How to do a low level format of my Intel 330 180GB SSD?

[Muse]

It suggests (says!) at the beginning of this Intel page that since I'm getting freezes in Windows I should do a low level format of my Intel 330 180GB SSD. It suggests 3 free tools to do so:

HDAT2
Killdisk
Dban

I'm finding this stuff thick. Running Dban I see ~1/2 a dozen ways to run it but am given no clue which suits my purpose (there's no mention of low level formatting), just the brief names of the methods.

I infer from Intel's shunting the user off to those utilities that its own "Secure Erase" functionality is not tantamount to a low level format.

My SSD was bought Nov. 23, 2012 and so is very close to reaching the limit of its 3 year warranty. I want to determine now if I can fix things or want to seek RMA relief.

How can I low level format the SSD in preparation for restoring the image of its contents or doing a fresh install of Windows if that doesn't work?

 

[Insert_Nickname]

No one other then drive manufacturers has been able to do a real low level format in, what, 20 years?

I suspect they mean the drive has to be reset to factory default. You can do that by just removing all the partitions with Windows own Logical Disk Manager. Or Linux's Gparted. Then just install Windows normally.

You can't do this on a system disk of course, so you'll have to connect it to another machine or use a Linux boot disk. A secure erase afterwards properly wont go amiss.

 

[LTC8K6]

I did see this from HDDGURU:

http://hddguru.com/software/HDD-LLF-Low-Level-Format-Tool/

 

[Coup27]

The only user available way to return an SSD back to "factory default" is to use secure erase. If you use any other tool you are likely to break it.

 

[LTC8K6]

The only user available way to return an SSD back to "factory default" is to use secure erase. If you use any other tool you are likely to break it.

If Intel is telling you to do it, it's probably okay to do it.

 

[VirtualLarry]

If Intel is telling you to do it, it's probably okay to do it.

Or they're written by clueless low-level reps.

OP: Secure Erase it. There is no such thing as a low-level format for SSDs. And writing zeros the entire drive, will: 1) wear it out more, unnecessarily, and 2) not reset the mapping table, if it's corrupted somehow. Only a Secure Erase will.

 

[Muse]

Well, the scene for Low Level Format of an Intel 330 180GB SSD is confusing as hell. The 3 freebies Intel linked (probably without knowing what the hell they were doing) looked like a dead end. I was not willing to slog into/through them. Instead, I followed the directions of this site (which, compared to the many others I checked out comes off as eminently sane, reasonable, clear and thorough): securely-erase-ssd-without-destroying it, and ran Parted Magic from a bootable CD, erased the thing. I then partitioned the SSD using Windows on another machine and restored the image I made Oct. 25. I got one iaStor disk timeout a few minutes after booting Windows, haven't gotten another since. Will see how things go. I have images of the system from May, and a couple of very early images from May and April of 2014 shortly after installing Win7. I could try any of those or I could do a fresh install.

After restoring yesterday I had to do a Repair using the install disk. Something was bungled. I was nervous because Acronis assigned the wrong drive letters, maybe the issue was involved with that (C was D, D was E). Well, a repair sorted the problem(s) out.

Parted Magic looks super impressive!

From the link above, the detailed instructions I followed are these, although I burned a CD from the Parted Magic ISO instead of creating a bootable flash drive:



Download Parted Magic and create a mountable USB drive using Unetbootin.
Boot the drive and choose option 1, Default Settings.
Once booted head to Start (bottom left) > System Tools > Erase Disk.
Choose the “Internal:Secure Erase command writes zeroes to entire data area” option, then confirm the drive you want to erase on the next screen.
If you are told your drive is “frozen”, you will need to click the Sleep button and repeat this process until you can proceed further. If your drive indicates a password requirement, leave the password as “NULL”.
Confirm that you have read and understand the risks, hit Yes to erase your drive.

The erase process takes a matter of seconds, then you’re done.
- - - -
I do not know if I unnecessarily wrote zeros to all the cells of the drive shortening its life. It was called a secure erase.

Parted Magic estimated the process would take ~4 minutes. The actual time that elapsed was ~70 seconds.

 

[Coup27]

Using Parted Magic wouldn't be necessary if Intel would make a bootable secure erase utility. Still cannot believe they haven't.

You haven't wrote zero's, you have just performed a secure erase. When I secure erase an Intel drive using the toolbox it takes about 60 seconds as well.

 

[Muse]

Using Parted Magic wouldn't be necessary if Intel would make a bootable secure erase utility. Still cannot believe they haven't.

You haven't wrote zero's, you have just performed a secure erase. When I secure erase an Intel drive using the toolbox it takes about 60 seconds as well.

I tried doing a secure erase using the Toolbox but it said the drive was frozen. I didn't try super hard but couldn't get it unfrozen so I just used Parted Magic instead. It also said the drive was frozen using Parted Magic, but it had a "Sleep" button and I pushed it just like the instructions at the site I linked said to do:

you will need to click the Sleep button

... and then I got past the "frozen" problem. Then I needed to put in the password, and as suggested the default "Null" password got me past that issue. All and all I was extremely impressed with Parted Magic. What you get when you boot from it looks like a full blown OS!

 

[VirtualLarry]

What you get when you boot from it looks like a full blown OS!

It's probably using Linux.

 

[Muse]

It's probably using Linux.

Yeah, it's open source, so AFAIK that almost dictates that it is Linux.

Well, I did this, what, 2+ days ago now, and the only iaStor data drive timeout occurred about 4 minutes after initial boot. None since, that's a vast improvement. I'm holding out hope that the SSD is not in fact bad. Intel recommends in the Intel SSD Toolbox to set up the trim Optimiser to run scheduled weekly. I have it set up to run daily!