News SanDisk Extreme Pro Failures Result From Design Flaw, Says Researcher

[Admin]

A researcher from Austria uncovers several possible hardware reasons for the Extreme Pro's failures.

SanDisk Extreme Pro Failures Result From Design Flaw, Says Researcher : Read more

 

[endocine]

"the resistors used in these SSDs are too big for the circuit board" What does that mean, are the solder pads too small for the component, or ... something else? how can anything be too big for the board its soldered onto?

 

[punkncat]

SanDisk having failure(s), unheard of..... 😉

I am astounded they still can sell things under that moniker.

 

[digitalgriffin]

Sandisk: here's a $5 rebate off your next drive purchase from us.

Lawyers: $$$$

 

[USAFRet]

SanDisk: "Even though your dead SSD is past the 3 year warranty, we're giving you a new, better one, for free."

(me, Dec 2018)

 

[SeaTech]

Something else that is interesting...apparently Western Digital intends to split/spin-off their Flash and HDD business after a merger plan with Kioxia fell through. Feels a bit odd really...depending on the news article you can get a rather different feel about this split..one is 'oh the flash business is not making money and there is too much supply on the market, let's get rid of it' while the other narrative has been "the HDD segment is a legacy business that does not mesh well with flash technologies, better to separate things out'. One thing is for certain: if the split does happen as reported there may no longer be WD branded SSDs/ M.2 drives...as they plan to have the HDD business keep the name...no name is yet specified for the flash business. Why seagate has made things work while WD's business has struggled is a bit mystifying. WD's non-sanDisk M.2/SSD drives seem to be performing well....shame to see that spun-off. I guess Seagate will be the competition winner by default...after so many years...it was akin to the Nvidia vs AMD struggle and now...perhaps no more.

 

[TwoSpoons100]

"the resistors used in these SSDs are too big for the circuit board" What does that mean, are the solder pads too small for the component, or ... something else? how can anything be too big for the board its soldered onto?

There are a number of failure modes for SMT parts, especially the larger ones which are of subject to higher mechanical stress. Those pads look like IPC minimum size, probably so they could cram everything into a smaller space. Doesn't help with reliability. The part may also be suffering from thermal shadowing, being so close to other parts. Or it could simply be the soldering temperature profile isn't quite right. I've not heard of 'Bad Solder' myself, only 'Bad Soldering'. And although solder paste does have a limited shelf life, the fab houses building these boards will being going through tonnes of the stuff, so they are always buying in fresh.

 

[ekio]

Outch. With the price they cost, being cheap about the design and manufacture is unforgivable. No Sandisk product for me anymore then.

 

[3ogdy]

Design flaw, yeah. I beat the drum about how bad SanDisk products are for a while around here.

Not just SSDs, but other flash storage devices as well. They become read - only and then die.
They have great pricing but the quality isn't there. You get what you pay for, I suppose.

They're simply not worth the hassle of losing data. My 128 GB Samsung SSD 830 still works to this day. Unbelievable.

 

[plateLunch]

Something else that is interesting...apparently Western Digital intends to split/spin-off their Flash and HDD business after a merger plan with Kioxia fell through. Feels a bit odd really...depending on the news article you can get a rather different feel about this split..

Split is being pushed by an "activist investor". In other words, a money grubbing MBA who doesn't really care about product quality or customers. Flash is considered a fast growing business. Activist investors like that. Fast growing businesses command high stock price multiples, creating money for investors. The HDD business is not growing. Maybe it can make a profit but it does not have the flashy growth that activist investors like.

Maybe related note... Western Digital's CEO came in as the lowest rated CEO as rated by employees in an Oct 14 article here on Tom's. Hmmm. When I saw that article, I was wondering if they suffer from quality problems with all the unhappy employees. And then this article comes out. Will probably take WD off my approved vendor list.

 

[Alvar "Miles" Udell]

Our colleagues from The Verge first reported back on August 8 that Western Digital's SanDisk Extreme 3TB SSDs can suddenly lose data, requiring expensive data recovery services to recoup precious files — if you're lucky.

Unless you use an ounce of common sense and routinely backup your files. I don't care if you run RAID6 with enterprise grade drives, you need to backup to either the cloud (personal NAS or commercial), or on an external HDD, and with the prices of both being exceedingly affordable, and setting up automated backups exceedingly easy, there's no excuse not to.

To borrow an illustration:

 

[cyrusfox]

I have nothing but good experience with Sandisk drives(Western Digital branded now). They make the best 22x30mm drives, I have used the sn520, sn530, and now the sn740(2TB model). They are very efficient and reasonably priced. I have also ran the high end SN750 and SN850.
For portable/external drives, I don't get the point, just buy a decent enclosure and get any decent drive. portables see an even lesser amount of Read/write cycles than internal drives, garbage grade flash is usually more than sufficient so I expect they are putting in the worst NAND, better to make your own with a normal internal drive.

And as always, never rely on a single copy of anything for critical data...

 

[kb7rky]

JFC...really? What the hell is it with manufacturers these days? First (in recent memory), Western Digital, *now* SanDisk?

Who's next...Intel? AMD? Asus?

 

[Order 66]

Thank goodness I have a Samsung MicroSD card in my switch. I would hate to risk losing my data.

 

[kb7rky]

Thank goodness I have a Samsung MicroSD card in my switch. I would hate to risk losing my data.

I see what you did there 😉

 

[Order 66]

I see what you did there 😉

I don't know what I did there, it was unintentional

 

[Avro Arrow]

I honestly thought that SanDisk would get better when they got bought by Western Digital because Western Digital products were always very reliable (and still are).

Go figure, eh?