Samsung 990 Pro and 980 Pro SSD Failure Issue – Latest Update
The news of Samsung SSDs reporting declining health that was covered in our previous post HERE continues to roll on and in the two weeks since our initial article and video on this, several new updates have emerged on this, some good, some less good, an official response and increased clarity on some affected SSDs in the Samsung SSD Family. I would recommend checking out the previous article if you are not upto speed on this, but the story up till now is
Samsung SSD Firmware Failure Issue – The Story so far?
The previous article can be found HERE, but in that article from Feb 02/02/23 we highlighted:
- The first large-scale public recognition of Samsung SSDs suffering decreased drive health and failures was reported in China on the forum ChipHell
- Big US-based PC builder Puget Systems started seeing increased Samsung SSD health drops and drive fails from their customer base (predominantly using them as OS drives in custom PC/Workstation builds
- Samsung initially confirmed (in conjunction with Puget Systems input) that they are aware of the issue affecting drives with the firmware version 3B2QGXA7 and rolled out firmware updates for several affected SSDs
- Clearest Indications of Samsung Drives affected by this firmware/health-drop issue were observed using the disk maintenance tool CrystalDiskInfo, users began seeing the health of drives drop and increased values in 0E and 03 measurement IDs from within the program
- The full range of affected Samsung SSDs is still TBC, but the Samsung 990 Pro (Released Nov’22) and the Samsung 980 Pro (Released Sept ’20) are confirmed to be affected. Other SSDs in the 870/970 EVO, 970 EVO Plus and PM9A1 range have been highlighted, but no official statement or confirmation has been made.
- Firmware Updates were either already made available for the affected SSDs or are in the process of being rolled out via the Samsung Magician Tool
In the two weeks since then, the following updates have emerged (covered in more detail later in this article)
- A Samsung Official Support Forum team member confirmed that this issue was recognized, that a firmware update for the Samsung 990 Pro is (was! Feb 13th released) coming that would prevent the firmware health declining issue.
- Any impact of the firmware issue on the health of a Samsung SSD will not be reversed after the firmware update
- Samsung is asking affected users to contact them under their warranty/support for RMAs and discuss replacement
- Puget Systems has switched its use of Samsung 1TB and 2TB NVMe SSDs in their built customer systems over to Sabrent SSD equivalents (already using their 4TB and 8TB drives)
- Robbie Khan at Neowin highlighted that his attempts to get his 1-week old Firmware affected Samsung 990 Pro Repaired/replaced were met with decline, but has since been contacted by Samsung to reapply for replacement and/or replicate the issue
That’s where we are right now! Let’s dig a little deeper into those latest updates, how to check if you could be potentially affected and how to go about updating your firmware appropriately.
Samsung 990 Pro and 980 Pro SSD Firmware Failures – Official Responses
In the last two weeks we have seen increased coverage of the firmware issue that is affecting certainly SSDs (with the Samsung 990 Pro garnering the peak of the headlines, as this SSD was released in the closing stages of 2022, around 3-4 months ago). In response to increased queries that have been raised on the official Samsung support channels, one post was responded to by a Samsung support team member, specifically addressing the investigation that is happening internally regarding this firmware-related SSD health issue. Below is the original post on the official Samsung Community Support forum (source):
Hello everyone,
Samsung has been investigating customer inquiries about anomalies related to the SMART of the 990 PRO SSD. These anomalies were found to be caused by issues with the 990 PRO SSD’s firmware. Accordingly, a firmware update was released today, February 13, 2023, that fixes these anomalies. (SMART values are not restored to factory settings after firmware update. Actual SMART values of each SSD vary depending on user environment and usage conditions).
The update can be downloaded from Samsung Magician or here: https://semiconductor.samsung.com/consumer-storage/support/tools/
You can find our warranty conditions for the 990 PRO SSD at https://semiconductor.samsung.com/consumer-storage/support/warranty/.
Unfortunately, this update does not reverse the effects of drives that have already had the declined health displayed in the Magician tool and in SMART test results. “The S.M.A.R.T. values are not reset to factory defaults after updating the firmware,” DavidB added. “The actual S.M.A.R.T. values of each SSD will vary depending on user environment and usage conditions.”. Meanwhile, a spokesman for Samsung told Blocksandfiles in an article on Feb 2nd:
“Samsung Electronics stands behind the quality of our industry-leading SSDs, including the latest 990 Pro. We are aware of limited reports concerning this matter and are currently investigating these experiences, as user configurations vary.”
So far, at the time of writing, outside of quotes provided on 3rd party sites and their support forum team, there has not been a particularly loud public statement on this from Samsung themselves on their own news pages.
Samsung 990 Pro and 980 Pro SSD Firmware Failures – Replacement and RMAs?
Regarding options open to the affected Samsung 990 Pro (and other Samsung SSDs potentially affected by this), there were reports online of users trying to raise the issue under a warranty repair/replace RMA with the Samsung support team getting their requests rejected, stating no issues were found. One prominent users was Robbie Khan at Neowin, who wrote an article on his attempts to seek an RMA and replacement for his affected Samsung 990 Pro SSD, spotting early signs that his 2TB drive was showing telltale signs of the firmware-related health declining issue in SMART testing in both the Samsung Magician Tool and in CrystalDiskInfo accessing the SMART results onboard the drive, within a few days of buying the SSD. He stated “Within another day or so it had dropped to 98%, by this point I’d not even written 2TB to the drive. Fast forward a couple more days and the drive health was sitting at 95%”:
When raising this with Samsung, his RMA for the Samsung 990 Pro was declined. Samsung stated that the issue was not found on his drive, despite his own tests in Samsung Magician indicating otherwise and CrystalDiskInfo indicating drive health decreasing after just a week, with just under 5TB of data being written to the 2TB SSD in that time. Stating that if the issue persisted when the drive was received back, that he could resubmit new and clearer evidence of this. As you can imagine, Robbie Kahn was less than thrilled about this! See email response from Samsung below (once again, from the same Neowin article)
Since that original Samsung 990 Pro SSD RMA request, the Neowin article and Samsung beginning to address this issue on some of their own platforms (and quotes on 3rd party platforms), Samsung reached back out to Robbie Kahn to readdress this issue. Robbie states:
“Samsung’s RMA division, Hanaro, have reached out and offered to A) Replace this SSD, and B) Try to replicate the problem. Quite why both of these options were not on the table before the issue became public is a mystery. We still request that readers continue to share their 990 Pro drive health stats and what region of the world they are in so that a better overall picture can be drawn of what appears to be a potentially developing situation.” – Robbie Khan @ Neowin 23/01/23
So, not great overall and you can definitely appreciate why Robbie would be less than thrilled about the way this has been handled till now, as well as his motivation to address this issue on behalf of other affected users.
Samsung 990 Pro and 980 Pro SSD Firmware Failures – Puget Systems Switching to Sabrent?
Puget Systems was one of the first bigger western corporate platforms to address this issue (issuing a big news post on their platform on Jan 31st here in response to raised issues by their customer base on Samsung SSDs showing signs of rapid health drops. Samsung did reach out to them and work with them after these raised concerns. Since this original article, Puget Systems have issued a larger and more specific statement on their working relationship with Samsung for the time being. Original full Puget Systems updated statement on the Declining Samsung SSD Health Firmware Issue and it’s impact on their operations can be found HERE, but more specifically:
“For many years, Samsung solid-state drives (SSDs) were among the most reliable components in our workstations. We wrote about this and praised their incredibly low failure rates many times, but something changed in the last year. We started to see abnormally high failure rates in the field with one specific model: the Samsung 980 Pro 2TB. This was their highest capacity M.2 NVMe drive in that line, and the smaller 500GB and 1TB models seemed unaffected. We worked with Samsung on this for several months, and they recently provided a firmware update which they claim will address the issues our customers have been running into. However, the trouble didn’t end there. Late in 2022, Samsung launched a new line of M.2 SSDs with increased performance – the 990 Pro line. Even before we got the updated 980 Pro firmware, we had hoped that this new series would remedy the problems its predecessor had… but unfortunately, the opposite has happened. Despite initial positive reviews and good performance during our qualification process, numerous tech websites have now reported that Samsung’s 990 Pro drives are exhibiting rapid health degradation, with Samsung Magician software reporting a drop of around 1% endurance per week.
These drives are popular and commonly used as both the primary OS & application drive as well as high-speed storage for project files, so if the endurance (and thus lifespan) of the drives is indeed dropping at this rate it is very concerning. Samsung is investigating these reports, and we will continue to work with them to help arrive at a solution for both our customers and the public in general. In the meantime, we felt it was prudent to shift our product line to an alternative product while this situation unfolds and we learn more.” – 02/02/23 William George, Product Development @ Puget Systems
They state that until the issue is satisfactorily resolved for them, they will be switching their included 1TB and 2TB SSDs used in their built systems from Samsung 990 Pro and Samsung 980 Pro drives over to the Sabrent Rocket 4 Plus SSD series, stating:
“As such, we are transitioning our 1 and 2TB NVMe drives over to Sabrent. We’ve been using their larger 4 and 8TB capacity drives for some time, as Samsung has not yet offered any high-performance SSDs in those sizes, and we have had good experiences with them so far. Our smallest 500GB model will remain on Samsung’s 980 Pro, however, as that size is not available in the 990 Pro line and thus was not impacted by whatever is affecting those newer drives. We don’t often announce changes to our product line like this, as brands and models shift all the time, but because we have been so outspoken about Samsung SSD reliability in the past we felt that it was important to speak up in this particular situation.” – 02/02/23 William George, Product Development @ Puget Systems
Although this is one isolated company making a statement on their use of Samsung SSDs changing, it is still quite a significantly high-profile statement nonetheless.
How to Check if your Samsung SSD could be potentially affected by this Firmware issue?
