What are good alternatives to the 990 Pro?

[Amuro0079]

Was originally planning on getting two 990 Pro SSD's next month for a complete new build (waiting on the X3D chips) next month, but with all the rapid health degradation reports I'm not sure about the 990 Pro anymore. I haven't built for quite a while now so would really like some recommendations for SSDs? I'm planning on going all NVMe in this build, maybe 2TB + 1TB. Fast and reliable is all I care, money isn't an issue.

[PopinFRESH]

Postat inițial de Illusion of Progress:

Postat inițial de PopinFRESH:

The "% health" in Crystal Disk Info isn't what is actually being done by SMART on the SSD.

Now I'm more interested in how meaningless that number can be because it seems to be reflecting a much higher health % than I should expect. My particular drive seems to have an endurance rating of 400 TB, so at just nearly 50 TB written (to NAND), I should expect around a 12.5% drop as opposed to the 5% drop CrystalDiskInfo shows.

I already knew the number was far from exact, but it seems almost meaningless to use for this purpose? I suspected it might not necessarily be linear which I'm presuming is the case and is what's throwing things off?

Correct the Crystal Disk Info calculation is not linear, and it also may not be reflective of the correct attribute ID for the SSD. SMART attributes are not a standardized set of attributes. Different manufactures use the extended SMART attributes table for differing purposes, even different purposes between disk models.

[Komarimaru]

Postat inițial de PopinFRESH:

Postat inițial de Komarimaru:

It doesn't display a percentage. Just says Good, 31.5TB written.

Select Drive Details for the drive in the left menu, then click on the S.M.A.R.T. button on the top right. This should show you the actual SMART attributes table

Makes no difference then. CrystalMark has the same numbers. Magic just says 100 instead of 99%

https://i.imgur.com/X3vidJD.png

[PopinFRESH]

Postat inițial de Komarimaru:

Postat inițial de PopinFRESH:

Select Drive Details for the drive in the left menu, then click on the S.M.A.R.T. button on the top right. This should show you the actual SMART attributes table

Makes no difference then. CrystalMark has the same numbers. Magic just says 100 instead of 99%

https://i.imgur.com/X3vidJD.png

That is not the % life left for the SSD. The attribute you've highlighted there is the percentage of the spare NAND area which is what is used for reallocated sectors when one of your "usable" NAND cells is unable to be read.

The attribute 5 which is being covered up is the number of reallocated sectors, which shows you have 1 sector that has been reallocated, to one of the sectors in the spare area.

The amount of sectors available in the spare area is variable and depending upon the capacity of the disk and what the manufacture configured in the disks firmware

EDIT:

Scroll down and post the whole list, and I'll see if it shows attribute 202 as % life left (which is going from memory but I'm pretty sure on the 970 Evo shows that value)

[Komarimaru]

Postat inițial de PopinFRESH:

Postat inițial de Komarimaru:

Makes no difference then. CrystalMark has the same numbers. Magic just says 100 instead of 99%

https://i.imgur.com/X3vidJD.png

That is not the % life left for the SSD. The attribute you've highlighted there is the percentage of the spare NAND area which is what is used for reallocated sectors when one of your "usable" NAND cells is unable to be read.

The attribute 5 which is being covered up is the number of reallocated sectors, which shows you have 1 sector that has been reallocated, to one of the sectors in the spare area.

The amount of sectors available in the spare area is variable and depending upon the capacity of the disk and what the manufacture configured in the disks firmware

EDIT:

Scroll down and post the whole list, and I'll see if it shows attribute 202 as % life left (which is going from memory but I'm pretty sure on the 970 Evo shows that value)

Since magic sucks and won't let ya expand things, just exported results and loaded the csv.
https://i.imgur.com/YWlxftH.png

once convert crystalmarks hex display to decimal, matches exactly what Magic says. So not seeing a difference.

