SSD Write Endurance 25nm Vs 34nm

[Christopher]

The 830 is supposed to be using 3K PE flash, but MWI was based on more like 3.6K.

[B.A.T]

Todays update:

m4
951.7772 TiB
4006 hours
Avg speed 74.35 MiB/s.
AD gone from 69 to 66.
P/E 16394.
MD5 OK.
Reallocated sectors : 00


Intel X25-M G1 80GB
655.58 TiB
23318 hours
Reallocated sectors : 162
Available Reserved space: 90
MWI=124
MD5 =OK
42.79 MiB/s on avg


Intel X25-E 64GB
131.75 TiB
405-30=375 hours
Reallocated sectors : 0
Available Reserved space: 100
MWI=99
MD5 =OK
101.07 MiB/s on avg

[Ao1]

The 830 is supposed to be using 3K PE flash, but MWI was based on more like 3.6K.

There are a lot of assumptions with the Samsung due to a lack of proper SMART info and info on the NAND. The X25-V is a bit easier:

X25-V
MWI 1 @ 187,627 GB
40 *5000 = 200,000 GB
WA & WL = ~ 1.06

[Ao1]

Here is a quick summary of drives with good SMART info. I’m going to guess that the P/E count for the Chronus was 3K not 5K giving a WA factor of 0.85, which seems more logical considering 46% compression was used.

M4 64 GB (25nm) = 176,128 – 64*3000 = 320000/ = 1.09 (or 1.8 with 5K P/E)
Intel X25-M G1 80 GB (50nm) = 150,528 – 80*10,000 = 800000/150528 = 5.31 (No TRIM)
Intel 320 40 GB 25nm = 194,560 - 40*5000 = 200,000/ 194,560 = 1.03
C300 64 GB (34nm) = 301,056 - 64*5000 = 320,000/301056 = 1.06
Chronos 60 GB (32nm) = 218,112 – 60*5000 = 300000/218112 = 1.37 (or 0.85 with 3K P/E) (46% compression)
Intel 520 60 GB = 429056– 60*5000 = 300000/429056= 0.69 (46% compression)
Intel X25-V 40GB = 187,627 – 40*5000 = 200000/187,627 = 1.06


Edit:

WA for the Intel 320 is slightly lower than the X25-V as expected, but getting any lower without compression must be close to impossible, so as 1,000s of P/E cycles disappear with every reduction in NAND geometry there is no way of avoiding a reduced life span.

[Anvil]

Intel 330 120GB

40.72TB Host writes
Reallocated sectors : 05 0
Available Reserved Space : E8 100
MWI 97
[F1] Total LBAs Written 1334448
[F2] Total LBAs Read 22623 // no movement
[F9] Total NAND Writes 29400GB
POH 106
MD5 OK

122.48MiB/s on avg (~33 hours)




--

Kingston SSDNow 40GB (X25-V)

988.64TB Host writes
Reallocated sectors : 05 46
Available Reserved Space : E8 99
POH 8854
MD5 OK

34.30MiB/s on avg (~33 hours)

--

Endurance_cr_20120527.png

[Christopher]

The SMART info on my 830 is fine. WLC works like it should, incrementing every 230GB, which was almost exactly 4x the 64GB Turbos. I believe it hit MWI 1 at 3620PE cycles. In any event, it's not 5K.

Assuming perfect wear leveling, PE count should increase every 256GB. It doesn't have perfect WL, so we can go by PE count (which has been the paragon of consistency this time around) 256/230 = 1.113

3600 * 256GB = 921,600

921,600 / 1.113 = 828,032GiB


I'm not really sure where I'm going with this, but ~1.1 is really where most decent drives should be (that aren't SF, but I suspect you might include them as well) with TRIM and whatnot.

The 830 is not suffering from 1.5xx WLE/WA no matter what.

[Anvil]

The thing is that some of the firmware-enhancements may have altered and bettered both WA and WL.
Some of the drives have had the fw updated multiple times during the test, that leaves some uncertainty about how the drive could have performed if it was using the later/best fw since day 1.
Well, I'm going to update to the latest fw when/if it shows up, as would I in real life.

Anyways, it is interesting seeing what the figures look like as they should be close.