Much like in my previous post on the Samsung SSD Firmware health-dropping issue, the scope of SSDs affected by this issue is a little hard to identify completely until we see an official confirmation by Samsung. SSDs can fail for a variety of reasons and although lots of users can raise concerns of SSD failure, there is a wide range of reasons that this could be the case. Only the Samsung 990 Pro and Samsung 980 Pro have been largely recognized as affected by this firmware issue (with new firmware updates issued via official sources), but sites that recognized this issue last year were keen to highlight that SSD Firmware is carried over quite alot between Samsung SSD ranges (as the Controller’s of most of Samsung SSDs are developed and manufactured in-house). Here is a table with the models and their affected firmware versions based on concerns by the website Chiphell in China:
| Model | Affected Firmware Versions |
|---|---|
| Samsung PM9A1 | S63JNF0R / S63JNX0T / S64JNE0R / S65XNF0R / S675NF0R / S676NF0R / S676NX0R / S677NF0R / S6W7NF0R |
| Samsung 870 EVO | S5Y2NJ0N / S5Y2NJ0R / S5Y3NF0R / S5Y3NG0R / S621NG0R / S625NJ0R / S626NF0R / S626NJ0R / S62BNJ0R / S62CNF0R / S62CNJ0R / S6BANJ0R / S6BBNG0R / S6BCNG0R / S6BCNJ0R / S6PTNZ0R / S6PUNF0R |
| Samsung 970 EVO | S464NB0K / S465NF0K / S466NF0K / S466NX0K / S466NX0M / S5H7NS0N / S5H9NS0N / 3B2QEXM7 |
| Samsung 970 EVO PLUS | S6P7NG0R / S6P7NF0T / 2B2QEXM7 / 4B2QEXM7 |
| Samsung 980 | S649NF0R / S649NF1R / S649NG0R / S649NJ0R / S649NX0R / S64ANG0R / S64DNF0R |
| Samsung 980 PRO | S5GXNF0R / S5GXNF0T / S5GXNG0N / S5GYNX0R / S69ENF0R / S69ENG0R / S6B0NG0R / 3B2QGXA7 |
| Samsung 990 PRO | 0B2QJXD7 |
And this is the largely confirmed stated list of SSDs from Samsung vs affected SSDs, and their status (as of 15/02/23, only the Samsung 990 Pro and Samsung 980 Pro SSD are indicated):
This table was last updated on 15-02-23
| Model | Model Number | Capacity | Affected |
| Samsung SSD 990 PRO | MZ-V9P1T0B/AM | 1TB |
YES (use update 1B2QJXD7)
|
| Samsung SSD 990 PRO | MZ-V9P2T0B/AM | 2TB |
YES (use update 1B2QJXD7)
|
| Samsung SSD 980 | MZ-V8V250 | 250GB | NO |
| Samsung SSD 980 | MZ-V8V500 | 500GB | NO |
| Samsung SSD 980 | MZ-V8V1T0 | 1TB | NO |
| Samsung SSD 980 PRO | MZ-V8P250B/AM | 250GB |
YES (use update 5B2QGXA7)
|
| Samsung SSD 980 PRO | MZ-V8P500B/AM | 500GB |
YES (use update 5B2QGXA7)
|
| Samsung SSD 980 PRO | MZ-V8P1T0B/AM | 1TB |
YES (use update 5B2QGXA7)
|
| Samsung SSD 980 PRO | MZ-V8P2T0B/AM | 2TB |
YES (use update 5B2QGXA7)
|
| Samsung SSD 970 PRO | MZ-V7P1T0BW | 1TB | NO |
| Samsung SSD 970 PRO | MZ-V7P512BW | 512GB | NO |
| SSD 960 PRO | MZ-V6P512BW | 512GB | NO |
| SSD 960 PRO | MZ-V6P1T0BW | 1TB | NO |
| SSD 960 PRO | MZ-V6P2T0BW | 2TB | NO |
| Samsung 950 PRO | MZ-V5P256BW | 256GB | NO |
| Samsung 950 PRO | MZ-V5P512BW | 512GB | NO |
| Samsung SSD 970 EVO Plus | MZ-V7S250 | 250GB | NO |
| Samsung SSD 970 EVO Plus | MZ-V7S500 | 500GB | NO |
| Samsung SSD 970 EVO Plus | MZ-V7S1T0 | 1TB | NO |
| Samsung SSD 970 EVO Plus | MZ-V7S2T0 | 2TB | NO |
| Samsung 970 EVO | MZ-V7E250BW | 250GB | NO |
| Samsung 970 EVO | MZ-V7E500BW | 500GB | NO |
| Samsung 970 EVO | MZ-V7E1T0BW | 1TB | NO |
| Samsung 970 EVO | MZ-V7E2T0BW | 2TB | NO |
| Samsung 960 EVO | MZ-V6E250BW | 250GB | NO |
| Samsung 960 EVO | MZ-V6E500BW | 500GB | NO |
| Samsung 960 EVO | MZ-V6E1T0BW | 1TB | NO |
| Samsung SSD 870 EVO | MZ-77E250BW | 250GB | NO |
| Samsung SSD 870 EVO | MZ-77E500BW | 500GB | NO |
| Samsung SSD 870 EVO | MZ-77E1T0BW | 1TB | NO |
| Samsung SSD 870 EVO | MZ-77E2T0BW | 2TB | NO |
| Samsung SSD 870 EVO | MZ-77E4T0BW | 4TB | NO |
| Samsung PM961 | MZVLW128HEGR | 128GB | NO |
| Samsung PM961 | MZVLW256HEHP | 256GB | NO |
| Samsung PM961 | MZVLW512HMJP | 512GB | NO |
| Samsung PM961 | MZVLW1T0HMLH | 1TB | NO |
| Samsung PM981 | MZVLB256HAHQ | 256GB | NO |
| Samsung PM981 | MZVLB512HAJQ | 512GB | NO |
| Samsung PM981 | MZVLB1T0HALR | 1TB | NO |
| Samsung PM981 | MZVLB2T0HMLA | 2TB | NO |
| Samsung PM1725a | MZWLL1T6HEHP | 1.6TB | NO |
| Samsung PM1725a | MZWLL3T2HAJQ | 3.2TB | NO |
| Samsung PM1725b | MZPLL1T6HAJQ | 1.6TB | NO |
| Samsung PM1725b | MZPLL3T2HAJQ | 3.2TB | NO |
| Samsung PM1728 | MZWLL6T4HMLA | 6.4TB | NO |
| Samsung PM1733 | MZPLL960HEHP | 960GB | NO |
| Samsung PM1733 | MZPLL1T9HAJQ | 1.92TB | NO |
| Samsung PM1733 | MZPLL3T8HALS | 3.84TB | NO |
| Samsung PM1733 | MZPLL7T6HALA | 7.68TB | NO |
| Samsung PM1735 | MZWLJ1T6HALU | 1.6TB | NO |
| Samsung PM1735 | MZWLJ3T2HALU | 3.2TB | NO |
| Samsung PM1735 | MZWLJ6T4HALU | 6.4TB | NO |
| Samsung SM951 | MZHPV128HDGM | 128GB | NO |
| Samsung SM951 | MZHPV256HDGL | 256GB | NO |
| Samsung SM951 | MZHPV512HDGL | 512GB | NO |
| Samsung SM961 | MZVPV128HDGM | 128GB | NO |
| Samsung SM961 | MZVPV256HDGL | 256GB | NO |
| Samsung SM961 | MZVPV512HDGL | 512GB | NO |
| Samsung SM961 | MZVPV1T0HALR | 1TB | NO |
| Samsung SM963 | MZILS1T2HCHP | 1.2TB | NO |
| Samsung SM963 | MZILS3T8HMLA | 3.84TB | NO |
| Samsung XS1715 | MZILS800HEHP | 800GB | NO |
| Samsung XS1715 | MZILS1T6HEJF | 1.6TB | NO |
| Samsung XS1715 | MZILS3T2HMLA | 3.2TB | NO |
| Samsung XS1715 | MZILS6T4HALA | 6.4TB | NO |
| Samsung XS1715 2.5″ | MZILS400HEGR-00003 | 400GB | NO |
| Samsung XS1715 2.5″ | MZILS800HEHP-00003 | 800GB | NO |
| Samsung XS1715 2.5″ | MZILS1T6HEJF-00003 | 1.6TB | NO |
| Samsung XS1715 2.5″ | MZILS3T2HMLA-00003 | 3.2TB | NO |
| Samsung XS1715 AIC | MZILS400HEGR-00004 | 400GB | NO |
| Samsung XS1715 AIC | MZILS800HEHP-00004 | 800GB | NO |
| Samsung XS1715 AIC | MZILS1T6HEJF-00004 | 1.6TB | NO |
| Samsung XS1715 AIC | MZILS3T2HMLA-00004 | 3.2TB | NO |
| Samsung PM9A1 | MZQLB1T0HBLB | 1TB | NO |
| Samsung PM9A1 | MZQLB2T0HBLB | 2TB | NO |
| Samsung PM9A1 | MZQLB4T0HBLA | 4TB | NO |
| Samsung SSD-970 EVO NVMe | MZ-V7E250BW | 250GB | NO |
| Samsung SSD-970 EVO NVMe | MZ-V7E500BW | 500GB | NO |
| Samsung SSD-970 EVO NVMe | MZ-V7E1T0BW | 1TB (1,000GB*) | NO |
| Samsung SSD-970 EVO NVMe | MZ-V7E2T0BW | 2TB (2,000GB*) | NO |
| Samsung SSD-870 QVO SATA | MZ-77Q1T0BW | 1TB (1,000GB*) | NO |
| Samsung SSD-870 QVO SATA | MZ-77Q2T0BW | 2TB (2,000GB*) | NO |
| Samsung SSD-870 QVO SATA | MZ-77Q4T0BW | 4TB (4,000GB*) | NO |
| Samsung SSD-870 QVO SATA | MZ-77Q8T0BW | 8TB (8,000GB*) | NO |
| Samsung SSD-860 QVO SATA | MZ-76Q1T0BW | 1TB (1,000GB*) | NO |
| Samsung SSD-860 QVO SATA | MZ-76Q2T0BW | 2TB (2,000GB*) | NO |
| Samsung SSD-860 QVO SATA | MZ-76Q4T0BW | 4TB (4,000GB*) | NO |
| Samsung SSD-860 EVO SATA | MZ-76E250B | 250GB | NO |
| Samsung SSD-860 EVO SATA | MZ-76E500B | 500GB | NO |
| Samsung SSD-860 EVO SATA | MZ-76E1T0B | 1TB (1,000GB*) | NO |
| Samsung SSD-860 EVO SATA | MZ-76E2T0B | 2TB (2,000GB*) | NO |
| Samsung SSD-860 EVO SATA | MZ-76E4T0B | 4TB (4,000GB*) | NO |
| Samsung SSD-860 PRO SATA | MZ-76P256BW | 256GB | NO |
| Samsung SSD-860 PRO SATA | MZ-76P512BW | 512GB | NO |
| Samsung SSD-860 PRO SATA | MZ-76P1T0BW | 1TB (1,000GB*) | NO |
| Samsung SSD-860 PRO SATA | MZ-76P2T0BW | 2TB (2,000GB*) | NO |
| Samsung SSD-860 PRO SATA | MZ-76P4T0BW | 4TB (4,000GB*) | NO |
| Samsung SSD-850 EVO SATA | MZ-75E120B | 120GB | NO |
| Samsung SSD-850 EVO SATA | MZ-75E250B | 250GB | NO |
| Samsung SSD-850 EVO SATA | MZ-75E500B | 500GB | NO |
| Samsung SSD-850 EVO SATA | MZ-75E1T0B | 1TB | NO |
| Samsung SSD-850 EVO SATA | MZ-75E2T0B | 2TB | NO |
| Samsung SSD-850 PRO SATA | MZ-7KE128BW | 128GB | NO |
| Samsung SSD-850 PRO SATA | MZ-7KE256BW | 256GB | NO |
| Samsung SSD-850 PRO SATA | MZ-7KE512BW | 512GB | NO |
| Samsung SSD-850 PRO SATA | MZ-7KE1T0BW | 1TB | NO |
| Samsung SSD-840 EVO SATA | MZ-7TE120BW | 120GB | NO |
| Samsung SSD-840 EVO SATA | MZ-7TE250BW | 250GB | NO |
| Samsung SSD-840 EVO SATA | MZ-7TE500BW | 500GB | NO |
| Samsung SSD-840 EVO SATA | MZ-7TE750BW | 750GB | NO |
| Samsung SSD-840 EVO SATA | MZ-7TE1T0BW | 1TB | NO |
| Samsung SSD-840 PRO SATA | MZ-7PD128BW | 128GB | NO |
| Samsung SSD-840 PRO SATA | MZ-7PD256BW | 256GB | NO |
| Samsung SSD-840 PRO SATA | MZ-7PD512BW | 512GB | NO |
| Samsung SSD-840 SATA | MZ-7TD120BW | 120GB | NO |
| Samsung SSD-840 SATA | MZ-7TD250BW | 250GB | NO |
| Samsung SSD-840 SATA | MZ-7TD500BW | 500GB | NO |
| Samsung SSD-840 SATA | MZ-7TD1T0BW | 1TB | NO |
| Samsung SSD-830 SATA | MZ-7PC064B | 64GB | NO |
| Samsung SSD-830 SATA | MZ-7PC128B | 128GB | NO |
| Samsung SSD-830 SATA | MZ-7PC256B | 256GB | NO |
| Samsung 470 SATA SSD | MZ-5PA064 | 64GB | NO |
| Samsung 470 SATA SSD | MZ-5PA128 | 128GB | NO |
| Samsung 470 SATA SSD | MZ-5PA256 | 256GB | NO |
How to Update Your Samsung SSD Firmware via PC and via Synology & QNAP NAS
Here is a guide on how to update the firmware on your Samsung NVMe SSD via PC NVME slot:
- Download the latest firmware version: Go to the Samsung website and search for the latest firmware version available for your specific Samsung NVMe SSD model.
