2-year-old EVO 840: First time to BORK an SSD

[BonzaiDuck]

[Freakin' . . Parted Magic . . . and it's sparsely-directed "Sleep" operation to Secure-Erase . . . ]

I thought something was "wrong," so I reset the computer and borked the drive.

I heard from the beginning the Samsung warranty-support was like Jack Torrance trying to get out of the maze in the bitter-cold ending of "The Shining." In other words . . . a horror story.

Any tips for getting this on track? Or should I just write it off? After all -- I should've used "Magician" to do the job. And now that I've spilled the beans here, I could get caught in a lie about it. How do I explain that Parted Magic feature, when Magician doesn't do it that way? Should I tell them I was abducted by aliens who took my 840 and jammed it up my keester?

Shit. And that fits the train of thought . . . too . . .

 

[VirtualLarry]

If you know what password was used to "lock" the drive, in preparation for "Secure Erase", then you may be able to continue the process manually, using a Linux Live distro (DVD or USB), using "sudo hdparm".

"sudo hdparm -I /dev/sda" will show you the info for the first ATA/SATA HDD/SSD. If it shows "locked" somehow, then try "sudo hdparm --user-master u --secure-erase PASSWORD /dev/sda".

If your drive is not "/dev/sda", then substitute appropriately.

 

[BonzaiDuck]

If you know what password was used to "lock" the drive, in preparation for "Secure Erase", then you may be able to continue the process manually, using a Linux Live distro (DVD or USB), using "sudo hdparm".

"sudo hdparm -I /dev/sda" will show you the info for the first ATA/SATA HDD/SSD. If it shows "locked" somehow, then try "sudo hdparm --user-master u --secure-erase PASSWORD /dev/sda".

If your drive is not "/dev/sda", then substitute appropriately.

I'll set this aside for something to try before I hook up an alternate SSD to the 2012 R2 server I'm building.

I could jump over to "Operating Systems" to ask the question. But maybe you have some idea. My current incarnation of Server 2008 R2 (WHS'11) is taking up 57GB on a 120GB SSD. 2012 R2 guidance says "minimum 32GB, add 5GB for the full GUI, and there's swapfile and hiberfil." For me and the new server, no need for either. So I'm wondering if a full install of 2012 R2 would consume at most 60 GB, because -- like the last starter-cartridge in the original "Flight of the Phoenix" -- it's all I have left (Elm Crest 510 120GB -- Secure-Erased and ready). All I have, unless I order another 250GB SSD.

I should probably pick up a couple NAS drives while I'm at it, but I figure I can configure everything but the final storage configuration using an SSD for the OS and a 1TB drive for the initial shared data setup.

I'm counting my pennies on this, but eager to move forward with the system build. And sure -- the outlays I'm looking at are chump-change, but this is all about stocks and flows and this month's auto-maintenance expenses.

Of course, people could say "That's what credit cards are for." July will be different on both the stocks and the flows.

Looking again, I don't think I have a clue about what password was used on that EVO, though.

 

[Braxos]

The 840 EVO has a key on the sticker to clear the ssd from any encryption/lock. Or am I mistaken and was the 850 EVO and above?

Sent from my SM-N910C using Tapatalk

 

[XavierMace]

I could jump over to "Operating Systems" to ask the question. But maybe you have some idea. My current incarnation of Server 2008 R2 (WHS'11) is taking up 57GB on a 120GB SSD. 2012 R2 guidance says "minimum 32GB, add 5GB for the full GUI, and there's swapfile and hiberfil." For me and the new server, no need for either. So I'm wondering if a full install of 2012 R2 would consume at most 60 GB, because -- like the last starter-cartridge in the original "Flight of the Phoenix" -- it's all I have left (Elm Crest 510 120GB -- Secure-Erased and ready). All I have, unless I order another 250GB SSD.

If you plan on running this box a long time, I wouldn't hold your breath on it. We're up to 80Gb as the minimum now at work for client C drives on non-app server systems. It was 40Gb 5 years ago, then 60Gb.

 

[Palorim12]

[Freakin' . . Parted Magic . . . and it's sparsely-directed "Sleep" operation to Secure-Erase . . . ]

I thought something was "wrong," so I reset the computer and borked the drive.

I heard from the beginning the Samsung warranty-support was like Jack Torrance trying to get out of the maze in the bitter-cold ending of "The Shining." In other words . . . a horror story.

Any tips for getting this on track? Or should I just write it off? After all -- I should've used "Magician" to do the job. And now that I've spilled the beans here, I could get caught in a lie about it. How do I explain that Parted Magic feature, when Magician doesn't do it that way? Should I tell them I was abducted by aliens who took my 840 and jammed it up my keester?

Shit. And that fits the train of thought . . . too . . .

The stories i've read about their issues warranty support usually sounded like the person was demanding something and got pissy when they didn't get their way.

I've been doing RMAs with them for my customers for several years now and as of January this year, Samsung does what they call "Repair First procedure". You send in the drive, they test and then attempt to repair the unit. So in your case, you attempted to Secure Erase, Encryption got enabled, so they would remove the encryption and factory reset the drive and send it back to you. and they cover shipping both ways using Next Day air UPS labels. Now, if for some reason they can't fix your unit, they send you a replacement. Now the same rules apply for the exchange as it did when they were doing exchanges before the switch to repair first, which is if the unit is within 90 days of purchase and you provide that proof of purchase, you get a new unit. Outside of that you get a re-certified unit. They don't do advanced replacement/cross shipment either, so i see that alot in complaints too, but i always say when i read those "Shoulda had a backup"

 

[BonzaiDuck]

The stories i've read about their issues warranty support usually sounded like the person was demanding something and got pissy when they didn't get their way.

I've been doing RMAs with them for my customers for several years now and as of January this year, Samsung does what they call "Repair First procedure". You send in the drive, they test and then attempt to repair the unit. So in your case, you attempted to Secure Erase, Encryption got enabled, so they would remove the encryption and factory reset the drive and send it back to you. and they cover shipping both ways using Next Day air UPS labels. Now, if for some reason they can't fix your unit, they send you a replacement. Now the same rules apply for the exchange as it did when they were doing exchanges before the switch to repair first, which is if the unit is within 90 days of purchase and you provide that proof of purchase, you get a new unit. Outside of that you get a re-certified unit. They don't do advanced replacement/cross shipment either, so i see that alot in complaints too, but i always say when i read those "Shoulda had a backup"

Thanks. It's not a problem of data loss. I had replaced the 840-EVO 250GB by cloning it to a 480GB ADATA SP550 with certain intentions and objectives. The drive has boot and system on it, with my basic accounts and software. That's why I was attempting to Secure Erase.

There's always some thread of suppressed underlying paranoia about this when I send a drive forward under RMA. But it wasn't my main computer: it was a gaming rig mostly.

I had just heard that getting through to Samsung support even for RMA was like running through a maze with no successful exit.