SSD Drives - Why so small in size?

[VanguardLH]

One? Just one?

From what I've seen of Gates in past seminars and expos, I suspect he
really just does e-mail on his host. He's lost doing anything outside
of what was planned for him to show off at the seminar and aides quickly
dash up to his side when something fails or unexpected happens. Being
an entrepreneur doesn't mean you're expert at what you sell. Don't
accredit expertise to Bill for technologies embraced by his software
products. He obviously can afford to pay someone else to do the
hardware and software setup, maintenance, and troubleshooting rather
than waste his own personal time of that stuff. His expertise is at a
far higher level than working on installing and fixing hardware and
software problems. He's high-end management, not low-end tech support.

 

[Char Jackson]

I don't think any of us suggests that anything you buy from eBay will
be a problem. Rather the *risk* of buying something from eBay is much
greater than buying it somewhere else, and saving a few dollars (or
Euros, in your case) by buying it there may not be worth exposing
yourself to that risk.

To illustrate, my nephew bought a lot (or set) of 10 32GB flash drives from
an Ebay seller about 18 months ago. When he got them, they were labeled
32GB, but they only formatted to 1GB. When he went to check with the seller,
the seller had vanished.

 

[Char Jackson]

Not to mention grinding or clicking sounds

I have owned at least one drive that could be revived by a few taps of a
screwdriver handle. I *did* decide to replace it

I've done the screwdriver handle trick, but my favorite was the drive that
only worked for about a minute when starting from cold, then would refuse to
respond as it warmed up. After pulling it out of the freezer, I put a piece
of Saran wrap (thin plastic) over it to protect it, then I set two large
glasses of ice water on top of the drive. It stayed cold enough for me to
pull the customer's data off.

 

[philo]

On 01/07/2013 06:23 PM, J. P. Gilliver (John) wrote:

Cost.
[]

As to SSD , I have been reluctant to use one as my fear would be
failure with no warning. With a mechanical drive it's been my
experience that there is usually some type of warning first...such as
SMART, bad clusters or R/W errors.

Brave of you to express that viewpoint; I totally agree with it, but
whenever I've expressed it online, I've been attacked, even when I make
it clear that I'm aware of your next line.

I have no experience with SSD so do not know if there is any pre-warning
or not.

However, as someone who has been repairing computers for many years
there was only one case I can think of of where a mechanical drive
failed with no warning.

I lucked out though and found a raised end on a SMT capacitor and
re-soldered it...and it worked!


The owner of that machine got a very good lecture on backups.
My advice to everyone is to have a copy of all data on at least two
physically independent drives.

I have also started to do some "cloud" backups.

 

[Ken Blake]

Not to mention grinding or clicking sounds

What, you think not only a good backup strategy is required, but also
grinding or clicking sounds? ;-)

 

[s|b]

To illustrate, my nephew bought a lot (or set) of 10 32GB flash drives from
an Ebay seller about 18 months ago. When he got them, they were labeled
32GB, but they only formatted to 1GB. When he went to check with the seller,
the seller had vanished.

Ah, but before buying I checked the feedback the seller got and the fact
that eBay labeled him as "Registered as a business seller" should mean
something, no? Or maybe I just got lucky...

 

[s|b]

Not necessarily for those who use SSDs exclusively and no HDs. If I
had Bill Gates's money, I would have only SSDs, and I'd probably have
two or three of that size. And some of us here (Char, for example)
might have many more than two or three.

I was hinting at a (famous?) quote from Bill Gates: "640K ought to be
enough for anybody"

 

[gufus]

I was hinting at a (famous?) quote from Bill Gates: "640K ought to be
enough for anybody"

VBG

 

[Ken Blake]

I was hinting at a (famous?) quote from Bill Gates: "640K ought to be
enough for anybody"

Yes, I know the (supposed) quotation, but missed that you were
referring to it. Sorry.

 

[Paul]

Ah, but before buying I checked the feedback the seller got and the fact
that eBay labeled him as "Registered as a business seller" should mean
something, no? Or maybe I just got lucky...

At one time, virtually all the USB flash drives on Ebay were bogus.

