How many years do SSD's last under normal conds?

[Gurd99]

From all the reading they are judged by how often you write to them, but for a OS drive this would be tiny. So I would like to know if they can easily last 10-15years? Even if it too early to tell, would this kind of life be expected?

[johns0]

No one knows how long since they have been out for just a few years,maybe 5-50 years.

[fritzi93]

Who can say? I've used them as OS drives in my two desktop PCs for at least 3 years now.
One has been no problem. The other gets corrupted every so often (every 8-9 months or so) and I have to do a backup image restore.
I discover the file corruption when I run system file checker.
I've read that power outages can cause corruption. Which I get from time to time when squirrels fry themselves on the transformer, ha.
But since one gets corrupted and the other doesn't, maybe the firmware is the culprit.
I tried to upgrade the firmware on that OCZ Vertex drive, but no go. Their forums indicate the drive was odd that way.

I should think more recently manufactured drives should be mostly trouble free.

[jagabo]

For typical desktop computer usage they should last for many years:

http://techreport.com/review/24841/introducing-the-ssd-endurance-experiment

Be sure to see all the followup links at the end.

Keep in mind that the average doesn't apply to the individual (and vice versa). The drive you buy might die the next day.

[SameSelf]

Who cares how long an OS-purposed ssd lasts? It's not like there is any critical data on it. If it fails, just pop in a new one and reload the image. SSD's may not be cheap as spinning rust, but they don't break the bank either and the new drive will assuredly be bigger and faster than the old fart in your 'puter anyway. I keep wishing my four-year-old, slow-as-molasses, tiny, and cramped ssd would kick the bucket. It would give me an excuse to buy a fat and zippy new one.

[Krispy Kritter]

They aren't rated by time, they are rated by the amount of reads/writes. So it will vary from user to user based on how much it's used. For reference, I use my PC daily for several hours and currently have 4+ years on the OS SSD.

[johns0]

Your wrong about time,all devices wear out through time by how often they are used and not used by chaotic deconstruction.

[Krispy Kritter]

Your wrong about time,all devices wear out through time by how often they are used .

Obviously it takes "time" for things to wear out, but SSD's aren't rated by time. They are rated by usage (ie: reads and writes). Or as you stated, "how often they are used".

Traditional mechanical drives are rated by time (ie: hours powered on) as whenever they have power, they are spinning. SSD's don't function that way. The only activity an SSD sees is when it's being used, regardless of how long it has power.

[hogger129]

There is no way to tell. They're rated for read/write cycles. If you are just running your OS off of it, and not reading/writing heaps of data to it all the time, it should last quite awhile, longer than an HDD.

[glenpinn]

I keep wishing my four-year-old, slow-as-molasses, tiny, and cramped ssd would kick the bucket. It would give me an excuse to buy a fat and zippy new one.

I don't get this sort of comment, if you claim that SSD's are not really that costly, why are you holding out till your old one dies first, that just defies logic in my opinion, if you can afford another one now, just go buy it.

As far as "who cares if they die" goes, well i hate to be the barer of bad news, but i have had 3 laptops bought to me this year that had a failed 120gb or 240gb SSD in it, and they lost all their files because of it, yes their own fault in a way for not doing regular backups to usb, although 2 of them had backed up their files a few months prior, so didn't lose everything, the 3rd one lost the lot.

Even worse with mechanical Hard drives, but some times i got lucky if the hdd became faulty i have been able to recover files from them before they crashed completely, not sure about a failing SSD, how one goes getting data off one.

[roma_turok]

On my SSD estimated 7 years:



but its probably more time
anyway on first significantly price drop
I gonna upgrade to 500gb or 1tb model

[Krispy Kritter]

On my SSD estimated 7 years:


[Attachment 34646 - Click to enlarge]

but its probably more time
anyway on first significantly price drop
I gonna upgrade to 500gb or 1tb model

What do you consider "significant"? My first SSD was a 120GB and I paid about $100 on sale. I've seen a 480GB on sale this weekend for $110, a 1TB for $240.

[Poppa_Meth]

Stick with a Samsung Evo or even a Pro if you can swing it. They are very reliable drives and endurance tests show them to be some of the best SSDs out there at the moment.

[roma_turok]

What do you consider "significant"? My first SSD was a 120GB and I paid about $100 on sale. I've seen a 480GB on sale this weekend for $110, a 1TB for $240.

Speed also important to me
this prices not on Top models
besides that prices on my location always 30%-40% higher from US