- Install Samsung SSD Magician software: The firmware update process can be performed using the Samsung SSD Magician software. Download and install this software from the Samsung website.
- Launch the Samsung SSD Magician software: Open the software and wait for it to detect your SSD.
- Check for firmware updates: Go to the “Firmware Update” tab in the software and click on “Check for Updates.” If a new firmware version is available, the software will prompt you to update.
- Start the firmware update: If a new firmware version is available, click on “Update Firmware.” Follow the on-screen instructions to complete the firmware update process.
- Wait for the firmware update to complete: The firmware update process may take several minutes. Do not turn off your computer or disconnect the SSD during this process.
- Verify the firmware update: Once the firmware update is complete, verify that the new firmware version is installed by going back to the “Firmware Update” tab in the Samsung SSD Magician software.
Note: Before updating the firmware, it is recommended to back up all important data stored on the SSD to ensure data safety during the firmware update process.
Updating the firmware on a Samsung NVMe SSD connected to a QNAP device can be done using the following steps:
- Connect to the QNAP device using SSH
- Download the firmware update package for the Samsung NVMe SSD from the Samsung website
- Copy the firmware update package to the QNAP device
- Run the following command to update the firmware: nvme update-firmware /dev/nvmeX -f /path/to/firmware.bin
Note: Replace “/dev/nvmeX” with the appropriate device identifier and “/path/to/firmware.bin” with the actual file path to the firmware update package.
It is important to follow the instructions carefully and backup any important data before updating the firmware as there is always a risk of data loss or failure during the update process.
Updating the firmware of a Samsung NVMe SSD via a Synology SSH command line involves several steps:
- Connect to your Synology NAS via SSH using a terminal or a SSH client like PuTTY.
- Determine the model and firmware version of your Samsung NVMe SSD. You can use the following command to get the details:
smartctl -i /dev/nvme0
- Download the latest firmware update for your Samsung NVMe SSD from the Samsung website.
- Copy the firmware update file to your Synology NAS.
- Check if the firmware update is compatible with your Synology NAS by following the instructions in the firmware update file.
- Stop all the running services on your Synology NAS using the following command:
/usr/syno/sbin/synoservice –stop all
- Run the firmware update for your Samsung NVMe SSD using the following command:
smartctl -n vendor,0 -f samsung,0xD3 /dev/nvme0 –attributes
- Monitor the progress of the firmware update by checking the output of the command.
- Once the firmware update is complete, restart the services on your Synology NAS using the following command:
/usr/syno/sbin/synoservice –start all
- Finally, confirm that the firmware update was successful by checking the firmware version using the following command:
smartctl -i /dev/nvme0
Note: This is just a general outline of the steps required to update the firmware of a Samsung NVMe SSD via Synology SSH command line. The exact commands and steps may vary depending on the Synology NAS model and firmware version.
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I kept waiting for you to be specific about what the problem actually is…there goes Godot, racing by
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I purchased a 980 pro with a production date of June 2023. Will it already have the firmware update installed as I only use it on PS5 and can’t check
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Holy icons batman… that desktop is maddening
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Dealing with this right now on my 990 pro, thank you for this video.
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Somewhat unrelated, but if you have an Intel 660p nvme that makes the os sluggish on heavy writing like installing a game, Download the solidigm drive tool to update the firmware (they now own intel ssd division). No damage in this case but the update totally wakes up the drive.
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at least they did not catch on fire like their washing machines did
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My 1TB Samsung PM9A1 bricked suddenly after 1 year of use. Terrible damage. Absolutely garbage hardware.
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My SSD970 EVO PLus 550gb Firmware 2B2QEXM7 just can’t get formatted. I’ve installed Windows in it, 3 times already, but now, It’s impossible. I had to buy another SSD (Sandisk this time). Every try, an error happens during Windows installation. I tried different windows and media. How could I fix this?
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Which production dates have the issue? I recently got the 2tb one no heatsink and it’s production date is 2024 05 21
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Any update in mid 2024? I is safe to buy now?
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Do the 980 Pro and 990 Pro NVMe drives still having the failure issues, or is that 100% fixed? Was thinking of getting one, but may go with WD.
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I use Samsung 990Pro 4TB and Crucial T705 2TB in an MS SQL server in my homelab for an project, then T705 is just rock solid without any issue, but the 990pro is very unstable even that Samsung Magician it is fine and newest firmware. What happens is when the 990pro is under high load for some times then the flash controller seems to go into panic mode that mean that 990pro drive disappears from Windows as an drive, then I have to reboot the server and the drive is not found by bios or Windows…. Then I wait for around half a day for the flash controller to complete it self-fixing/recovery function and then I can reboot the server and the drive magically reappear until is does it again.
sometimes there is days between other times it is weeks.
So based on what I see it very unstable drive with 1034 hours on time and 16,9TB write / 3,2PB Read (yes Petabyte… it is an busy SQL server)
I will like change the for an T705 4TB
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A 990 Pro 4TB bought today (can’t tell how long was It in stock but It Is on Amazon so i assume they refill stock with new ones often) Is to be considered with new firmware or can still have problems? I use It externally on USB enclosure and can t check on a direct m.2 slot.
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My sept2021 2tb 980 pro has failed, smartctl = failure no blocks left. 🙁 waiting on a new one.
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Just bought 2 of the 2tb 990 pro for 2 ps5 consoles now in 2024 is this problem still goin? Il check any dates and info off the box tommorow soon as i recieve goods slightly worried now
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is there an option to update via ps5?
or only pc?
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I installed the 990 pro 1 TB at first the laptop did not detect it ! Tried several ways then moved it into the other slot and if worked ! Hope this helps
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My 970 Evo Plus 1 TB failed. Error: Write protected.
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my 2 Samsung ssd’s failed and Samsung Netherlands so called tech support neither solved nor offered replacement ! they suck! they cant offer replacement as they are cut off fund from samsung then so they choose to lie to costumers instead hopping that the lies will take them far! Anyway there is no method to flash ssd’s manually but if you are out of warranty which im not then can try making a usb bootable linus drive then copy burn an image from a new ssd onto the failed one!!! etc…i may do a tutorial if enough interest to show how i ditched the warranty and burned flashing ssd with new and fix ..
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Mine keeps disconnecting as second drive on my gigabyte g5 KF laptop. Its still on 100% health. Tried everything from internet. Nothing helped yet. Its almost 3 months, no update from samsung.
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With the torture of RMA,5 year guarantee is a joke. I have all samsung after listening to all you guys saying these were the best never seen one fail.Now I have to worry.
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I just got the 990 pro 2t. I did not know about this. On your list the product code ends with b/am (MZ-V9P2TOB/AM). My code ends with GW (MZ-V9P2TOGW). Does someone know the difference? I got it for ps5 and dont have a pc. I can not upgrade the firmware.
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I was gonna buy Samsung 990 pro 4tb for £330 from samsung website for my PS5 now im not too sure i should get NVME ssd, far as i know PS5 dont update nvme firmwares and i have no PCs with nvme on motherboards either.
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What… if the effin deal with Samsung firmware these days? In my mind, three possibilities exist: They’ve got high school kids designing firmware –or– it’s some sneaky way to insert crap onto on our hardware that we don’t want –or– Like many good things, quality is in the toilet. Correct me if I’m wrong but the problem units seem to be coming out of the Korea facilities.
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Today I lost my Samsung SSD 980 pro 2 tb with heat sink on the ps5 and Samsung declined to even check attached is a video
https://youtu.be/9R_yHQ4Wb34?si=cTt-5sKfwdFwSID8
I will repalce with one from crossair
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I dont understand people they are always dissatisfied always complain even if it is good they can’t handle the technology and then they come here to judge
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Got my 990 pro 4TB yesterday and ive literally run crystaldiskmark just a few times and well it devouring itself
The accelerate degradation / wear is very much still and issue even fir the 4TB versions as some batches are clearly bad and i got a bad one
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So how about for the PS5? Every drive is formatted before it can be used by the PS5. Does this mean the firmware update will be erased?
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the 870 evo seem to have a high failure rate too, even recently
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Samsung is a brand to avoid! Not only the trashy, self-destructing, untested firmware releases, but the shocking denials and dismissive responses to affected customers. Ugh!
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My 970 EVO NvMe 2TB died around 5yrs.
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2x 2TB 990 Pro SSDs and they both have a wear of 2% after 5 months. TBW is only 4.6TB and 11.6TB so based on that, their claim of 1,200TBW is far fetched. i have another Samsung OEM 1TB drive with 4.5TBW and it has a wear of 0%! Go figure. Seems Samsung is trying to plan their revenue stream, but I’ll be buying something else at this rate
I know this video is about 9 months old. But I wanted to mention that I recently ‘lost’ my Samsung 970 Evo (SATA SSD), which was just about reaching a one year mark of usage in my system.
I was merely watching YouTube actually, and suddenly my system hanged solid, nothing responded (even on the 2nd monitor where I had music videos playing, the sound froze, everything froze). Of course, like usual, I simply restarted my PC. However, after that restart, instead of going back to Windows it refused to ‘Post’ (to get past the BIOS). I became “stuck” in the BIOS because – apparently at that point – the Boot wasn’t working anymore, the drive itself was not being detected anymore in the BIOS (just gone).
