Question Should I be worried about my Samsung 850 EVO 250GB?

[vollachr]

Hi,

I have the Samsung 850 EVO 250GB SATA 2.5" SSD, it is the oldest SSD in my system, it was originally used as system drive for Windows but it haven't been used this way for a couple of years approximately.

Generally, I don't seem to feel or see any noticeable problem with it but S.M.A.R.T check via CrystalDiskInfo shows "Caution 1%" with with "Wear Leveling Count" showing Threshold 0, Current & Worst 1.

Samsung Magician however, latest version, showing the same data in S.M.A.R.T but says it's OK, then on the other hand the drive is rated for 75TBW and it claims over 1400TB was already written to it.

I'm not sure what to think or do about that, should I be worried the drive is nearing it's end of life?

Again, no noticeable problem but I haven't actually used the drive to write/delete anything substantial in months.

Attaching screenshots for reference.

 

[helpstar]

Are you sure it´s 1400 TB and not 1400 GB ?

 

[Lafong]

20216 total hours on.

That's 120 weeks if on constantly, 24 hours a day; 7 days a week.

Does that sound plausible to you? About 7 years if on 8 hours a day. Sounds reasonable to me.

1452 TB in 5, 6, or 7 years is much higher than I've heard any ordinary home user write. That's 600 to 800 GB per day.

Can you account for writes that heavy during the days it was a system drive? Any unusual usage pattern? Mining? Heavy database use?

Do you have any reason to believe 1400 plus TB is wrong?

If everything on it was backed up as it should be regardless, I'd probably keep using it purely as a personal experiment.

 

[vollachr]

20216 total hours on.

That's 120 weeks if on constantly, 24 hours a day; 7 days a week.

Does that sound plausible to you? About 7 years if on 8 hours a day. Sounds reasonable to me.

1452 TB in 5, 6, or 7 years is much higher than I've heard any ordinary home user write. That's 600 to 800 GB per day.

Can you account for writes that heavy during the days it was a system drive? Any unusual usage pattern? Mining? Heavy database use?

Do you have any reason to believe 1400 plus TB is wrong?

If everything on it was backed up as it should be regardless, I'd probably keep using it purely as a personal experiment.

It's a Gaming & Internet computer mostly and I do/did graphic design on it too but saying I can account for 1400 plus TB, no, I can't, my computer isn't on 24/7, usually about 12 hours a day, usage pattern has changed over the years though, possibly drastically, I do not and never did install games on this SSD but as system drive it is where the temp files and many game saves go, I make it a point to only use system drive for system related and software/program installation stuff, meaning I install things to it that are not games, and there's temp files and internet files that are occasionally cleaned.

Maybe if I had used it as a download location, I download A LOT but I have never used the drive for that.

The drive is used currently and for the last year at least for static storage of my graphic design files.

Are you sure it´s 1400 TB and not 1400 GB ?

It says TB in Samsung Magician, clear as day (see attached image), so sure? only if the software is reliable, it doesn't make sense to me that I manage to write 1400 TB to the poor drive since purchased.

 

[Lafong]

20216 hours on.

You say about 12 hours a day.

That would be 1685 days; between 4 and 5 years use.

Sounds perfectly reasonable .

Unless you have strong evidence that 1452 TB is outright wrong, I'd have to assume it is correct and you just weren't aware of what was going on day to day on the drive.

Worry about it? It would cost about 50 dollars to buy a new drive of that size to eliminate your worry. "Worth it" would be up to you only.

 

[vollachr]

20216 hours on.

You say about 12 hours a day.

That would be 1685 days; between 4 and 5 years use.

Sounds perfectly reasonable .

Unless you have strong evidence that 1452 TB is outright wrong, I'd have to assume it is correct and you just weren't aware of what was going on day to day on the drive.

Worry about it? It would cost about 50 dollars to buy a new drive of that size to eliminate your worry. "Worth it" would be up to you only.

Sure, what I meant is should I worry about the drive dying? I have files there, possibly not all of them backed up, as for replacing it, that is a thing to consider, I just invested in replacing a couple of 2TB mechanical HDDs that were suspect with a 4TB SATA SSD & 1TB NVME SSD so money is kinda short now, I'll back up the data there as soon as I can I guess and I'll see how long it continues to work I guess.

As for evidence, no, obviously not, and I can't even find the receipt to check how many years I have it but I kinda doubt this is accurate, what I can't figure out is if it is accurate, how come Samsung Magician still say the drive health is "Good".

 

[Lafong]

Sure, what I meant is should I worry about the drive dying? I have files there, possibly not all of them backed up, as for replacing it, that is a thing to consider, I just invested in replacing a couple of 2TB mechanical HDDs that were suspect with a 4TB SATA SSD & 1TB NVME SSD so money is kinda short now, I'll back up the data there as soon as I can I guess and I'll see how long it continues to work I guess.

As for evidence, no, obviously not, and I can't even find the receipt to check how many years I have it but I kinda doubt this is accurate, what I can't figure out is if it is accurate, how come Samsung Magician still say the drive health is "Good".

Hard to say what Magician uses as an algorithm to nudge a drive over the line from "Good" to something else.

I would worry about any drive dying. New and unused; ancient and highly used; or anywhere in between. Thus backups. Today rather than tomorrow. I hate to make assumptions about safety of hardware generally or my personal files generally. Of course, maybe the files on it are only sorta valuable. All of that factors into your decisions......but 50 dollars to maybe relieve your anxiety a lot?

I have seen certain people express concern over wear leveling readings, but cannot recall anyone saying those readings have any predictive value, so hard to say how much that should increase your anxiety.

Footnote: just saw Crucial MX 500 SSD, 4 TB on sale for 270 at Newegg. Highly tempted myself as I have an 8 year old WD Green 3 TB as my backup drive. Over 50,000 hours on it with zero defects. Could last another 50,000 or drop dead in 60 seconds.

 

[USAFRet]

Sure, what I meant is should I worry about the drive dying? I have files there, possibly not all of them backed up,

Thats the thing....you should be prepared for ANY drive to die at ANY time.
And very suddenly.

 

[vollachr]

Okay, I see your points, I'll just make sure I have an up-to-date backup of the files and run some tests, benchmarks, chkdsk, etc. to see how the drive is and if/when it dies I'll see if I replace it or not, I did add an extra 1TB recently.

Thank you all.

 

[Bob.B]

Hi,

I have the Samsung 850 EVO 250GB SATA 2.5" SSD, it is the oldest SSD in my system, it was originally used as system drive for Windows but it haven't been used this way for a couple of years approximately.

Generally, I don't seem to feel or see any noticeable problem with it but S.M.A.R.T check via CrystalDiskInfo shows "Caution 1%" with with "Wear Leveling Count" showing Threshold 0, Current & Worst 1.

Samsung Magician however, latest version, showing the same data in S.M.A.R.T but says it's OK, then on the other hand the drive is rated for 75TBW and it claims over 1400TB was already written to it.

I'm not sure what to think or do about that, should I be worried the drive is nearing it's end of life?

Again, no noticeable problem but I haven't actually used the drive to write/delete anything substantial in months.

Attaching screenshots for reference.

74GB/hr?
I don't know what you could be doing to get that kind of usage.

If true you have been hammering on that disk.