

I cannot explain why the 870EVO is doing this, after an very short time it goes to 99 percent, then it stays there for a very long time. Only Samsung can explain this behavior.

What you have is POR Recovery count at 7. This means your SSD was powered off 7 times unexpected while it was busy working. Yes 40 degrees is a little high, i think it was mounted in an Laptop?

Nah it was on amazon, i still was in the 30 days return thing.
Also first time using SSD here, i though it was something bad going to 99% like this with just 2tbw, since all those failed 870 evo lately problem.
About the POR i really don't know, i always shutted down the pc normally idk why it happened, and yes it was on 40c because i was doing a full scan that made me wait 7+ hours to complete, it was under stress. The normal temp is about 28/30c if i remember correctly

 

[SPDIF]

ID # 235 Power Recovery Count

A count of the number of sudden power off cases. If there is a sudden power off, the firmware must recover all of the mapping and user data during the next power on. This is a count of the number of times this has happened.
Just remember the threshold is a lower limit. In the case of POR Recovery Count it is zero, therefor the closer the Current Value gets to zero the closer the drive is to failing. The Current Value for Samsung solid state drives decreases from 100 or 200 to their respective lower limits. The Raw Data is the count of actual events.


SMART attribute 177 (Wear Leveling Count)

This attribute represents the number of media program and erase operations (the number of times a block has been erased). This value is directly related to the lifetime of the SSD. The raw value of this attribute shows the total count of P/E Cycles.
This means, that in your particular SSD VALUE 99 shows still 99 percent of lifetime is remaining, but average Program/Erase cycles per block is 1 times.



From Amazon? Then you just will get a new one at home, yours will then after Samsung checked it be sold as refurbished SSD.

 

[E.S]

And here i'am.
The 2023 model i bought recently just hit 99% on crystal disk with just 2 TB of written data.
Is this normal?
Also the full scan with samsung magician took more than 7+ hours to complete (it didn't find anything), while my m.2 970 evo makes it in 40 minutes max. (i know the speed are so different, 500 mb/s vs 3000 mb/s, but i don't think this needed 7+ hours.)
btw I have already sent it back and get another one and see if it happens again.
CrystalDisk:

https://imgur.com/M1LJEzu

The health status of Samsung ssd is shown truncated.
Whenever Wear Leveling Count around 20 times increase, in 870evo, 1% of health condition decreases.
Since your Wear Leveling Count is 1,your actual health status is 99.95%.

 

[Bwaze]

Samsung Expects Its Operating Profit To Drop By 96 Percent, The Biggest In 14 Years

"To stave off more financial losses, a Samsung official reportedly stated that the firm is reducing memory chip production by a ‘meaningful’ level as it adjusts to a significant drop in semiconductor demand."

Other news sites also mention reduction in NAND, which is in oversupply:

"Samsung is the world's biggest memory chipmaker, accounting for about 40% of DRAM and one-third of NAND flash memory markets."

So I wouldn't expect further price drops.

 

[80251]

So Samsung is trying to artificially limit production to drive supply down and prices up? F'em!

 

[SPDIF]

Samsung Electronics reportedly is quietly reducing NAND flash production by lowering capacity utilization for the chips to 90% in response to sluggish demand, after resisting doing so for a while, according to industry sources.

Earlier this year, Samsung said it would not slash its memory chip investment despite dwindling demand, hoping for a recovery of the memory chip market in the second quarter of this year. At the same time, its peers, such as Micron Technology, Kioxia and SK Hynix have cut their memory chip production to counter oversupply.

If you want a good SSD i suggest you buy one today... Seems other fab's then Sammy will do the same. It's the same like oil production they follow. The world is driven by money...

 

[amiens80]

"If you want a good SSD i suggest you buy one today..."

Carlllllll !! , there is no such good SSD in the world
Sorry, i have to do tha joke !

 

[unwind-protect]

I'm gonna hit U.2 SSDs on Ebay...

 

[SuperConker]

ain't you paranoïd ?
do you know the logicial computer of the 99% score ? maybe it is just because it not brand new. If after 2TB of writting, it would write a "100%" score, i would doubt a lot of the efficiency score of benchmark.
For me, 99% it normal
Mine is in bader old-shape than yours but your temp is curiously higher...