I CMOS’ed the BIOS, removed the Battery for a while, turned the PC back on, re-adjusted the BIOS settings (Optimized Defaults) and STILL nothing, drive was gone. I then decided to simply re-install the BIOS (EZ Flash, from USB device). Even THAT did nothing.
At that point I had only one option, to re-install Windows on a completely different drive, and that worked (the other drive is Western Digital Blue, also SATA SSD). From that new Windows installation on the new drive, I did a Windows Memory Diagnostic (which is known to also check for drive failures and repair them when possible during the process). The Memory Diagnostic – in a way – confirmed there was a problem with the drive, because it eventually said that the “repair” of the affected drive was done at 100% (when in reality, no such repair happened). But in actuality, no repair was ‘done’ per se. After the Memory Diagnostic was done, went back to Windows, and tried to use BOTH the Windows Disk Management tool AND Samsung’s own Magician tool. And BOTH the Disk Management and Samsung’s Magician “hanged” for 15+ minutes doing nothing, and detecting nothing… it just kept on trying to detect… and trying… and nothing showed up.
So yeah, my conclusion… my Samsung 970 Evo simply ‘died’ on me, just… boom, like that, gone. I didn’t do anything crazy with that drive, just installed Windows on it, it had some games, that’s it.
Lesson learned, right now I have not one but 2 Windows installations (on my newer WD SSD drive, and on an older ‘backup’ HDD Drive) just in case. I’ll stick with Western Digital from now on, or maybe Seagate, never had any problems with their drives in 20 years of building computers.
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And people still buy Samsung stuff over consistent firmware failures 🙂
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I just bought a 2TB 980 Pro. There is a lot of info but, all I want to know is should I return it, or are we safe as long as I update the firmware ?
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yeah, my trust for samsung is forever lost. Just one year after purchase and I noticed my games started crashing with errors, and I saw how all my files started becoming corrupted here and there in the Samsung SSD EVO 870 2TB. Check showed critical errors everywhere in the drive. Lost many files. Managed to save some of the files that were not corrupted yet. Damn. I had Intel SSD that worked for 7 years flawlessly like a swiss clock as main system drive, left it in my old PC, it could still be working fine, and this samsung was used only as 3rd storage drive for keeping games and medias and still broke in a year, pathetic. Never buying samsung ssd anymore, overpriced useless trash.
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Is it some kind of production batch which is not affected? So it is already with newest firmware without defect? I bought one from 30.05.2023 and I have no possibility to check the firmware or update it.. it was pure for ps5 with heatsink. What do you think?
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Must be a you issue. Mine are running just fine.
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In Western Australia, Australia, recently, from July to September 2023, around 300 Samsung 980 Pro 2TB drives, were auctioned of. Ranged in price from $130AUD to $180AUD. From what I understand, the S/N is one of the troubled ones, S69ENFOR, it was part of a massive Samsung product sell off. Can’t comment if it was factory, but would assume give the amount of Samsung products being auctioned. Of course in Australia, new, unopened, auctioned items only have a max of 30 days warranty, and after that you’re on your own. I noticed some of the PC reseller players had a field day feeding on cheap 2TB drives. Obviously to resell. Hope its only firmware, and not a reflection on the flash itself, or a combination of the two.
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Mine just started failing today. DO NOT BUY SAMSUNG SSDs.
And FSCK cryptobros. With a treble hook.
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What do you think of this M.2 Samsung MZ1L23T8HBLA-00A07 PM9A3 3.8TB NVMe PCIe Gen4?
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2 year old 1TB 970 Evo Plus completely dead, thanks samsung
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Just had a 1TB 970 EVO PLUS from 2019 die suddenly, luckily had all files backed up.
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I just purchased two 990 Pro’s and put them in a Stripped Array, the Firmware for both is 3B2QJXD7. It seems I am not able to check Performance, Diagonstic, or Performance Optimization. The reason no volumes or portions can be found. All drives at setup in NTFS, two are Dynamic and one is Basic. Why can’t Magician see the volumes? Also when looking at the S.M.A.R.T. data what numbers should I be most interested in to check drive integrity. Like many I also have Samsung drives in many devices to include other PCs, PS5, and Synology NAS I will need to check. It seems this issue affected the EVO line as well. Thanks
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So end conclusion DONT buy Samsung SSD drives anymore..I myself switched over to Seagate Firecuda 530.
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My SSD just died after 2 years. 970 evo 1tb. REGISTRY_ERROR blue screen, for literally no reason.
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List of Samsung NVMe SSD + firmware + DOM + POM. Taken from https://www.youtube.com/@prossd
970 EVO 1T 2B2QEXE7 14 10 2020 Korea
970 EVO PLUS 1 TB 4B2QEXM7 19 04 2022 Korea *with Elpis (gen. 4) not Phoenix (gen. 3)*
970 EVO PLUS 500 GB 2B2QEXM7 04 01 2022 China
970 EVO PLUS 500 GB 2B2QEXM7 21 06 2019 China
PM9A1 2TB 3L2QGXB7 01 04 2021 China
970 PRO 1TB 1B2QEXP7 23 01 2021 Korea
970 EVO PLUS 1TB 2B2QEXM7 10 08 2020 Thailand
970 EVO PLUS 1TB 2B2QEXM7 22 01 2022 China
970 EVO PLUS 2TB 2B2QEXM7 18 10 2021 China
970 EVO PLUS 2TB 2B2QEXM7 15 04 2021 China
990 PRO 1TB 3B2QJXD7 16 05 2023 Korea w/ heatsink
990 PRO 1TB 0B2QJXD7 28 10 2022 Korea
990 PRO 1TB 3B2QJXD7 06 01 2023 Korea
990 PRO 2TB 3B2QJXD7 10 11 2022 Korea
990 PRO 2TB 0B2QJXD7 08 11 2022 Korea
980 1TB 1B4QFXO7 11 02 2021 Korea
980 PRO 500 GB 1B2QGXA7 29 09 2020 Korea
980 PRO 1TB 2B2QGXA7 10 12 2020 China
980 PRO 2TB 5B2QGXA7 21 09 2021 Vietnam
*980 PRO 1TB 3B2QGXA7 30 10 2021 Korea w/ heatsink * affected firmware?*
980 PRO 2TB 2B2QGXA7 14 01 2021 Korea
980 PRO 1TB 5B2QGXA7 02 12 2021 Korea w/ heatsink
980 PRO 1TB 5B2QGXA7 30 12 2022 China
980 PRO 2TB 5B2QGXA7 23 09 2022 Vietnam
980 PRO 1TB 5B2QGXA7 29 04 2022 Vietnam
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HM so if i buy this ssd right now will it still be dying fast?
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Mine died today, 970 evo plus 2022. Not detected in anything. But its still warm when connected
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I have a 970 Evo Plus 1TB that died last week. One fucking year old. Some of my data is on the Users folder, which I do not have permissions to access. To change the permission I would have to write on the SSD, and guess what, it’s stuck on read only. Great job Samsung!
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I just installed a 990 pro ssd yesterday in my ps5, and just now discovered these post about issues. I don’t hope I will experience those. I don’t have a computer or possibility to update the ssd firmware.
Also …. A but off topic ….
I moved all my games from the console storage to my new ssd, but in the games folder in console storage it still says about 20gb used. Even though there’s nothing in there ? Is that normal ? ????
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Completely avoid SAMSUNG now, they have probably internal issues with senior management, and SOP’s, and other internal issues, there is NO clarity, totally unacceptable. These chips are as critical as having surgery. I have heard enough of people with failures even with updates, so no thanks, i don’t need the chronic issues.
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I’m glad that I found this video, mate! I was just in an online chat with a Samsung rep last night (July 20, 2023) – and he was pushing the 990 Pro NVMe M.2 SSD! Perhaps I’m being a bit cynical about this, but, in addition to having the 990 Pro series pushed by said Samsung rep, I’ve noticed that the prices for the same SSDs have been reduced. The obvious question is: Does this mean that these “defective” SSDs are still being sold to the public?
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i have the 990 2tb , 980 pro 2tb and 1tb , and 970 evo plus 2tb . i never had a problem with any of them.
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Been out of the loop a little bit on a lot of hardware stuff and I just saw this issue on my 2TB 980 PRO…. I’ve already updated to the latest firmware, but I’m doing the full scan and it’s not looking good; about 26% into the scan I can see over 18 bad blocks….
And I also have a 2TB WD BLACK SN850 that I use on my laptop and early on it had a SMART error that showed critical, but I ignore it because I was only using the laptop casually, and I’m finally going through the RMA process on that as well.
I’ve used SSDs for a long time, and this is probably the first time I’ve had failures like these, and across two different brands’ flagship products.
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Does anyone have model number mz-v8p2t0cw production date of 2023 02 07 on the 980PRO? What firmware was on yours? I don’t have a PC to check it on, I purchased the drive for my PS5.
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my EVO died yesterday
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I have a Samsung 970 EVO M.2 that died and went into read-only mode after about a year of use. It’s firmware is 2B2QEXE7 and is listed as current.
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bought 10 days ago 980 normal 500GB NOT the Pro! Manufactured in 11.2022 … after 11 hrs. of running ~> 10 days of use: NOW READ ONLY ! Beware ! I updated my second one now to 3BQ4… still works. -.-
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Thx just updated the firmware for both my samsung hardrives before i have used them much both scanned in perfects shape.Even tho i have the 1tb pro not the 2tb better safe than sorry.
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I just find out this problem because my 970 evo plus just dead in Feb. I am so disappointed that Samsung should broadcast this issue or recall the products. Plenty people like me have no time to watch this kind of problems all the time.
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is there a way to extract the files in the read only locked drive?
i cant assign the volume in disk management now
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What version of Windows are you running? I can not successfully install the Samsung Magician! When I install it, it loads down in the task bar and it highlights the software in a small window, but nothing on the monitor above. Just a translucent shaped pencil in the middle on the monitor. I am using Windows 11.
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With several owners in the comments here, commenting on how trying to upgrade the firmware failed, and how Samsung did not honor a return/replacement, I’m staying clear of this brand. I was considering buying one because of the speed, but will have to look elsewhere now. Can anyone suggest one that’s just as fast, or faster while being more reliable?
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Just got this issue with my 1-year-old 970 EVO plus (FW version 3B2QEXM7) and only a little bit over 8 TBW from their promised 600… Samsung sucks, now if they will ask for my dead drive then I will be out of warranty replacement as I have too much personal information over there, perhaps a convenient situation for them… It doesn’t help me that upgrading the drive would save it, this info came post-mortem… why they did not cooperate with Microsoft to push of their fw fix via regular updates? Never buy again Samsung products!!!
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damn! I was just about to buy a 1tb 970 evo plus on sale for 55 usd..
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My 1TB 970 Evo Plus just died (Disk write error), and i bought it in September 2022 (only 9 months old), I only really installed games on it with long load times and only used about 400gb of it. Hopefully i get a replacement.
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Dying is not the word, just bad firmware.
