SPCR

Samsung released their firmware fix and restoration tool for the bug that caused slow reads for older data. You can read about it at Anandtech, Techreport and others. I updated my 240GB Evo this afternoon. The firmware update was a quick push-the-button-now-done-and-restart. The restoration process took about 45 minutes.

I benchmarked the before and after results with AS SSD and SSD Read Speed Tester.

Before: After: AS SSD doesn't report much in the way of read improvements, but it does show a big bump in write speeds. The SSD Read Speed Tester does a deep dive into the files and does show an immense difference in before and after results.

For comparison, here's the MX100 256GB in the same system.

thanks Steve!

did anyone even notice a hit in performance, with this bug, or just in benchmark results?

My boot time had been slowly degrading - I figured it was the usual Windows cruft building up. Now, I'm back to 11-12 sec from pushing the button to Windows password screen. Those are mostly aged files being read. So, the fix had a noticable impact.

CA_Steve wrote:My boot time had been slowly degrading - I figured it was the usual Windows cruft building up. Now, I'm back to 11-12 sec from pushing the button to Windows password screen. Those are mostly aged files being read. So, the fix had a noticable impact.

I will have to agree. after updating firmware, windows starts like I forgot it could! (Probably because I mostly use sleep, and only reboot occasionally..)

I'm wondering what do i have to do.... 2x msata 840 Evo in raid 0.

1) Break the array and format with windows fresh install and run the firmware.

2) Get an msata adapter and run it on a desktop, i can secure erase on my asus, and then just install both ssds again and re do the raid, reformart fresh, but i have my doubts as it seems its not just the firmware but a process after that takes some time.

I'm still not sure what route would end up better.. or if there another one better.

You have to break the array to do the update / restoration process and I think it's limited to Windows atm. What about:
- backup the data and erase the disks.
- pull the SSDs and use the mSATA adapter to run the update/restoration process. The restoration process took me 40min with 110GB on the drive. Maybe it'll be shorter with empty drives. <shrug>
- Rebuild the raid and restore the data.

CA_Steve wrote:The restoration process took me 40min with 110GB on the drive. Maybe it'll be shorter with empty drives. <shrug>

That's probably correct because I have about 20GB and it took me 20 min on my Samsung 840 EVO 120GB. The latter part of the restoration seemed like the software just re-writing over the existing data.

Does the new firmware actually solve the problem in the long run?

bastiaan wrote:Does the new firmware actually solve the problem in the long run?

I guess we will know in about 6 months. (but considering i didn't notice the first time, i probably wont a 2nd time...)

Techreport:

Given how the bug manifests, we won't know if the EVO is truly fixed until at least a month from now, when freshly written data will be old enough to exhibit slower read performance. Samsung is confident that the problem has been addressed, though, and the company has updated its validation procedures to look for similar issues in future products.

Seems the bug is not fully fixed =(

Some 840 EVOs still vulnerable to read speed slowdowns

Any serious info about the (Toshiba-made?) OCZ Arc 100 reliability? It could be a worthwhile competitor of those EVOs, price-wise.

Second attempt coming in March.

While we continue to look into the issue, Samsung will release an updated version of the Samsung SSD Magician software in March that will include a performance restoration tool.

That does't make sense with me. Why issue an update while you're still debugging the issue? Maybe that's just the language barrier talking.

My take is that they don't know of a permanent fix, yet. But, the restoration tool works in the short term. So, they're including in the Magician Toolbox so we can push the button whenever things get slow.

Has anyone had a chance to play around with the latest fix?

http://www.anandtech.com/show/9196/sams ... 40-evo-fix

Not yet.

saw it when it dropped. downloaded it and updated magician, but didnt have time to run the iso yet...

Will be doing that soon-ish, maybe this week or next.

Here's my before and after for the new restoration tool.

Very impressive! And should be permanent this time. Thanks for posting.

Eunos wrote:Very impressive! And should be permanent this time. Thanks for posting.

well not exactly permanent, but it now has an auto rerun in the background. not really a fix per say, but more of a work around.