SSD health.

Most computers nowadays come with solid-state drives (SSDs).

This is because SSDs have several advantages over hard disk drives (HDDs): they are faster, quieter, smaller, more efficient, and consume less energy. However, they have a shorter lifespan and are still more expensive than HDDs.

Since SSDs don't have moving parts, they're very reliable and offer lower chances of failure than HDDs. Even so, as SSDs age, they will eventually fail.

This is just another reminder that it's essential to periodically back up all your files.

how long do SSDs last.

Unlike HDDs, SSDs have a limited number of possible writes before the drive enters read-only mode. This is due to the design of SSD hardware, which sacrifices durability for speed. However, most users don't need to worry about this issue as even enthusiastic home users will likely need several years to exhaust the write cycles of an SSD.

On average, most SSDs can last for over five years, while the most durable units can exceed ten years. The lifespan of your SSD will depend on how often you write data to it. You should keep an eye on the SSD's lifespan to determine when it's time to upgrade.

how can you estimate the remaining lifespan of your SSD?

1. using software.

If you want to estimate the remaining lifespan of your SSD, you can use software that tracks the drive's health, such as the manufacturer's proprietary software or free third-party tools. These programs can provide information about the drive's remaining lifespan, including how many write cycles it has gone through and how much data has been written to it. Keep in mind that these estimates are not always accurate, but they can give you a general idea of how much longer your SSD is likely to last.

On average, a modern SSD will survive until you've written about 700TB of data over its lifetime. Some may survive longer, some shorter. If you can see how much lifetime data you've written on your current SSD, you can estimate its remaining lifespan.

If you're around the 400TB mark, for example, then you know that you're more than halfway through the lifespan of the device. As you near 700TB, you'll want to think about getting a backup drive just in case. But in reality, it would take years of heavy use to even get close to that amount.

2. warranty and MTBF hours.

Most SSD manufacturers offer a warranty that can give you a rough estimate of how long your SSD will last at a minimum. While the warranty won't reveal the exact remaining life of your SSD, it can help you estimate the probability of its failure. For example, an SSD with a five-year warranty or 600TB TBW (total host writes) will likely last longer than an SSD with a three-year warranty or 200TB TBW.

Another factor to consider when estimating the lifespan of your SSD is the MTBF (mean time between failures) hours provided by the manufacturer in the spec sheet. This metric does not predict the exact lifespan of your SSD, but it does give you an idea of the probability of the SSD malfunctioning within the warranty period. For instance, if your SSD has an MTBF of 1 million hours, it means the probability of it failing is only 0.03% within the warranty years, even if you use it for at least eight hours every day. In other words, the higher the MTBF hours, the less likely your SSD is to malfunction.

how SSDs fail.

Unlike HDDs, SSDs do not have physical moving platters, making them immune to the mechanical failures associated with traditional hard disks. However, although SSDs are not susceptible to these types of issues, other components within the drive can still fail.

• SSDs require capacitors and power supplies, which are vulnerable to malfunctions, particularly in the case of a power surge or failure. In fact, SSDs have been known to corrupt existing data in the event of a power failure, even if the drive itself has not completely failed.

• The other potential issue with SSDs is that they have a limited number of read/write cycles, which is a common problem with all types of flash memory. Over time, the read/write cycle can affect the ability to write new data to the SSD.

how to check the health of an SSD.

While an HDD's constant whirring or ticking may indicate that it's failing, SSDs won't make any noise to alert you of a problem. So, how can you know if an SSD is failing?

testing programs.

There are now many SSD testing programs available on the market that can be used to check the health and performance of your SSD. The first thing that an SSD health check tool does is to evaluate the overall health of your SSD. Some SSD health check tools will display the current state of your SSD and provide you with a health status. Others can detect the number of bad sectors on your SSD, which can indicate the overall condition of the drive. Additionally, some SSD tools allow you to carry out garbage collection and adjust other parameters, which can improve the performance of the drive. Most SSD health check tools also provide options to optimize or tune your SSD to meet specific demands. However, it's important to note that certain optimizations may come at the cost of reduced storage capacity.

errors.

While figuring out if an SSD is failing can be difficult, there are some signs of SSD failure, such as errors, crashes, and other issues that may warn you before you lose your data.

1. errors involving bad blocks.