[PopinFRESH]

Postat inițial de Komarimaru:

Postat inițial de PopinFRESH:

That is not the % life left for the SSD. The attribute you've highlighted there is the percentage of the spare NAND area which is what is used for reallocated sectors when one of your "usable" NAND cells is unable to be read.

The attribute 5 which is being covered up is the number of reallocated sectors, which shows you have 1 sector that has been reallocated, to one of the sectors in the spare area.

The amount of sectors available in the spare area is variable and depending upon the capacity of the disk and what the manufacture configured in the disks firmware

EDIT:

Scroll down and post the whole list, and I'll see if it shows attribute 202 as % life left (which is going from memory but I'm pretty sure on the 970 Evo shows that value)

Since magic sucks and won't let ya expand things, just exported results and loaded the csv.
https://i.imgur.com/YWlxftH.png

once convert crystalmarks hex display to decimal, matches exactly what Magic says. So not seeing a difference.

Is that image from magician or CDI? The SMART attributes table should have columns for "Value" or "Normalized", and then the column for RAW. I'm not sure why the output you're getting doesn't show the normalized data.

I'm fairly confident that the attribute 202 (which is showing as Temperature sensor 2 in your image as a RAW value of 328) is the % life left. The RAW value is not the percentage, the normalized value for that attribute will count down from 100 to 0. I don't have my 970 Evo handy right now to check myself, however, I'll try to check it in a few hours when I can.

[Komarimaru]

Postat inițial de PopinFRESH:

Postat inițial de Komarimaru:

Since magic sucks and won't let ya expand things, just exported results and loaded the csv.
https://i.imgur.com/YWlxftH.png

once convert crystalmarks hex display to decimal, matches exactly what Magic says. So not seeing a difference.

Is that image from magician or CDI? The SMART attributes table should have columns for "Value" or "Normalized", and then the column for RAW. I'm not sure why the output you're getting doesn't show the normalized data.

I'm fairly confident that the attribute 202 (which is showing as Temperature sensor 2 in your image as a RAW value of 328) is the % life left. The RAW value is not the percentage, the normalized value for that attribute will count down from 100 to 0. I don't have my 970 Evo handy right now to check myself, however, I'll try to check it in a few hours when I can.

It's literally what it shows in Magics poorly designed Display.

I used the export feature, nothing more, and opened it in a csv viewer.
I'm confused on what you're looking for.
https://i.imgur.com/ZqYDJ5j.png
https://i.imgur.com/v00WOmm.png
https://i.imgur.com/0q9DnSC.png
https://i.imgur.com/8gkXTTX.png

SMART is just SMART. The numbers won't change no matter how many times you have my show you the numbers. Not even sure why you had me get Magic at all really, since only thing it's useful for is firmware updates, CrystalDisk is just as good at viewing SMART data.

[PopinFRESH]

Postat inițial de Komarimaru:

Postat inițial de PopinFRESH:

Is that image from magician or CDI? The SMART attributes table should have columns for "Value" or "Normalized", and then the column for RAW. I'm not sure why the output you're getting doesn't show the normalized data.

I'm fairly confident that the attribute 202 (which is showing as Temperature sensor 2 in your image as a RAW value of 328) is the % life left. The RAW value is not the percentage, the normalized value for that attribute will count down from 100 to 0. I don't have my 970 Evo handy right now to check myself, however, I'll try to check it in a few hours when I can.

It's literally what it shows in Magics poorly designed Display.

I used the export feature, nothing more, and opened it in a csv viewer.
I'm confused on what you're looking for.
https://i.imgur.com/ZqYDJ5j.png
https://i.imgur.com/v00WOmm.png
https://i.imgur.com/0q9DnSC.png
https://i.imgur.com/8gkXTTX.png

SMART is just SMART. The numbers won't change no matter how many times you have my show you the numbers. Not even sure why you had me get Magic at all really, since only thing it's useful for is firmware updates, CrystalDisk is just as good at viewing SMART data.