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hey I saw aliens today
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My 970 EVO Plus just up and died this week after 11 months of ownership. No warnings, still detected in bios, bios SSD test fails immediately. Detected but will not boot. Tried CSM legacy to no avail. I had a lot of data on there. Instant death is far worse than a conventional HDD slowly dying. I had no chance to even recover any data.
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I’ve just got the 990 pro for my laptop do I do the update before puting it in or after I’ve put it in thank you for this video super helpful ????I just wish I seen this video before I got it so leave a like ???? so we can get the word out and because this guy is super helpful giving us this information ℹ️ thanks dude
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I experienced this just now with my two SAMSUNG 990 PRO 2TB NVME PCIE 4.0 after 1 week of using it but suddenly both 2 990 m.2 went undetected. I can’t update the firmware since it’s not detected in Samsung Magician Software. 🙁
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Do you know if the 980 Pro w/ model code MZ-V8P2T0CW is affected? It was produced 2023-03-04, so I’m hoping they put it on shelves with updated firmware.
It is 990 model. You will see a new firmware for effected models here https://semiconductor.samsung.com/consumer-storage/support/tools/
I have a samsung 2tb 990pro as bootdrive when i launched samsung magician it says i have the latest firmware but its still on 0B2Q the newer one is 1B2Q it seems it doesnt detect the newest firmware, any solutions for this?
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Hello, I bought the Samsung 990 pro 1 tb m2 ssd model. my motherboard is asus tuf x570-plus wifi model, my bios is up to date.
When I first plugged the 990 pro, windows was not installed.
My 970 evo ssd also had windows installed. and both ssd’s looked fine in samsung magician program.
When I installed windows 11 on 990 pro, I got the error “the device is connected to the driver that magician does not support” in the magician program.
Then I reinstalled windows 10 and the problem went away.
but now there is the problem of “the device is connected to the driver that magician does not support” again in windows 10.
990 pro firmware version is up to date!
please help.
Thanks.
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Makes perfect sense to not trust SamSuck, since they had to be taken to federal court in an expensive set of litigations, which lasted for 7 long years, by Apple Computer with SamSuck proven guilty, guilty, guilty, for stealing patented features off the iPhone and illegally using them on their own phones. Why trust proven criminals with any of their products??
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Some people are stupid lol there’s nothing wrong with the Samsung drives , just update them to the latest firmware and there won’t be any issue it’s not hard
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I just had a 4TB 860 EVO drive fail after just 3 years of very little use.
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Can Samsung EVO 970 firmware update as well?
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Can Samsung EVO 970 firmware update as well?
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Great video explaining how to update the firmware.
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Great video explaining how to update the firmware.
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my 970 evo plus just died a week ago.
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Unfortunately my Samsung 970 Evo Plus running the firmware “3B2QEXM7” (which is different from the one which is known to fail “3B2QGXA7”) has been hit yesterday. It was my OS/Primary drive, meaning my PC is entirely shafted and it took me 2 days to finally figure it out when scanning the SSD on ubuntu through an USB-Stick finally revealed that it was in read only mode. I don’t know if Samsung will compensate and send me a new SSD, as these reportedly have 5 years of warranty and mine is just 1.5 years old.
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Got 970 Evo Plus delivered. Had troubles with it from the moment it was in. Even Samsung Magician doesnt see it in 😀
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My drive (980 pro w/heatsink 2TB) production date 2023 – 02 – 20 made in Korea was shipped with the latest firmware on it (5B2QGXA7)
I don’t have an M.2 slot on my MB, but I did buy a PCIe to M.2 adapter to check. I did not need to mount the drive, just plugged the drive with adapter in MB, booted up system and launched the Samsung Magician app.
Note that I formatted the drive with a PS5 before plugging it in the computer and because of the adapter I was using, the Samsung app couldn’t run the test that shows each sector like shown in this video
Samsung really should have indicated what firmware the drive shipped with on the box as I believe a number of people like myself bought the drive only for their PS5 and would have never plugged it in a PC.
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I had a 960 evo fail and a 970 evo plus fail I’m going back to sata sdd’s until further notice.
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So I only just learned of this AFTER my 980 PRO 2TB running firmware 3B2QGXA7 died and flipped into readonly mode. I’m not even too mad about the data loss, but they damn well better send me a new one! Anyone know how to go about doing this??
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Absulute garbage. First one failed after 14tb of data transfer, second one was brand new, failed within a week after 500gb of data transfer. Both would cause files to corrupt and windows 11 to bluescreen.
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@everyone after firmware update has it completely solved the dying / health degrading issue for you? have you been observing it since then? i have already been using 980 pro 2tb but since this happening i feel hesitant now, was just about to order 2tb 990 pro expecting as its an update and hoping it would not have such an issue and now i see this… i dont feel mental peace buying 990 pro after seeing all this on several platfroms
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both my 980 pro 2tb and 970 evo plus 2tb are currently stuck in read only mode, any way to revive them?
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I have a brand new 1TB Samsung 990 PRO. I tried the firmware update which Magician indicates is available, but the firmware update keeps failing. The message that I get is “Failed to update firmware on the selected drive.” I also have two Samsung 980 PRO 2TB drives on this system which have been performing well since October 2022.
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I’m getting a new PC next week with a 2tb 990 Pro as the OS drive, should I update ASAP?
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So what SSD brands would you recommend with good reliability?
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I got in touch with Samsung support, they kindly agreed to update my brand new 990 pro 2TB ssd. I have no equipment to do it myself, they will update firmware for me. I intend to use it in my PS5.
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Is it just me or anyone ever noticed that Windows DEFRAGS DRIVES BY DEFAULT?? And last time I checked that is deadly for ssds
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my 970 died in in a year i dont even know if you can return it anymore
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Mine has degraded by 6% in the 8 days since I have installed it (checked when I found out about this issue).. I took it back and they said they won’t warranty it.. so why would I install the update, that won’t fix the current 6%, when I could just destroy the drive in a few days and they will have to cover it since they warranty 1200TB of writes?.. seriously considering this ????
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I recently had to replace two original 870EVO 1TB made in 2021 Korea, sealed from Samsung store in Amazon. Firmware update didn’t fix the issue. I quickly got a refund from Amazon 1.3y after purchase and I got new 2TB ones from 2022 China. Let’s see if these hold up but at least is pretty easy to refund them. I have much older 860 EVO and 970 Pro that exhibit no errors.
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Samsung magician software don’t see my 980 pro. windows wont boot from it, I have to use it as a secondary drive. from box
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Decided to go with a different brand on a new SSD just because Samsung is not being upfront about what is going on.
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uhm i bought the 990 PRO but I cannot download Samsung Magician Tool or SSD firmware because they only offer it for Windows user….
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Please can you talk about that bad performance that’s affecting the 990 Pro? The write speeds are all over the place. I don’t know if this is because of the new firmware, but there are some reports (including mine) on reddit.
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I’ve personally never had any issues with my samsung 970 evo pluses. I’ve been running a 500gb 970 evo plus for over 2 years. Just recently upgraded my other rig and slotted in a 2tb 970 evo plus about a month ago. Hopefully this isn’t an issue with newer models, but this is just my personal experience. Haven’t had any problems so far.
Note: I’ve also never done a single firmware update on any of my ssd’s. Didn’t know that was a thing. Maybe that’s why mine lasted so long?
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Has any 970 evo plus 500GB failed? How to make it fail quickly?
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This video is rubbish , fake news.
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Yup. Mine failed. Lost all data. Won’t migrate. Mi support.
Samsung support and RMA sucks don’t buy Samsung ssds! 24 attempts for rma. Crickets!
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Are u aware of how this affects the ps5s?
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Great video as always! How do you update the firmware on an samsung ssd if you have it installed in a Qnap qm2 card?
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New Firmweare 5B2QGXA7 2tb980 pro is still affected??
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Don’t know what you are talking about. I got ZERO issues with Samsung NVME. I have 970 pro – 980pro and 990 pro…they work GREAT. You should NEVER enable S.M.A.R.T. feature on NVME drives…NEVER! It will break the drive.
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Samsung RMA sucks. 980pro2Tb..fail….its like pulling teeth to get fixed or replaced 8 hours of trying and counting. DO NOT BUY. They don’t stand behind their product! What’s your time worth? Really Samsung doesn’t care. Firmware doesn’t fix damages….nor does repair work bricked!
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Man, Samsung RMA sucks. 980pro2Tb..fail….its like pulling teeth to get fixed or replaced 8 hours of trying and counting. DO NOT BUY. They don’t stand behind their product! What’s your time worth? Samsung doesn’t care.
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I lost 500gb samsung ssd evo 850
All files change to raw i cannot acess the drive and gi the problemer to seagate old drive 1tb
I don’t know is happenvafter install samsung magician or other things
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Hi, I have recently bought a Samsung 980 1 TB made in Viet-Nam (production date 2022/10/06). Samsung magician shows that there’s a firmware update available from the existing 2B4QFX07 to the newer 3B4QFX07. The diagnostic scan doesn’t show any bad sector. Besides, I don’t know if the 3B4QFX07 is bug-free. So I am hesitating to update. Please advise.
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should i be worried about my just ordered 990 pro 1tb? is this a hardware’s fault that firmware fixes or just the firmware’s fault?
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Puget switched all their M.2 production to Sabrent
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I had to recover and reformat my friend’s 2x 970 pros because they were completely filled with loops or something fishy.
He then downloaded a virus once I got his PC running…
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Anyone know when the new 4TB M.2 NVME SSD is being released?
SAMSUNG 990 PRO SSD 4TB
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Will the samsung 990 pro tb with heatsink firmware will affect the system and games?
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Is it safe to buy the 990 Pro 2TB now tho or should I just go look for another brand? It’s for my PS5
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Problems with 970 EVO Plus Model MZ-V7S1TO purchased 2 June 2020. Samsung Magician tests “Failed to complete the operation due to unknow error. Please click OK to refresh and try again.” Have RMA from Samsung.
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How do I check / update my Samsung 980pro ssd’s (1 & 2TB) if I don’t have a PC? Presently using them in ACASIS TBU405 housings connected to my Mac Studio.
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970 EVO 2TB just failed now 30 minutes ago!!!!
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so.. they will release a newer version without problems?
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970evo 1tb just up and failed on me this morning, unrecoverable and out of the blue.
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I thought I was on to something for a bit there by finding problems cropping up with Samsung ssd’s then your vid :/ looks like my 970 Evo+ is just straight up effed. Or my mobo. I’m not checking now though. Requires a bit more effort than I have at the moment.
If anyone’s ssd decides to shut off one day and start working the next for seemingly no reason and doing a diagnostic comes up clean. Just back it up anyway. Because like me you might come back to it a week later and it shits itself again.
I have hard drives from 10 years ago in better condition than a 3 yr old SSD that says it’s fine with only 14.5 TBW.
Only consolation at this point is it wasn’t my boot drive and nothing crucial on there. Oh and of course still in warranty
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Yes my 970 evo just so happens to be produced on the 6th of April in the effected batch hooray, I thought buying a Samsung ssd would be problem free as everyone sings praise to them, meanwhile I could have saved $60 and just got another Kingston ssd which work perfectly fine.????