Similar to bad sectors on HDDs, SSDs can also have bad blocks. An SSD bad block error occurs when the computer tries to read or write a file, but the process takes an unusually long time and eventually fails. Due to the extended read or write time, the process ultimately fails and displays an error message regarding a bad block.

The common symptoms of bad blocks are: 

- inability to read or write a file to the drive
- the need to repair your PC/file system
- active applications frequently freezing up and crashing
- frequent errors when moving files
- generally slow performance, especially when accessing large files
- random crashes

If you observe any of these symptoms, the best approach is to run drive monitoring software to check the health of your SSD. If there are any issues, back up your files immediately and start looking for a replacement SSD.

2. files cannot be read or written.

There are two ways in which a bad block can affect your files:

• The system detects the bad block while writing data to the drive and thus refuses to write data. In this case, your data was never written to the drive, so it isn't corrupted. Usually, the system will resolve it automatically. However, if it doesn't, you can probably fix this by attempting to save the file in a different location or copying it to the cloud, restarting your computer, and then saving it back to your drive.

• The system detects the bad block after the data has been written, and thus it refuses to read that data. Unfortunately, in this case, retrieving your data won't be easy. A bad SSD block usually means that whatever data was stored on those blocks is lost for good. It is recommended to back up your important data regularly to prevent data loss in case of such an issue.

3. the file system needs repair.

Have you ever seen an error message like this on your screen on either Windows or macOS?

"It looks like Windows didn't load correctly. If you'd like to restart and try again, choose "Restart my PC" below. Otherwise, choose "See advanced repair options" for troubleshooting tools and advanced options. If you don't know which option is right for you, contact someone you trust to help with this."

Sometimes this can happen because you didn't shut down your computer properly.

Shutting down your system incorrectly can lead to errors on an SSD. Actually, unsafe shutdowns are one of the SSD health metrics - for example, if your SSD has experienced 21 unsafe shutdowns, this means that you have created the potential for a data error 21 times.

Often, these errors cannot be helped, but sometimes, they can be a sign of your SSD developing bad blocks or a problem in the connector port.

Thankfully, the resolution is easy. Windows, macOS, and Linux have built-in repair tools for a corrupt file system. Each OS will prompt you to run its respective tool upon such an error, so follow the steps and repair the file system.

4. frequent crashes during boot.

If your computer frequently crashes during the boot process but works fine after hitting the reset button a couple of times, this may indicate that your SSD is malfunctioning. It could be due to a bad block or a sign of a failing drive. It is crucial to back up your data immediately to prevent data loss.

To test if the drive is the issue, you can download and run one of the diagnostic tools mentioned earlier. If you have already backed up your data, you may also try formatting your SSD and reinstalling the operating system.

5. your drive becomes read-only.

This is a rare occurrence, but it is a clear indication that your SSD may be on the verge of failing.

When this happens, your SSD may not allow you to perform any tasks that involve writing data to the disk. However, it will still function in read-only mode. Your SSD may appear to be unresponsive, but fortunately, you can still recover your data if you act quickly. This is because your SSD is still allowing you to read the data on the drive, which means you can copy it to another drive.

Before you discard the SSD that you believe has failed, connect it to another computer as an external or secondary hard drive. Make sure that you don't boot the operating system from the SSD; you should use the main drive of the computer for this purpose. If you don't have access to another computer or laptop, you can run a Linux live distro from a USB on your existing machine. Booting an alternative operating system will prevent your SSD from attempting to launch the previous operating system, and it will allow you to access the read-only data on your failing SSD.

how to extend the life of your SSD.

SSDs aren't infallible and can sometimes fail before their expected lifespan.

If your SSD is showing signs of failure or if you've had it for over five years, it's probably time to start looking for a replacement. However, there are a few things you can do to extend its lifespan while you shop for a new one:

• Avoid extreme temperatures and ensure proper cooling.

• Protect the drive from power outages and fluctuations by using a UPS or surge protector.

• Free up space on the SSD to move data away from bad blocks.

Remember to transfer your data from the failing SSD to a new drive, whether it's an SSD or an HDD.

Above all, protecting your data should be your top priority.

If your SSD has failed, you may only get one chance to recover your data.

Kotar Data Recovery provides professional data recovery services for a full range of solid state drives using MLC, eMLC, TLC, or SLC NAND flash memory technologies, for all makes and models of computers, laptops, and server storage.