Cool story. Since you've indicated you know what smart is and seem frustrated with someone trying to help you I'll leave you to your own devices. Have a nice life.

[Komarimaru]

Postat inițial de PopinFRESH:

Postat inițial de Komarimaru:

It's literally what it shows in Magics poorly designed Display.

I used the export feature, nothing more, and opened it in a csv viewer.
I'm confused on what you're looking for.
https://i.imgur.com/ZqYDJ5j.png
https://i.imgur.com/v00WOmm.png
https://i.imgur.com/0q9DnSC.png
https://i.imgur.com/8gkXTTX.png

SMART is just SMART. The numbers won't change no matter how many times you have my show you the numbers. Not even sure why you had me get Magic at all really, since only thing it's useful for is firmware updates, CrystalDisk is just as good at viewing SMART data.

Cool story. Since you've indicated you know what smart is and seem frustrated with someone trying to help you I'll leave you to your own devices. Have a nice life.

Uh... I didn't ask for help. You said for me to post information so I did. You're the one who claimed that CrystalDiskInfo was showing wrong information.

Postat inițial de PopinFRESH:

Check it in Samsung Magician

Also, 970 Evo endurance rating for your 1TB model is 600TBW

Postat inițial de Samsung:

TBW for 970 EVO: 150 TBW for 250GB model, 300 TBW for 500GB model, 600 TBW for 1TB model, 1,200 TBW for 2TB model

The "% health" in Crystal Disk Info isn't what is actually being done by SMART on the SSD.

From your screen shot it looks like it is incorrectly using the SMART attribute 0x05 as "percentage used". That attribute is actually the Reallocated Sector Count.

The math Samsung is using is this:

Total Bytes Written (TBW) = (Physical Capacity * NAND PE Cycles) / (Write Amplification Factor * Wear Leveling Factor)

The attributes relevant to this for the 970 Evo are 177 and 241

IIRC on the 970 Evo attribute 202 is a computed % life left and the normalized value decrements from 100 -> 0.

Your words, not mine. Wasn't looking for help, was stating that 96-97% doesn't seem that far off for a 980 Pro with 100TB written. I think you're confusing Samsungs Warranty to actual true TBW capacity.

[PopinFRESH]

You clearly know that SMART is just SMART. 🤷‍♀️ Again, have a nice life

[Komarimaru]

Postat inițial de PopinFRESH:

You clearly know that SMART is just SMART. 🤷‍♀️ Again, have a nice life

Well, glad you now understand it. Sorry you got confused on me seeking help, I didn't need it. Was just stating that someone calling another out is wrong, and would show that even drives 1/3 the TBW weren't even below 99%. And shown in CrystalMark and Samsungs.

[PopinFRESH]

Postat inițial de Komarimaru:

Postat inițial de PopinFRESH:

You clearly know that SMART is just SMART. 🤷‍♀️ Again, have a nice life

Well, glad you now understand it. Sorry you got confused on me seeking help, I didn't need it. Was just stating that someone calling another out, would show that even drives 1/3 the TBW weren't even below 99%. And shown in CrystalMark and Samsungs.

Enjoy your ignorance.

[Ralf]

Samsung isn't that great these days, 870 Evo, 980 Pro and 990 Pro have issues. I would rather buy a Kingston drive like the KC3000 or Fury Renegade.

[PopinFRESH]

Postat inițial de Illusion of Progress:

Postat inițial de PopinFRESH:

The "% health" in Crystal Disk Info isn't what is actually being done by SMART on the SSD.

Now I'm more interested in how meaningless that number can be because it seems to be reflecting a much higher health % than I should expect. My particular drive seems to have an endurance rating of 400 TB, so at just nearly 50 TB written (to NAND), I should expect around a 12.5% drop as opposed to the 5% drop CrystalDiskInfo shows.