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Ordered a SN850x today because of this issue.
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My Samsung 970 evo plus 1TB failed tonight……no warning…purchased Nov 2021……????
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If I buy one today, and I update the drivers somehow, can I safely use it for a PS5? Thanks
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Any chance for a video covering SSD review for Steam Decks?
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Maybe I’m just lucky, but I have 7 Samsung SSDs and most of them run daily, some of them since 2015.
Lucky with WD HDDs too, never failed and some are recicled from some mid 2000s desktop pc.
The only one that failed, a decade ago, was a Seagate HDD.
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Let me be clear. People with version 4B2 are ALSO effected by this ssd problem.. because those drives with 4B2 are declining in health without proper SMART health monitoring. But when you update firmware to 5b2, your damage is done and you may actually brick your ssd instantly during that upgrade. So basically, if you have 4b2 youre damned if you do, and damned if you dont. Just get an RMA if you own one of these made before last week Please notice how ALL the sellers have a sale on these models NOW. As if they KNOW they all need replaced. ALL of them
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Just to clarify, 8-bit strings beginning with S4, S5, S6 are not firmwares, they’re first eight bits of the serial number.
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using 980 PRO for yyyyears – no problems
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Honestly, if I were building a computer right now, I would probably get a Firecuda anyway given that they are rated for more total writes.
Most people aren’t going to notice speed above a Gen 3×4 anyway, so you might as well base your purchasing decisions on total writes.
I don’t remember what I have in my Synology. It might be good to explain how to update SSD firmware in a NAS.
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Building a multi pc system and have no doubt Samsung will iron out firmware with updates. I am currently building my gaming rig with 6x Western Digital blue sata ssd as my primary drive and 1x Western Digital blue m.2 nvme as my cache. Office pc 1x Kingston sata ssd and 1x Kingston m.2 nvme primary drive. Looking forward to doing a build with a Samsung setup. Cheers ???? keep up the good work ????
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I used a Samsung 970 EVO as an OS drive that failed recently. It’s the first Samsung SSD that I’ve ever had fail.
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I refunded 3 to amazon before I gave up with Samsung (2 980’s and one 970) and I went back to crucial for now.
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What are we supposed to do to upgrade firmware then if we have them for the PS5 and don’t have PC…..
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I Want To get The Firecuda 530 But i dont have PC update the Firmware should i just not get a SSD????
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Any idea how to update the firmware if you’re using Linux Mint?
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Glad I use a hgst hdd…
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I have a range of the devices and firmware is up to date, no issues to date. Any chance the issues are related to the many counterfeit devices around? I wouldn’t put any credence in anything reported out of China, as Samsung are whipping their arse on phones and all levels of Chinese media lie through their teeth.
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I’ve got an M1 Mac Mini. Just looked at this, and it looks like I’ve got no real recourse for my 980 pro. Magician tool only works for pc? Ridiculous…. They’ve really wrecked their rep not just in the product, but in how they’re handling (or not handling) it.
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I was running several 980 Pro drives in multiple systems. None of them the 2TBs models though. I began replacing my 980 Pro drives with the SN850x drives. It’s faster anyway. At this point I will not touch a 990 model. Samsung has egg on their face over this issue.
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You talk a lot about there may be a problem, there may be a solution. It took me less time to download the Samsung Magician, back up my boot drive (980 Pro 2TB) update the firmware on my boot drive than it did to listen to you prattle on. Did it help? I don’t know.
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Have a Samsung 970 Evo Plus 500GB (Boot Drive) so far things look to be ok, but i definitely make sure i got system backups done weekly just in case something ever does happen
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Bought my 980 Pro w/Heatsink back in October, fucking glad I’ve been delaying it’s installation as primary drive all this time now.
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Bought a 990 Pro 1TB in Dec 22 for a new PC build C drive. On either Samsung Magician or Crystal Benchmark this drive gave read speeds between about 4,000 and 6,000 MB/s and write speeds of around 1,500 MB/s. Tested a lot as I could not really beleive the poor results. Sent back to CCL. On the same build a 980 Pro 2TB is doing 6,100 read and 4,093 write. No age or fault problems showing, just poor performance and the 990 Pro was a long way away from stated values and worse than the 980 Pro. The machine also boots a touch faster now I have switched to 980 Pro. The 980 Pro seems slightly slower since I switched to using as C drive so no idea why that is. Also feels snappier than the 990 Pro though. My son has a 980 Pro 1TB as a C drive that has been running fine for 23 months and he uses his PC a lot. (9hrs per day at least) Had a lot of trouble with a Crucial SSD drive about 15 yrs ago so switched to Samsung. Not sure I will be staying with Samsung as I have lost confidence in them.
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I checked my firmware for my 980 Pro Dec 2022 that was on the list of affected models, Luckily it was already on the current firmware. Now I have to check another affected 980 Pro that I purchased in Feb 2022 but it’s in my PS5…
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Those drives can get pretty warm, some even have a cooling system attached, so maybe depending on where they are placed on the MB they may not get cooled properly. With my motherboards there was coolers that I can stick on them and there is probably a reason for this.
With HDD it was the same, i experienced some damaged HDD some years ago then i installed fans to cool them and i never had any failure since.
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I have the 980 pro 1TB with heatsink date of manufacture November 29, 2021 is it affected? Model Number : MZ-V8P10CW
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pcie to nvme cards are available all over the place for people without free m.2 spots 🙂
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Is there a cutoff production date effected by this, I have a 980 pro in a PS5, production date 10/15/2022, no means to update via computer. Thanks!
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I just bought the Samsung 990 pro last week and is still in the box, I just stumbled on this and is starting to get worried about my newly bought ssd
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My pro 980 did not get recognized on my pc . But my ps5 did recognized it. So thats that. I recommend a regular ssd .
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980 pro – the issue with drive only appears to affect the 2TB version and firmware that fixes this was released over a year ago.
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980 pro – the issue with drive only appears to affect the 2TB version and firmware that fixes this was released over a year ago.
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I bought in January 2023 two 2TB 990PROs. And I’m happy now that I didn’t have time to plug them in to PC yet.
So they have 0GB usage and I can apply firmware update on factory unused drives.
The question is – what the update is doing? is it a bug fix, or is it a trick to cheat the smart statistics (when the issue of degradation will be still there).
If that issue is the software (firmware code) only, then okay – they can fix it. But if that issue is the hardware related only? What they else can do -instead of cheat the smart statistics to calm down the user.
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I bought in January 2023 two 2TB 990PROs. And I’m happy now that I didn’t have time to plug them in to PC yet.
So they have 0GB usage and I can apply firmware update on factory unused drives.
The question is – what the update is doing? is it a bug fix, or is it a trick to cheat the smart statistics (when the issue of degradation will be still there).
If that issue is the software (firmware code) only, then okay – they can fix it. But if that issue is the hardware related only? What they else can do -instead of cheat the smart statistics to calm down the user.
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This is our fault!
Few years ago we had on the markert expensive SSDs with the best MLC memory chips and cheaper with the worst TLC. The long story short – TLC degradation is two or three times faster than MLC. And what we did? We didn’t read about differences between them, we didn’t want to pay more – we started to picked up the cheapest SSDs available, because why to overprice something, when you can get the same cheaper, right?
And now this is the punishment.
Manufacturer stoped use expensive MLC. They stop to continue developing/evolution of MLC. Because not enough people was buying expensive SSDs with MLC memory chips.
Samsung 960/970 EVO has TLC, 960/970 PRO has MLC (so xxx PRO always means MLC memory, and non pro version – TLC)
BUT starting from 980 PRO – there is no MLC anymore – this time it has TLC, and the same with 990 pro – also TLC.
There is no MLC SSDs right now on the market! They all gone. They abandon the best memory chips (MLC), for cheaper, the worst TLC and trying to squeeze impossible things from it.
And now we have the resoults.
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This is our fault!
Few years ago we had on the markert expensive SSDs with the best MLC memory chips and cheaper with the worst TLC. The long story short – TLC degradation is two or three times faster than MLC. And what we did? We didn’t read about differences between them, we didn’t want to pay more – we started to picked up the cheapest SSDs available, because why to overprice something, when you can get the same cheaper, right?
And now this is the punishment.
Manufacturer stoped use expensive MLC. They stop to continue developing/evolution of MLC. Because not enough people was buying expensive SSDs with MLC memory chips.
Samsung 960/970 EVO has TLC, 960/970 PRO has MLC (so xxx PRO always means MLC memory, and non pro version – TLC)
BUT starting from 980 PRO – there is no MLC anymore – this time it has TLC, and the same with 990 pro – also TLC.
There is no MLC SSDs right now on the market! They all gone. They abandon the best memory chips (MLC), for cheaper, the worst TLC and trying to squeeze impossible things from it.
And now we have the resoults.
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The irony of this episode is that I just had to do a RMA on a DOA Sabrent Rocket. Heh. Swapped it out with a Crucial P3 series for this customer’s unit.
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I was wondering why the 970 evo plus 2tb was so cheep
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Samsung reputation is now completely damaged. I would never consider a Samsung drive again.
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Samsung magician software doesn’t work well. I have 3 older SSDs and only 1 would update with newer firmware. Its a faulty updating tool.
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I returned all my 990s back to Amazon and went with sk hynix
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if this helps I checked my 980 pro with heatsink, that I put in my ps5 that I purchased in September 23. this drive was manufactured 2022 08 03 which it written on the box. The samsung software said it had the latest update already installed. So if you have one in you ps5 and can check the box for its production date you may be fine like I was. I did not mount disk in pc but crystal disk said it was good 100% and the media section to look out for all showed zeros
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Samsung has been using the parts that would be tossed a few years ago. I lost 2 SSD’s and a TV after 5 months. They said yeah we know the TV has issues but we don’t know what to do about it. Then locked the thread and marked it solved. I will not purchase anything that has a Samsung provided part in it let alone their brand crap.
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I see the 980 Pros are the cheapest they’ve ever been on PCPartPicker right now, so is it worth buying one over a cheaper Kingston drive so long as I update my firmware immediately after installation?
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A video guide on how to upgrade Samsung firmwares on QNAPs would be great!
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Super thanks for the update! I just cancelled my order for a Samsung 2TB 980 Pro MVMe at Amazon and replaced it with an order for a WD Black 2TB SN850X MVMe which was even slightly cheaper. Will be adding it to my PS5. So glad to have avoided falling into that Samsung Rabbit Hole. ????
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Now that I think about it I remember back when Samsung went to TLC for the first time in their Evo series and had cell deterioration issues
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Had bad sectors crop up on a 10 month old 870 EVO , the warranty(local) was one year in my country and Samsung quietly rolled out an update which fixed the problem but the drive still has reallocated bad sectors. The number went up as I scanned the drive with Magician. They were also pretty quiet about it back then, went on reddit and there were forums full of people complaining about dead 870 to bad sectors developing out of the blue.
