Re: [gentoo-user] Re: Finally got a SSD drive to put my OS on

[Mark Knecht <markknecht@gmail.com>]

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On Tue, Apr 18, 2023 at 7:53 AM Nikos Chantziaras <realnc@gmail.com> wrote:
>
> On 16/04/2023 01:47, Dale wrote:
> > Anything else that makes these special?  Any tips or tricks?
>
> Only three things.
>
> 1. Make sure the fstrim service is active (should run every week by
> default, at least with systemd, "systemctl enable fstrim.timer".)
>
> 2. Don't use the "discard" mount option.
>
> 3. Use smartctl to keep track of TBW.
>
> People are always mentioning performance, but it's not the important
> factor for me. The more important factor is longevity. You want your
> storage device to last as long as possible, and fstrim helps, discard
hurts.
>
> With "smartctl -x /dev/sda" (or whatever device your SSD is in /dev) pay
> attention to the "Data Units Written" field. Your 500GB 870 Evo has a
> TBW of 300TBW. That's "terabytes written". This is the manufacturer's
> "guarantee" that the device won't fail prior to writing that many
> terabytes to it. When you reach that, it doesn't mean it will fail, but
> it does mean you might want to start thinking of replacing it with a new
> one just in case, and then keep using it as a secondary drive.
>
> If you use KDE, you can also view that SMART data in the "SMART Status"
> UI (just type "SMART status" in the KDE application launcher.)
>

Add to that list that Samsung only warranties the drive for 5 years
no matter how much or how little you use it. Again, it doesn't mean
it will die in 5 years just as it doesn't mean it will die if it has had
more than 300TBW. However it _might_ mean that data written
to the drive and never touched again may be gone in 5 years.

Non-volatile memory doesn't hold it's charge forever, just as
magnetic disk drives and magnetic tape will eventually lose their
data.

On all of my systems here at home, looking at the TBW values, my
drives will go out of warranty at 5 years long before I'll get anywhere
near the TBW spec. However I run stable, long term distros that don't
update often and mostly use larger data files.

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