Ebay even had a warning web page, crafted by one of their users,
which described the type of scam involved. A seller would offer a
16Gb instead of a 16GB USB flash, and 16Gbits = 2GB. The user
would end up with a product in hand, with a 2GB flash chip inside
of it, and the controller on it was hacked to indicate 16GB. And
the instant you stored more than 2GB of stuff on it, the file system
would be corrupted. That's the kind of stuff you get from an
Ebay seller.

Now on the other hand, the Ebay seller would offer the USB flash
device for a ridiculously low price. Which should really be a warning
sign, for the thinking consumer. It's all about that "free lunch" thing.

Paul

 

[Gene E. Bloch]

What, you think not only a good backup strategy is required, but also
grinding or clicking sounds? ;-)

You're supposed to respond to what I meant, not to what I wrote...

Maybe I should have read my post before pressing send

And now my syn tax has been raised one more time.

 

[Ken Blake]

You're supposed to respond to what I meant, not to what I wrote...

Maybe I should have read my post before pressing send

LOL! Just pulling your leg a little, as I'm sure you realize.

 

[J. P. Gilliver (John)]

On 01/07/2013 06:23 PM, J. P. Gilliver (John) wrote:

Cost.
[]

As to SSD , I have been reluctant to use one as my fear would be
failure with no warning. With a mechanical drive it's been my
experience that there is usually some type of warning first...such as
SMART, bad clusters or R/W errors.

Brave of you to express that viewpoint; I totally agree with it, but
whenever I've expressed it online, I've been attacked, even when I make
it clear that I'm aware of your next line.

I have no experience with SSD so do not know if there is any
pre-warning or not.

However, as someone who has been repairing computers for many years
there was only one case I can think of of where a mechanical drive
failed with no warning.

My experience of mechanical drives is very similar. Of SSDs ditto, in
that I've not played with them, but of USB memory sticks, certainly
sudden and total failure seems to be the norm.

 

[J. P. Gilliver (John)]

In message <[email protected]>, VanguardLH <[email protected]>
writes:
[]

From what I've seen of Gates in past seminars and expos, I suspect he
really just does e-mail on his host. He's lost doing anything outside []
than waste his own personal time of that stuff. His expertise is at a
far higher level than working on installing and fixing hardware and
software problems. He's high-end management, not low-end tech support.

Back around 1980, most home computers had a ROM interpreter for the
BASIC language; many (IIRR about two thirds, at least in UK) had the
Microsoft BASIC, which was IMO a very competent implementation. (Of the
rest, Commodores - in the PET - was probably the commonest, though there
were several others, such as Sinclair/Timex.) This definitely had Bill's
name embedded in the code, so he does have a technical background, at
the very least.
--
J. P. Gilliver. UMRA: 1960/<1985 MB++G()AL-IS-Ch++(p)Ar@T+H+Sh0!:`)DNAf

.... we, the inter/in/actives of this world, need to unite and do nothing.
That'll teach them. Let telly make its own programmes.
- Alison Graham, RT 23-29 April 2011

 

[charlie]

I was hinting at a (famous?) quote from Bill Gates: "640K ought to be
enough for anybody"

It's a well known fact that programmers will find ways to consume all
the available assets, and ask for more. I still remember struggling to
write a machine code routine for an Apple ][ that had to fit in less
than 256 memory locations. The routine captured a midi data stream or
"dump" in real time, and stored it in a location not used by basic.
(High Res Graphics memory) A side effect was that you could display the
memory area, and "see" the incoming data as colored graphic squares.

 

[Gene Wirchenko]

On Wed, 9 Jan 2013 05:01:36 +0000, "J. P. Gilliver (John)"

[snip]

Back around 1980, most home computers had a ROM interpreter for the
BASIC language; many (IIRR about two thirds, at least in UK) had the
Microsoft BASIC, which was IMO a very competent implementation. (Of the
rest, Commodores - in the PET - was probably the commonest, though there

Which was also a Microsoft BASIC.

were several others, such as Sinclair/Timex.) This definitely had Bill's
name embedded in the code, so he does have a technical background, at
the very least.

Sincerely,

Gene Wirchenko

 

[Gene E. Bloch]

LOL! Just pulling your leg a little, as I'm sure you realize.

Definitely. It's nice to have some fun occasionally, even as the butt of
someone else's jokes