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Ah great, looks like every Samsung SSD is suspect. 🙁
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I’m having issue with my 990 saying “firmware update failed” with no other information
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Cool
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When did the Pro series go from MLC to TLC
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My 2tb 990 pro has lost 5% health with only about 2.2 tb read and 1.7 written for a total of 218 hours of functioning . I did the update as soon as it was released and so far, it’s staying put at 95% health status; fingers crossed it doesn’t get any worse, but I still have a hard time accepting that I won’t be regaining these 5% lost for barely a month’s use. Thanks Samsung 😐
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I bougth a 980 pro nvme 3 months ago, no problems so far, have 2 more ssd from Samsung 2 years of use no problems so far, i’ve updated the 980 pro to the new update > 5B2QGXA7 with magician cuz someone said with that new update didn’t give anymore trouble.. lets see
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Also, windows users can update the firmware from Samsung Magician software from the Samsung website, or if you have a DVD drive that software does come with some of their SSD then you can update it once installed
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I already had 2 ssd 860 evo’s dying. Now I need to worry about my 2 980Pro’s, I thought let’s not skimp on my SSD’s and buy something good, that turned out great….
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*Feb 15/02/23* – Updated Information on the Samsung M.2 NVMe SSD Firmware Issue. You can find out more in the article and video below:
Samsung 990 Pro SSD Firmware Failures UPDATED Video – https://youtu.be/ZkiYghAGCOQ
Samsung 990 Pro SSD Failures UPDATED Article – https://nascompares.com/news/samsung-990-pro-ssd-failures-updated-official-response-replacements-more/
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just had my boot drive 980 non pro just died. got home from work to a blue screen of deth and boot looping
took a new drive and it worked. any recommendations for a good ssd that won’tdie in the first 3 months
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How do we check when we updated? And check how much damage was done?
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Does this effect all 980 series like the none pro version ?
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Yah I’m pretty much done with Samsung drives. I’ve had to replace my 980 pro boot drive twice in the past year. And I use a separate game drive. I literally don’t do anything besides game on my PC. I went with seagate firecuda this time. Samsung won’t get any more of my money.
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i use 980 M.2, nothing happen so far and I built mine system last year. This makes me very concern
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I have 2 SAMSUNG nvme:
1 TB – 970 Evo Plus with 55 TBW
1 TB – PM9A1 with 9 TBW
somehow both drives have 2% wearout
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Yep mine just died
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My 990 pro lost 2% of life with 10 times less writes than by 970 evo plus which still has 100% life FYI stay away from Samsung drives!
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Meanwhile I still have a secondary drive SeaGate 1 TB from 2009 that runs flawless.
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Both my EVO 850 and 870s failed after general use for a few years. Yes random failure non-mountable at boot. My Crucial BX500 suffered from a write slowdown where it eventually could not write to itself while running. recommend buying Enterprise grade SSDs always.
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My 8 year old 850 EVO should still be good, right? 🙂
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Swap disk is frying SSD hard drives due to insufficient ram memory. Just go to your activity monitor in Apple and it tells You the situation facing your memory. Remember swap disk is bad for SSD… only 150 teraflops before the 256GB SSD burns out…
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I chose to buy a WD Black SN850X for the PC I’m building because of this. Piss poor communication from Samsung here.
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You sure do put a lot of “BS” links to weed through and no clear link to what we all came for. LAM
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I installed a 2nd samsung ssd yesterday and samsung wizard won’t detect it. It’s working perfectly fine otherwise but it makes me nervous given I just spent $160 on it and I can’t find any related issues
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Samsung doesn’t seem to be able to admit their failures.
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My 980 pro is causing BSOD when launching certain games through steam and caused me to lose over 100 hours of progress in a game. Now I assume I have to go through warranty
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How do I check when my 980 pro was manufactured? My ssd has a sticker on it that says 2022.09 somewhere on it, is this the manufacturing date?
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And I have two 970’s in my computer. 1TB for OS and 2TB for Linux Mint (dual boot). Oh boy…
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What about the basic 980? I couldn’t find anything out!
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I’m really confused im on farmwear update 0B2QJXD7 and there is no update available am I good? I got the 990 pro SSD 2TB
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Just had my 980 Pro 2TB fail on me.
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Well, I do not think it is a firmware issue as I am running the latest firmware on my 980 pro 2TB, manufactured on 7-24-2021, but was purchased from Best Buy on 9-4-2021. I was having some issues with PC lately, running sluggish, and had a couple blue screen out of the blue. Thought, it might be my overclock on either cpu, or gpu. After hearing about this, I looked at smart, and found the media errors were over 2000. Ran a quick scan did not show any bad blocks, but did give a message of integrity errors. Click the resolve button, but it failed. Tried the full slow scan, then that is when I got two red blocks. I have a second one, but that was just a clone backup of this drive, and not use much, only for backing up every month or so. At the moment it has no errors, and was manufactured on 7-23-2021. Samsung with all it technology needs to update their website to have a easy way to request a rma, or speak to support. Looks like I have to call them personally, and speak to someone. I just purchased two of the newest WD black’s, and will run them instead. Thanks for this information!
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Thank You.
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I read about this bug in the 3xxxx firmware and updated my 980 pro 2tb to 5xxxx. After that, it doesn’t work correctly anymore. I use(d) this drive in a TB-case as the boot drive of my Mac mini M1 and now it’s slow as hell. Booting takes 15 min or so. As i don’t own a windows machine, my brother made the update for me. He also has the exact same SSD and his drive still works. So in essence, my drive is not completely bad (not in the “write only”-state) but it’s completely unusable. Any suggestions? My fear is that if i send it back for warranty it’s not obvious that it dosen’t work correctly, it’s just very slow. BTW: the activity LED on my TB-case is blinking all the time after power up. It seems to do _something_ but even after i had my Mac powered up continuously for a few days the SSD didn’t stop blinking..
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Samsung RMA process is a pita. After 2 drive failures (out of about 10 drives), and subsequent bad rma process, I’ve sworn off recommending and using samsung drives.
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I’ve had my 970 EVO PLUS for a year now, keep it under 60% full and never had any issues.
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My friend reported many bad blocks on his two year old 2TB 980 Pro despite crystaldiskinfo shows 100%. I’m starting to nervous about mine 980 Pro
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Mine died a year ago, it was very expensive for me. but VERY. There is no international guarantee. There will be no more of my purchases of Samsung appliances. Never again.
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my samsung 1tb 970 evo plus is suck on a read only protected so i can not install a fresh install of windows
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me got… 990pro2TB 2,5TBwritten 93% health, 980pro2TB 3,5TBwritten still 100%, both like 3 months in usage bought new sealed with 100%.. yeeaaahh premium E-waste..
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I just bought three 2TB 980’s. They will be going into the PC fresh. If i update the firmware first thing, should i be fine? Their production date is 2022/09/23.
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yikes
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I have a Samsung 980 1TB non-Evo/pro NVME that I got in November during Black Friday before this issue became known, however so far I have had zero issues and my drive seems fine.
I am keeping an eye on it of course, hopefully I will be okay but yeah maybe I will stop buying Samsung for a while.
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Mnah you can do better for set camera placement and overall format.
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If I understand correctly a new 980 pro updated to newest firmware shouldn’t have any issues?
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The 990 PRO is the worst!
I have two Samsung M.2 SSD:
970 Evo (not plus, just evo) Power on count: 905, Power on hours: 15194, Total writes 31779 GB and at 97% health no errors
990 Pro Power on count: 8, Power on hours: 28, Total writes: 544 GB and at 99% health….
Not happy, and what do i do now? Keep this one and wait for the update and then return it.. Or buy a worse and more expensive SSD. (990 PRO is at 99 Euro’s atm @NL)
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add this to your mental notes about my failure with a Samsung 980 Pro 2 TB NVMe drive, the drive failed at approximately 8 months after I purchased it, it was my OS drive running Windows 10, the failure for me was very interesting in the sense that, I was able to use the drive I could use my computer. I did just about anything I wanted to do… Until I discovered I could not transfer files using Windows,…. I joined a youtube channel called ” live Windows training-Doug Betts” and demonstrated the problem… Episode LonnDawg Remote Troubleshooting File Explorer Crashing 12/22/2022 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LdgrkYhoTbM&t=5619s again the failure kind of puzzled me because in general the machine was working just fine except for one particular function… And not finding much on the Internet to repair such a failure, I asked for help.
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I was just thinking that SSD is the only product I still dared to buy from Samsung.
I guess that’s over too.
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Still the best in buy in NvMe reviews!
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I had a Samsung SSD 980 PRO 2TB 2000.3 GB Firmware 3B2QGXA7 100% Bad with Critical Warning and Available Spare. should of noticed then Synology active backup for Business started to fail.
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Had a 970 EVO 1TB and an 870 EVO 2TB that got many errors at (970) 5,6 and (870) 6,1 TBW
Managed to return them and got new ones that seem to be fine. They have different firmware compared to the old drives I had. Did not update firmware back then.
Firmware of the 970 EVO was 3B2QEXM7
Don’t remember what the firmware of the 870 was. Only remember it to be different when I checked when replacing them.
Might be worthwhile to check for issues even if the SSD is not an NVMe drive.
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The firmware would not reverse the damage done right? So consumer should be getting replacement?
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I have been using a 980 pro for about 1-2 months and currently when I try to use it as my main drive, the whole system crashes after a few seconds / minutes…
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980pro failtures a lot. I have a friend who own 7 980Pro,but 3 out of 8 has encounter failures.
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My 2tb 870 evo died last week it lasted nearly 2 years, Think it was because I shut down the computer (cpu fan wasn’t spinning)
It was strange, Windows wouldn’t read it but I put it in a ubuntu laptop and it read it??? format recognised as raw, couldn’t format it again . . .
Amazon gave a refund ????
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Whats the latest fw for a 256GB PM9A1 00B00 ?
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I have two 980 PRO and two 870 QVO and all are fine…. so you are not telling truth at all
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Mine currently is on 600GB tbw and on 100% without errors.
990 Pro 2TB, Firmware 0B2QJXD7
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I just bought 2 980 PROs recently from Amazon before these news came out… Haven’t installed them yet. Should they be safe to use after updating the firmware, or should I wait a bit more before using them?
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Can’t find many people talking about this. You are and you are very good. First time viewer – I will subscribe now, I like you.
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I have a lot of Sammy M.2’s. One System has a 1tb 980 pro as boot with 2tb 970 EVO Plus and mine, using right now has 500gb 790 EVO Plus as boot and gaming drive a 1tb 790 EVO Plus. Mine as I can look at are Firmware 2B2QEXM7 (970 E+ 500gb) AND 4B2QEXM7 (790 E+1TB) Weird how they both say I am running the most current firmware but have different first numbers.
Can’t look at the other system right now. As they are fairly new. Like, two months old.
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I never updated mine and It’s still fine 1 980 1tb and 1 980 2tb and both never failed on me
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I got a Samsung 980 Pro 2TB around the time it was released (March 2021) and it recently died (Read only mode) start of December last year (2022), it was my boot drive so my computer stopped working. Luckily, I had backups, so I was able to get up and running pretty quickly.
but me having my 980 Pro my boot drive wasn’t the worst part, I tried to get a replacement from the shop I got the SSD from (Centrecom), and they said my SSD wasn’t faulty (According to their testing).
