Used SSD Help!

[TravisB]

Hello,

 

So I was recently offered a second hand Sandisk Extreme Pro 240gb for 100 NZD. They claim it is 12 months old, was in an old HP pc and mostly did reads. Should I go through would the offer? or buy brand new?

[HPWebcamAble]

I would never buy a used drive. They are usually the first part to fail in a computer anyway.

[jslowik]

Have to agree with @HPWebcamAble. Especially not an SSD.

 

I don't think that's even a great deal if I'm honest, but I don't know what the market is like in your area.

[Moonzy]

storage drives are one of those things that you should never buy used

[Curufinwe_wins]

28 minutes ago, HPWebcamAble said:

I would never buy a used drive. They are usually the first part to fail in a computer anyway.

Uhh... SSDs fail first? Only if you write PETABTYES...

20 minutes ago, jslowik said:

Have to agree with @HPWebcamAble. Especially not an SSD.

 

I don't think that's even a great deal if I'm honest, but I don't know what the market is like in your area.

http://techreport.com/review/27909/the-ssd-endurance-experiment-theyre-all-dead

 

SSDs support secure erase which lets you instantly and without damage to the drive wipe everything the previous user had.

 

Additionally SMART reporting on modern SSDs allows you to tell LITERALLY EVERYTHING ABOUT THE DRIVE.

 

 

See you can tell how many hours it's been working, how much has been written to it, any relocated sector issues, any error issues, etc, etc.

 

As long as you get a good SMART print out (although don't buy one without seeing it) there really isn't any reason not to trust the drive, and certainly not with that good of a bargain.

 

 

(BTW the M: drive that says unknown is a factor re-certified drive directly from Micron, so obviously if I tried to sell you that you probably don't want to buy it. But a fresh drive with proper SMART reporting is as good as it gets.)

[HPWebcamAble]

21 minutes ago, Curufinwe_wins said:

Uhh... SSDs fail first? Only if you write PETABTYES...

What fails before an SSD or HDD?

[Curufinwe_wins]

13 minutes ago, HPWebcamAble said:

What fails before an SSD or HDD?

Before an SSD: HDD, PSU, motherboard, graphics card, case fans, pumps.

 

Like everything other than cpus and server ram...

 

SSDs just don't fail under standard use (outside of those controllers with known systematic issues. Examples of known bad eggs are early Corsair Neutron drives, Kingston V300, 840 Evo. But even then failure rates are super low relative to other hardware.)

 

Shit, both motherboards and graphics cards have RMA rates over 2% globally. 

 

Crucial, Intel, Samsung all routinely push <.5% RMA (with Samsung often pushing <.1%)

 

Obviously RMA =/= long term failure rate, but the those have been nearly none existent as well since the days of TRIM.

[done12many2]

5 hours ago, HPWebcamAble said:

I would never buy a used drive. They are usually the first part to fail in a computer anyway.

 

5 hours ago, jslowik said:

Have to agree with @HPWebcamAble. Especially not an SSD.

 

I don't think that's even a great deal if I'm honest, but I don't know what the market is like in your area.

I would absolutely buy a used SSD if the price was good.  Yeah a spinning disk might be a gamble, but buying a used SSD is nowhere near as risky as buying other components within a PC.

 

SSDs don't fail nearly as much as other things.

[done12many2]

5 hours ago, HPWebcamAble said:

What fails before an SSD or HDD?

I'm not saying that a SSD is invincible, but there are other components in a PC with moving parts that are more likely to fail before a SSD will.  Fans and PSUs come to mind.  Just peruse through this very forum and you'll see more dead PSU threads than you'll ever see SSDs.  If you don't trust that though, here's a good read.

 

http://www.digitaltrends.com/computing/solid-state-drives-outlast-pc-hosts/

[HPWebcamAble]

15 hours ago, done12many2 said:

http://www.digitaltrends.com/computing/solid-state-drives-outlast-pc-hosts/

 

20 hours ago, Curufinwe_wins said:

-snip-

Good to know

 

20 hours ago, Curufinwe_wins said:

Shit, both motherboards and graphics cards have RMA rates over 2% globally. 

 

Crucial, Intel, Samsung all routinely push <.5% RMA (with Samsung often pushing <.1%)

RMA's happen inside a product's warranty period.. so any manufacture that knows basic stats will set their warranty to end just before the average fail time

But I agree with the other stuff you said.

 

[done12many2]

3 minutes ago, HPWebcamAble said:

 

Good to know

 

RMA's happen inside a product's warranty period.. so any manufacture that knows basic stats will set their warranty to end just before the average fail time

But I agree with the other stuff you said.

 

Additional info for sharing.  A lot of current Samsung SSDs have 5 year warranties.  Per their own policy, if you cannot provide a receipt they simply use the manufactured date.  This make buying something like a used Samsung 850 Evo a great buy if you ask me.  Anything you buy for at least a few more years from right now won't be very risky.

[Curufinwe_wins]

3 hours ago, HPWebcamAble said:

 

Good to know

 

RMA's happen inside a product's warranty period.. so any manufacture that knows basic stats will set their warranty to end just before the average fail time

But I agree with the other stuff you said.

 

Sure, but the RMA length of a motherboard or graphics card is generally 1-2 years max, while SSD warranty starts at 3 years (Intel does 5 on almost all their newish products, current mainstream Sammy is 5 w/ prosumer at 10, sandisk mainstream is 3 with prosumer being 10.)

 

So by the very logic that the length of an warranty period across the industry should give a fairly decent qualitative difference in failure rates (which I'm not huge on but obviously there is a certain degree of correlation), SSDs are once again one of the last parts to fail in a pc.

 

And yea, just something to take into account.

 

You mileage WILL vary.