Intel SSD Reliability

[idata]

This is a note to address several articles I have come across lately that state intel's reputation for quality and reliability in the SSD market as if it is a given. These comments are from my personal experience with intel's drives. I have owned 3 intel solid state drives, one X25-M G1, and two X25-M G2's. The X25-M G1 failed after 2 years while one of the G2 drives failed after 2.5 years. Now, I am not an expert on MTBF and reliability, but in my opinion this is a pretty poor track record. It is entirely possible that this is a coinicidence, however both drives failed in the same manner, from the same problem (determined by a third party data recovery specialist): Bad NAND flash.

As best I understand it as it was descibed by the company that analyzed these failed drives, a block of NAND flash either went bad or became inaccessible by the controller rendering the drives useless and unable to be accessed by normal means of hooking it up to a SATA or USB port. Two drives, different NAND (50 nm for the G1 and 34 nm for the G2), same failure mode.

Once again, this is not definitive, just my observations but to me, I think review sites need to be a little more cautious about how they qualify intel's reputation for quality and reliability because from my perspective, intel has neither and I have since began using crucial SSD's. Hopefully, I will see much longer life from these new drives.

I am also very disappointed with intel's supposed 3 year manufacturer's warranty. With the X25-M G2 drive that failed, it had been 2.5 years and since I had the G1 drive replaced under the limited warranty, I thought the second would also be covered. When I called intel and gave them the drives identification number they said "they could not pull it up in the system" and thus could not replace it. I asked what they meant by not being able to pull it up and they said they could only replace retail drives, not OEM drives. To me, if you manufacture a product, and then stamp your name on it as intel does, you should stand by your product regardless of whether it is for the retail channel or the oem channel. So my final message to intel is this: If you want to boast about your reputation for quality and reliability, then have the guts to stand by your product and make it right for the consumer when there is a problem. As far as I am concerned, you will not get the opportunity to leave this consumer out in the cold ever again.

[idata]

I owned a 320 SSD that failed three times in six months with the infamous 8 MB bug.

The drive was advertised with the slogan "world class reliability".

From where I'm coming from, Intel SSD reliability is a myth, backed by top marketing dollars only.