Backup your data right now.

That drive of yours is actually dying, and you should RMA it asap.

It's not supposed to have any bad sectors/blocks (Runtime Bad Block) on it after this little use.
Nor is it supposed to have any "Uncorrectable Error Count"


Look at my 860 EVO from 2018. It's been heavily used, but no such Errors on it yet.

Or how about this super-old 850 PRO from 2015?

That's how a normal SSD is supposed to look like after 5-8 years of use.

 

[Justicator]

Update - after going thru their RMA process (which implied you had to pay to both ship the unit to them, and to have it returned, but in the end they paid both) and have it shipped to and looked at their repair center in NJ, with not many updates, I have a replacement 870 EVO that arrived today. I started the process on 03/21 so just under one month. The production date on the drive is 2023 03 24 so I will install and see if the bios is up-to-date, update if not, and then we'll see how it goes. Just wanted to give my update and thanks all!

 

[chrcoluk]

I have decided to update the fw on my 870 EVO, although so far no issues, I will keep the thread updated of course.

 

[amiens80]

is there a way to check the SSD cell only the one which are contening data, not the free ones ? in samsung magicien , the long check regards all cells..... it takes a bunch of time !
As my 2tb 870 is not full, i wish to gain time to not check the useless cells !

 

[toyo]

And here i'am.
The 2023 model i bought recently just hit 99% on crystal disk with just 2 TB of written data.
Is this normal?
Also the full scan with samsung magician took more than 7+ hours to complete (it didn't find anything), while my m.2 970 evo makes it in 40 minutes max. (i know the speed are so different, 500 mb/s vs 3000 mb/s, but i don't think this needed 7+ hours.)
btw I have already sent it back and get another one and see if it happens again.
CrystalDisk:

https://imgur.com/M1LJEzu

It shouldn't go down so fast. That is either some error in CDI or the SMART of the drive in general.
What matters for these SATA drives is the Wear Leveling number. That dictates when the life% drops. Here is how it worked for my 850 Evo of just 500GB:
99%, 16 WL, 11100 GB written
98%, 22 WL, 14852 GB written
98% 37 WL, 24806 GB written
Each 650GB written or so, a WL cycle is performed. For larger drives, it should happen less often.
Some data on WL:

Wear Leveling​

NAND flash memory is susceptible to wear due to repeated program and erase cycles that are commonly done in data storage applications and systems using Flash Translation Layer (FTL). Constantly programming and erasing to the same memory location eventually wears that portion of memory out and makes it invalid. As a result, the NAND flash would have limited lifetime. To prevent scenarios such as these from occurring, special algorithms are deployed within the SSD called wear leveling. As the term suggests, wear leveling provides a method for distributing program and erase cycles uniformly throughout all of the memory blocks within the SSD. This prevents continuous program and erase cycles to the same memory block, resulting in greater extended life to the overall NAND flash memory.

There are two types of wear leveling, dynamic and static. The dynamic wear algorithm guarantees that data program and erase cycles will be evenly distributed throughout all the blocks within the NAND flash. The algorithm is dynamic because it is executed every time the data in the write buffer of the drive is flushed and written to flash memory. Dynamic wear leveling alone cannot insure that all blocks are being wear-leveled at the same rate. There is also the special case when data is written and stored in flash for long periods of time or indefinitely. While other blocks are actively being swapped, erased and pooled, these blocks remain inactive in the wear-leveling process. To insure that all blocks are being wear-leveled at the same rate, a secondary wear-leveling algorithm called static wear leveling is deployed. Static wear leveling addresses the blocks that are inactive and have data stored in them.

But there might be another potential culprit for these fast drops in life% at just one single WL.
The modern NAND might just be less reliable than the old NAND because of stacking and smaller process manufacturing (?). Samsung says this is still TLC, not QLC. Who knows.

 

[SPDIF]

For 870EVO drives it is perfectly normal to go to 99 percent life after only written 4TB total or less. I have seen the same with 30+ drives with different dates. After that it takes numerous TB to be written before it goes to 98 percent. As i said only Samsung knows why it is doing that, other drives from Samsung don't have such behavior.
But nothing to worry about! For the 870EVO it is normal. Only when health goes rapid down with Reallocated sector count going up, you have a rotten drive in your hands.