I asked if they did a write test on the SSD, they said yes (A lie as you’ll see soon), I took their word for it (Maybe it was skill issue on my part) went home and tried to reinstall Windows (It failed ofc), I thought maybe the formatting was messed up so I tried to format within Linux but that also failed (Got a read only error).
I went back to the shop and told them that it’s not working and this time I made them do a write test, at this point they confirmed the issue I was having but still refused to replace it, they blamed me for having it in read only mode.
I explained SSDs enter read only mode state when they die but they ignored me, at this point they offered to “repair” my computer for $150, I refused as I know what I’m doing, and so I went home with no replacement being forced to contact Samsung for my replacement.
I make an RMA request at Samsung, mail in my SSD and 2 weeks later they confirm my fault (And I think I’m finally at the end of the road) but it takes another 2 weeks for Samsung to say that they have no replacements available and instead offer me a refund. I give them all my details needed for the refund and I get silence, it took about 3 weeks for them to send a form for me to fill out for my refund (Sent Yesterday) and now I have to wait 14 days for my money to arrive in my bank account.
I have gone through literal hell just to get a refund for my SSD that I spent $500 for, I’m extremely bitter at this point and I’m not going to be buying any Samsung Product, and I sure as hell won’t be buying it from Centrecom.
I live in Australia, and we have very strict consumer protection laws, Centrecom in particular has egregiously violated these laws, I never thought that a shitshow like this could happen here.
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any problems for people only using these drives for PS5?
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Remember if you are returning your drive don’t forget to scrub it so that they can’t see all the porn you had on there. 🙂
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Really helpful video, thanks! I have the dreaded 3B2QGXA7 firmware in two 2tb drives. Question: I have a Razor Core X with a GPU in it connected to my 2018 Macbook pro via thunderbolt 3. Can I get an NVME PCIe card, plug my 980 pro into that inside the Razer Core X & do the firmware that way? Or is it just not possible over thunderbolt at all, even with a PCIe card in an enclosure?
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EEEEEEPPP!
I have this Samsung 980 Pro SSD.
Yikes! I need a backup, posthaste.
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I’m victim of evo870 “bad blocks” on ordinary laptop… about a year of buy, replaced on warranty
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I had a DS220+ fitted with 2x1TB 870 EVO’s. The NAS reported a drive starting to fail so I purchased 2 replacements. The disk then failed so I added the new disk, whilst re-building the RAID the second 870 died – all data lost ????Both 870’s were purchased in Dec 2021, I did some basic tests and the only errors I could find were bad sectors, I may put them in a PC and follow your testing guide.
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What are alternative brands that you can recommend that have similar specs to it?
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lol my 1tb 970 evo plus died today
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Great update. Followed your steps and checked my drive. Thank you
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Bla bla bla bla ….
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Scamsung products are garbage. I have multiple devices from phones, monitors, fridge, dishwasher, and TVs that die early or have erratic behaviors. I will buy another Samshit product again.
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firmware can be update with a thunderbolt adapter, i did it a bunch of times with an owc envoy express without any issue
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yup same thing hapened to me, my samsung 980 pro failed after 3 weeks of usage, Im using wd sn850x now, hope it last
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Just recently bought a 2TB 980 pro ssd for my future pc build. Is there anyway to test the ssd without a pc to plug it into. Thought this was a safe purchase seeing how everyone recommends them.
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I have encountered this issue (surging Media and Data Integrity Errors entries in SMART and failing Full Scan in Samsung Magician) in July last year. With sheer luck, I have spotted it early. I somehow managed to contain and recover the situation by performing secure erase and a firmware update.
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my 970 evo 1 tb crashed last week tried everything reinstalling bios fresh windows 11 install nothing worked. bought a new 990 pro 1 tb ssd now well see if this one actually works. Got one year out of my 970 evo 1tb
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I owned an addlink for about 5 months and it just recently died. Thankfully it had a 5 year warranty. Thankfully everything stored was easily replaced. I think ssds in general are a new tech and we are seeing the failures of it now.
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I have 2 Samsung T7 2TB ext drives. I paid $400 ea. They BOTH failed at about 6mos. Samsung is giving me an extensive hard time for support. These drives were periodically Smart checked with no indications of regression. Lost all Data, which Samsung will not offer recovery. I blame myself, of course. These drives now go for UNDER $150. Big loss overall ! Good bye Samsung. Buyers beware ! Thanx for this Mate !????
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Mine failed last week. Exactly as reported. Read locked.
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My last drive 980 pro went all the way to 0% took about 3 months of straight writing but should show you SSDs aren’t just dying like I know people who are running Chia plot nvmes at 0% for the last 3 months and it’s still kicking and writing 108gb plot files with no errors.. just because your drive says it’s 0% doesn’t mean jack!
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Dude I farm Xch chia and I have 120 drives 18tb and guess what I’ve only used about 3 nvmes to get 1.638PIB!! Stop the CHIA crap and look how they have made it sooo much better for people who have 128gb of ram it barely touches the nvmes! Now they use ram disk for most the writing and use the nvme to read so it doesn’t kill it as fast at all!
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Glad i went with WD blue edition then. Not as fast but atleast its reliable
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I just built a new PC with a 980 pro 2tb m.2. This is not what I was expecting when buying a samsung ssd. Are they working on fixes or am I going to have to purchase a new 2TB m.2?
Upgrading from a 2.5 sata 240GB from a cheap-o back in 2016, so I’m very unfamiliar with m.2’s
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So I have two Samsung 980 non-pro 1TB, are there any issues with those?
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I’m glad I got a 990 PRO. ????
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I assume you can use a M.2 SSD to PCIE card adaptor?
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You cannot use any external dock or USB converter as the firmware upgrade process will need to detect an NVMe drive connected directly to PCIe. You CAN, however, use an M.2 M key PCIe expansion card with a desktop machine with open PCIe slot to upgrade your firmware. Most NVMe drives use 4 PCIe lanes, so an expansion card with support for one NVMe drive will use 4 PCIe lanes, support for 2 drives means 8 PCIe lanes, and support for 4 cards means 16 PCIe lanes like a graphics card.
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Is there an equivalent tool from Samsung under Linux?
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Was trying to figure out WTF as going on with my 980 Pro. My PC wouldn’t boot and got Stuck on Read-only mode a week ago.
Samsung’s RMA process is a nightmare
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just bought one with heatsink and removed heatsink so no more warranty ,F me
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I’m wondering if you could do a video comparing the 4K h265 transcoding for the Minis or MinisForum mini computers. Since my NAS will not do the transcoding I was thinking about putting one of the Minis mini computers next to my TV and have it run Plex pulling the data over Ethernet from my NAS. I contacted MinisForum to see what box would do this for the lowest cost and their response was that they could not recommend a system but would choose one with a discrete graphics chip. I’m just wondering if this would be a cost effective option and where the sweet spot would be in their lineup.
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So is this just for the NVMe devices, or is it impacting the SATA SSD’s too?
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I upgrade a lot of Intel era Apple iMacs and laptops using NVMe with adapters. I’ve switched from Samsung to WD Black as I’ve has several failures from Samsung drives and the WD are proving to be faster and, so far, more reliable.
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It’s good I got 990pro 2fTB or my PS5 console just now. But as a imac user I won’t be able to update 990pro firmware or check any health stats…
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I have a 980 Pro 2TB with over 100TB written with no issues. The real story is with the 990 Pro.
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*Samsung pushing an update to the drive truly doesn’t fix it! The update is basically hiding the problems, so you can’t see them.. You should know that SOFTWARE can not repair HARDWARE problems it can only hide them and try to prevent any more damage from happening!*
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Yep had a 980 Pro PCIe 4.0 NVMe M.2 2TB SSD fail. Had to recover data and eventually (took months) received a 970 Evo Plus via a RMA.
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What about the 980 Pro 1TB models made 2022/01 ? Mine is the heatsink model.
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Oh, so it’s M.2 form factor drives only? I thought the 2.5″ Samsung SSD that I got late 2019 would be concerned.
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You got to make a video with the 990 pro in a ps5 please.
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i hv asus z690 plus tuf wifi d4 motherboard. i wana fill my three m.2 slots .
which one i shud buy among 2tb 970 evo plus or 2tb 980 pro
im using 850 evo and 860 evo since launch
& 970 evo plus since 12th gen launch
P.S. 980 pro lacks the nvme driver unlike 970 evo plus
do we any other brand that has good software and driver support.
please advice me????
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Also an issue with 870 EVO drives. Had one with errors and had it replaced through Samsung warranty fortunately.
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Had 2 2TB 980 PRO fail on me, one lasted about 5 months and the other just under 4 months.
Both started spitting out large numbers of SMART media errors and data corruption (luckily nothing valuable was lost).
Luckily replaced with other brands that are still working ~12 months later.
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To be clear … you cant hook up an affected drive to your motherboard via external usb , using enclosures etc … but does that mean that you can only hook the drive up to the board using the M.2 spot on the board, or can you rig an enclosure up to run directly off of a sata connection on the board?
And if the drive in question IS ACTUALLY your C: or system drive, can you run the update on it as the system drive, or does the updating drive have to be mounted as a secondary drive to the system, likely requiring a second M.2 spot on the board?
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I wonder if the *Samsung PM9A1* (980 OEM) are effected ?
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Anyone manged to update it via Thunderbolt or SATA somehow?
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PlayStation 5 Fantom Drives Venom8 7,400MB/s read speed, 6,900MB/s write speed compatible ssd test when
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I’m screwed! I have the Samsung 980 pro and the 990 pro.
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I run two of these and have seen no issues so far in over a year of use.
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I’m using the power management setting drives turn off after 5 mins and are set to low power use, still works great for me
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So after watching this, a bunch of crypto miners are whining because they’ve raped their computers along with every component including their m.2 SSDs and they’re whining like little babies. Got it.
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I’ve stopped using Samsung drives altogether as I had 9 x 870 EVO drives fail within less than a month of purchasing them brand new.
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My 980 Pro 2TB s.m.a.r.t. shows 941 Media Errors but diagnostic scan says all is good
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I have a lot of 980 Pro and 970 EVO M.2s with absolutely NO SMART ERRORS. I did however update to the latest firmware but there was only one to my understanding affected firmware and most firmware versions are only a month or two before a revision. Meaning the chances of you having a bad firmware are extremely small.
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Interesting topic. I’m using a 980 PRO as an external SSD for my Mac Studio for photo & music libraries. The Samsung SSD is already on an automated backup schedule to a traditional external hard drive, and I use DriveDX to monitor the health of all my drives, but I’ll be keeping a close eye on the SMART stats from now on.
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Samsung is beginning to disappoint me, I rent an apt with a samsung fridge, it already making noise, my parents have a samsung clothing dryer, it broke in 5 years. Samsung TVs were a good deal but their OS they began to put into TVs is very laggy and lackluster…. SSDs were the only thing I still trust them with, and I have their sata ssds…
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