[Christopher]

The 01FW for the 830 is a sack full of pain where WA is concerned. I think the V4s WA got markedly worse with 1.4FW. Most drives don't get that much of a bump one way or the other, and it's hard to know what's going to happen before you flash.

I know that the M3P's GC got tweaked on 1.03 FW, but I didn't see much difference. I did a lot of IOmeter and power consumption testing for several hours before puttin the M3P to work.

[[XC] Oj101]

1.5 PB?!! That Samsung's doing great

Congrats on becoming a mod Anvil, when did that happen?

[canthearu]

The Torqx 2 had its first bad block at approximately 40600 GiB, with 1677 average NAND cycles, 2539 max NAND cycles.

The Vertex 4 had its first bad block at 294.27 TiB Host writes.

If you have an octane/petrol or vertex 4 and your drive gets a bad block, you better have a backup!

[Anvil]

The Kingston (X25-V) had reallocation's (1) from the get-go.

I'm sending a list of all reallocation's to Ao1. (until SmartLog was introduced)

[canthearu]

Edit:

WA for the Intel 320 is slightly lower than the X25-V as expected, but getting any lower without compression must be close to impossible, so as 1,000s of P/E cycles disappear with every reduction in NAND geometry there is no way of avoiding a reduced life span.

Yes there is, multiple techniques:

a) More ECC, so the wearing effect is less apparent and takes longer to degrade the capacity of an NAND cell to hold data.
b) Gentle programming/erase techniques. Not entirely sure if this is possible, but multiple companies claim to be doing stuff like this ... it will trickle down to consumer SSDs as needed.
c) Larger capacity SSDs. As lithography shrinks, capacity of drives will increase with mostly offsets the reduction in endurance. It is nice to dream of a 512gig drive in 50nm NAND, but outside of the odd deal, no normal person can afford it.

[Ao1]

EEC deals with correctable errors and as NAND geometry shrinks, instances of correctable errors increase exponentially. A correctable error does not necessarily mean the NAND cell is on its way out. Any improvements that may be available in the future have to be offset by the continuing growth of page sizes as geometries shrink. I really can’t see anything that is going to reduce WA below what it is already (without compression), especially if page file sizes continue to grow, but then again I’m not a NAND engineer.

[canthearu]

EEC deals with correctable errors and as NAND geometry shrinks, instances of correctable errors increase exponentially. A correctable error does not necessarily mean the NAND cell is on its way out. Any improvements that may be available in the future have to be offset by the continuing growth of page sizes as geometries shrink. I really can’t see anything that is going to reduce WA below what it is already (without compression), especially if page file sizes continue to grow, but then again I’m not a NAND engineer.

Error rate also increases as the NAND becomes more worn. Having stronger ECC means you can apply more wear to the NAND cells before they become too damaged to reliably correct. This is one of the keys ideas behind Intel's HET-NAND.

Bad/weak block identification also seems to be an important key to SSD long life. Intel's own controller seems to have this spot on, while I'm more skeptical of the crucial and sandforce drives. The everest (and everest 2) controllers probably need more work, something seems a bit iffy about how bad blocks occur on octane and vertex 4 drives.

I agree that WA doesn't really any room to improve anymore ... although working block dedup could certainly improve it a bit more.

[Christopher]

I've actually moved the two drives out of the endurance rig and into my main desktop. I want to see what happens over the next week, as I noticed that the drives seem to be not in-considerably faster.

After 21 hours, the M3P is at 270MB/s and the 830 is at 303MB/s. I'm probably hallucinating, but I feel like there is something preventing the drives from running quite as fast as they should. Both rigs are on 10.6.1002, one H67 and Z68.

Perhaps I imagined it, but we'll see.

[canthearu]

Both rigs are on 10.6.1002, one H67 and Z68.

I am using 11.1.0.1006 on my Z77. Seems to be working pretty well.

Could power management be a factor.

Maybe you are wearing out the SATA cables with all the transferred data

[Christopher]

I am using 11.1.0.1006 on my Z77. Seems to be working pretty well.

Could power management be a factor.