I already knew the number was far from exact, but it seems almost meaningless to use for this purpose? I suspected it might not necessarily be linear which I'm presuming is the case and is what's throwing things off?

For Illusion of Progress, this is how CDI determines that status

REF: CDI Health Status[crystalmark.info]

Postat inițial de Crystal Disk Info:

SSD
Intel, MTRON, SAMSUNG, Indilinx, SandForce, JMicron JMF61x and Micron controller SSD
Health Status	Color	Description
Good	Blue	
Caution	Yellow	Remaining Life <= 10%
Bad	Red	Remaining Life < Threshold value (Vendor Define)
Reference S.M.A.R.T. Attribute ID

Intel : 0xE8, Available Reserved Space
MTRON : 0xBB, Total Erase Count
SAMSUNG : 0xB4, Unused Reserved Block Count (Total) / Used Reserved Block Count (Total)
Indilinx : 0xD1, Remaining Drive Life
SandForce : 0xE7, SSD Life Left
JMicron JMF61x : 0xAA, Bad Block Count
Micron : 0xCA, Percentage Of The Rated Lifetime Used

Other SSD
Health Status	Color	Description
Good	Blue	
Caution	Yellow	 Remaining Life <= 10%
Bad	Red	 Remaining Life < Threshold value (Vendor Define)
Unknown	Gray

Again, there is no standard for SMART attributes so these are dependent upon how the vendors use them.

Some vendors provide more meaningful attributes built-in, others such as Samsung not so much. For example if you have a Micron or SandForce those attribute values should be fairly accurate as to the life remaining for the usable NAND capacity.

Samsung is hit or miss dependent upon the model if they have a built-in attribute that shows "SSD Life Left" or not. Many of their SSDs will just provide the attributes which you'd need to be able to calculate such a value. For Samsung SSDs CDI just uses "0xB4, Unused Reserved Block Count (Total) / Used Reserved Block Count (Total)" which is to say the amount of Available cells in the Spare Area / the number of Used cells in the Spare Area. That doesn't really indicate anything as to the health of the rest of the "usable" NAND where your data is actually being stored; until your NAND starts to fail and more sectors are being reallocated. Given that most SSDs do some form of garbage collection and wear-leveling, this usually results in relatively even wear on all NAND cells across the usable NAND. As such imo it is kinda stupid to base the overall health of the SSD on a ratio of how much of the Spare area has been used since with wear-leveling, once you've reached a point where your NAND starts to be reallocated to spare area most of your NAND is worn out and will rapidly fail.

I checked on my 970 Evo when I got home and it doesn't have a direct attribute. I was thinking of my Corsair SSD which uses SMART attribute 209 for the % Life Left. For the 970 Evo I'd need to calculate it using the attributes I noted before (177 = Wear Leveling Count, raw value is the number of Program Erase cycles (P/E); and 241 = Total LBAs Written (in bytes).)

Which SSD are you using @Illusion of Progress?

[Illusion of Progress]

Thanks for the information. Admittedly, a lot of it goes over my head, but my understanding is that my earlier intuition that the number shouldn't (necessarily) be taken for much was rather spot on.

And my current SSD is a 1 TB Western Digital Blue 3D SATA (not the NVMe SN550 or 570). I forget the exact model number but I'll try and find it later.

Edit: Oh wait, silly me. It was listed in my screenshot. I thought I might have to dig the box out or something to be sure I had the full, proper model.

Seems it's "WDC WDBNCE0010PNC".

[PopinFRESH]

It should be shown on most of their models as attribute 231 (0xE7)

0xE7	Life Left (SSDs) or Temperature

Indicates the approximate SSD life left, in terms of program/erase cycles or available reserved blocks. A normalized value of 100 represents a new drive, with a threshold value at 10 indicating a need for replacement. A value of 0 may mean that the drive is operating in read-only mode to allow data recovery.
Previously (pre-2010) occasionally used for Drive Temperature (more typically reported at 0xC2).