SSD Secure Erase

[tp4tissue]

Make sure y'all run it every ~30-50 Terabyte (writes).


Just ran it on my cheapo SSD after 78 TB,   It's sooo much faster now.

Before it was crawling at 100MB/s linear , now back to 600MB/s


Restored to factory fresh performance

[SpAmRaY]

What does it do to overall lifespan?? Any degradation in that regard??

Sent from my SM-G930V using Tapatalk

[tp4tissue]

What does it do to overall lifespan?? Any degradation in that regard??

it uses 1 full program/erase cycle,  but this isn't a weekly thing, so there won't be any meaning reduction in total lifespan.

The other kewl thing is it only takes less than a minute, full disk refresh.

[xtrafrood]

translation: dd if=/dev/zero of=/dev/sdXXX bs=1M

[Leslieann]

Unless your drive and/or os lacks or has terrible trim/gargage collection you shouldn't need to do that.

Win7 did not have trim on by default (has to be done with command prompt), 8 does or will if an ssd is detected, same for win10. XP relies entirely on the drive to do it and early ssds did not have it at all. I would say most newer SSDs should do it automatically as well, however the market has been hit by some pretty crappy ssds lately so they may not.


With as much torrenting data shuffling as TP does, I can imagine he just overloads it.

[Leslieann]

translation: dd if=/dev/zero of=/dev/sdXXX bs=1M

Do not do this!
Same for trying to defrag an ssd.

The trim/garbage collection system in an SSD can cause it to just keep formatting (or moving if defragged) the same cells over and over until it reaches the same wear level as the others, then slowly expands until all cells have the same wear level. It's a great way to use a ton of write cycles and destroy an ssd. Most major ssd manufacturers offer tools specifically designed for the job for this very reason.

[xtrafrood]

translation: dd if=/dev/zero of=/dev/sdXXX bs=1M

Do not do this!
Same for trying to defrag an ssd.

The trim/garbage collection system in an SSD can cause it to just keep formatting (or moving if defragged) the same cells over and over until it reaches the same wear level as the others, then slowly expands until all cells have the same wear level. It's a great way to use a ton of write cycles and destroy an ssd. Most major ssd manufacturers offer tools specifically designed for the job for this very reason.

Don't flip all the bits to 0?  So don't reformat either?  I run a cron job once a week for trimming, so maybe my use case is a bit different from folks that have trim on full tilt.

edit - Whoops, not a cron job.  I enabled fstrim.service and fstrim.timer for periodic trimming because my system did not perform well with continuous trim (discard).
https://wiki.archlinux.org/index.php/Solid_state_drive#Periodic_TRIM

My limited understanding tells me that if the person was to un-mount the drive FIRST they would also turn off any of the mount options like discard.

I actually had to look up secure erase and this is what led me to believe that it's as simple as that dd command I posted earlier (sans un-mount).
https://www.cnet.com/how-to/how-to-securely-erase-an-ssd-drive/ (pic with window title: Disk Erasing 101)

[tp4tissue]

trim and GC are not the same as Secure Erase. 

Secure erase is the only thing that can fix the speed degradation Tp4 were seeing.

Even if you guys don't data-shuffle, it's still prudent to do SErase every ~30-50TB writes.

[fanpeople]

The only true secure erase is completed with a hammer. Send me your drives and I will "trim" them for you.

[tp4tissue]

The only true secure erase is completed with a hammer. Send me your drives and I will "trim" them for you.

NSA research proj BMH#432 , Silicon Shards Restoration.

[fanpeople]

The only true secure erase is completed with a hammer. Send me your drives and I will "trim" them for you.

NSA research proj BMH#432 , Silicon Shards Restoration.

They can't restore the shards if i put them in my skin pocket for safe keeping

[xtrafrood]

Ok, in your world what does Secure Erase ACTUALLY mean?  What is in fact Secure Erase?

GC probably stands for something obvious (galactic commander?) but OFC trim has nothing to do with erasing the data on an SSD.. dang

I think the point was brought up because if continuous trim is active on a *nix SSD and not un-mounted before zeroing out the data disastrous things could happen

Read somewhere that the FBI recommends zeroing out the drive 10-20 times for data shredding.  Never had the need but there it is I guess.

[fohat.digs]

The only true secure erase is completed with a hammer.

It's a shame that SSDs don't have those great magnets inside like real Hard Disk Drives. I need to get out my T10 and strip a few more that I have laying around.

[Coreda]

Sure you don't have an Samsung EVO 840? As this is precisely the kind of issue that affected that line, where data that was written a while ago and not re-written would suffer from slower reads (sometimes HDD levels of slowness). They issued a firmware fix late in its life, though I have no experience with the fix.

[xtrafrood]

The only true secure erase is completed with a hammer.

It's a shame that SSDs don't have those great magnets inside like real Hard Disk Drives. I need to get out my T10 and strip a few more that I have laying around.

In a pinch I'd image the platters would make for decent signaling mirrors too

[tp4tissue]

Sure you don't have an Samsung EVO 840? As this is precisely the kind of issue that affected that line, where data that was written a while ago and not re-written would suffer from slower reads (sometimes HDD levels of slowness). They issued a firmware fix late in its life, though I have no experience with the fix.

Are you implying Tp4 is unaware of the ssd he's using, or of the 840 evo voltage degradation problem ?

[Coreda]

Are you implying Tp4 is unaware of the ssd he's using, or of the 840 evo voltage degradation problem ?

Well, you didn't mention the model just that it was cheap (suggesting either it's not one of the typical brands or it's an older model bought inexpensively) so worth a shot.

[p_blaze]

Sure you don't have an Samsung EVO 840? As this is precisely the kind of issue that affected that line, where data that was written a while ago and not re-written would suffer from slower reads (sometimes HDD levels of slowness). They issued a firmware fix late in its life, though I have no experience with the fix.

Are you implying Tp4 is unaware of the ssd he's using, or of the 840 evo voltage degradation problem ?

nice meme tp

[xtrafrood]

Sure you don't have an Samsung EVO 840? As this is precisely the kind of issue that affected that line, where data that was written a while ago and not re-written would suffer from slower reads (sometimes HDD levels of slowness). They issued a firmware fix late in its life, though I have no experience with the fix.

Are you implying Tp4 is unaware of the ssd he's using, or of the 840 evo voltage degradation problem ?

nice meme tp

First impression says that that anime is about middle school... because that sounds like middle school..

[tp4tissue]

First impression says that that anime is about middle school... because that sounds like middle school..

I've never seen that anime,  merely linked to illustrate the classic Ohohoho faux-demure response

[Leslieann]

Don't flip all the bits to 0?  So don't reformat either?  I run a cron job once a week for trimming, so maybe my use case is a bit different from folks that have trim on full tilt.

A quick format (which resets the table) should be all you need.

Even if it doesn't trigger trim, it still shouldn't be necessary.
Part of the problem you run into is that trim is built into many drives now, so even if you disable it in the OS the drive still does it.

[xtrafrood]

Don't flip all the bits to 0?  So don't reformat either?  I run a cron job once a week for trimming, so maybe my use case is a bit different from folks that have trim on full tilt.

A quick format (which resets the table) should be all you need.

Even if it doesn't trigger trim, it still shouldn't be necessary.
Part of the problem you run into is that trim is built into many drives now, so even if you disable it in the OS the drive still does it.

I create a new partition table with gparted if I need a fresh drive. 

Read up on new nand flash controllers a bit more I will.

Good for help make VM go fast is all I know atm.