Maybe you are wearing out the SATA cables with all the transferred data

Maybe all those PB of host traffic are wearing out the PCH... but no, I don't think so. Not sure what it is, but when I was doing preliminary testing I would use my desktop, and it would be around 270 avg for the M3P. I'd put it in the e-rig, and it would do 240ish MB/s. Both seem to be doing much better, but it will be a few days before I know for certain.

[Christopher]

Plextor M3P 128GB Day 1

27,386.66 GiB
26.74 TiB

269.65 MB/s Average

25 Hours

Rellocated Event Count 0
--------------------------------------------

Samsung 830 256GB Day 70

1,683,657.62 GiB
1,644.20 TiB

304.48 MB/s Average
1667 Hours

7260 Wear Leveling Count
MWI 1

6/0 Erase/Program Fail
Used Reserved Block Count: 12/24572 sectors

--------------------------------------------

The M3P is doing 269MB/s avg after 25 hours, the 830 is doing a staggering 304MB/s. We'll see where they settle.

[Anvil]

Are the rigs set up differenty?
(drivers, AV scanning, ...)

The speed of the M3P almost looks too good to be true, how many days will it last based on that speed. (based on i.e 3K P/E cycles)

[Christopher]

Are the rigs set up differenty?
(drivers, AV scanning, ...)

The speed of the M3P almost looks too good to be true, how many days will it last based on that speed. (based on i.e 3K P/E cycles)

The rigs are very similar, neither has AV or anything like that -- especially the endurance rig, which is about as stripped down as a Win7x64 install can get. The instantaneous speeds are higher, not just the average.

The M3P 128GB is a fantastic drive. Having 32 dice helps. It maxes out at 350MB/s writes at just about every transfer size.





I think the 128GB 830 would be almost as fast, but the 830 is a little more inconsistent. The M3P does 322MB/s through the entire loop just about.

The two drives could be fast enough that other factors are coming into play with regards to speed. At 269.73MB/s avg, you'll get 22,758GiB a day.Each day the drive will use about 197 PE cycles based on 1.1 WA

[Anvil]

Intel 330 120GB

46.92TB Host writes
Reallocated sectors : 05 0
Available Reserved Space : E8 100
MWI 96
[F1] Total LBAs Written 1537505
[F2] Total LBAs Read 22623 // no movement
[F9] Total NAND Writes 33879GB
POH 144
MD5 OK

122.66MiB/s on avg (~48 hours)

--

Kingston SSDNow 40GB (X25-V)

990.32TB Host writes
Reallocated sectors : 05 46
Available Reserved Space : E8 99
POH 8869
MD5 OK

33.99MiB/s on avg (~48 hours)

[B.A.T]

Todays update:

m4
957.0306 TiB
4027 hours
Avg speed 74.35 MiB/s.
AD gone from 66 to 63.
P/E 16483.
MD5 OK.
Reallocated sectors : 00


Intel X25-M G1 80GB
658.64 TiB
23339 hours
Reallocated sectors : 162
Available Reserved space: 90
MWI=124
MD5 =OK
42.82MiB/s on avg


Intel X25-E 64GB
138.93 TiB
426-30=396 hours
Reallocated sectors : 0
Available Reserved space: 100
MWI=99
MD5 =OK
101.07 MiB/s on avg

[canthearu]

Intel 520 60GB - Day 95

Drive hours: 2,227
ASU GiB written: 705,925.67 GiB (689.38 TiB)
Avg MB/s: 93.40 MB/s
MD5: OK

Host GB written (F1): 710,944.63 GiB (694.28 TiB, 22750228 raw)
NAND writes (F9): 503,298 GiB (491.50 TiB)

Reallocated sectors (05): 0
Failure count (AB, AC): 0 program, 0 erase
Raw Error Rate (8B): 100 normalised
Avaliable Reserved Space (AA): 100 normalised
Media Wearout Indicator (E9): 1

[Christopher]

Avg speed on the 830 is down 2%, M3P is up by 1%.

After 37 hours, it's just about blown through 10% of the PE cycles! Exciting.

I wish the MWI implementation on the Plextor wasn't so damn lazy.

[Anvil]

I haven't gotten to test mine yet, I've updated the firmware so they are ready.

Have you got a recent screenshot showing the M3Ps SMART status/values?