It's
2011 (the
year after the SSD
Bubble) - but as I warned back in
2007 (Year of
SSD Revolutions) don't count on being able to recover data from a failed flash
SSD.
Warning to readers! Anyone can in a few hours create a
plausible looking website which claims their company can perform data recovery
on flash SSDs.
Many of the sites I've seen in this market segment
make claims which are unsupportable and few of the so-called SSD recovery
companies I've queried in this market have any clear idea of the complexity of
the task involved.
Many SSD failures are in fact unrecoverable -
because if the remapping tables get trashed - the media data is effectively
randomized - and mixed up with blocks which were marked as corrupted and
unusable even before the SSD failed. Worse still if the SSD is
encrypted.
My
advice at this stage in the
SSD market
expansion is to look at data recovery information on your SSD vendor's
original site and (mostly) disregard any data recovery sites you may see which
have been in operation for less than 5 years. You can verify age and content
using the
internet archive. | |
 |
| . |
SandForce names trusted
partner for SSD data recovery
Editor:- May 5, 2011 - SandForce today
named DriveSavers
as a member of its trusted partners program.
"DriveSavers was our
first choice to expand the SandForce Trusted program to include
data recovery services,"
said Kent Smith, Senior Director of Product Marketing for SandForce. "While
SandForce SSD Processors eliminate the most common data loss scenarios through
DuraClass NAND flash management features, DriveSavers can provide the SSD a
safety net should the unexpected SSD failure happen and data loss occurs."
Editor's comments:- although many data recovery companies have
developed techniques
to deal with SSDs - some SSDs are difficult or impossible to recover without
the support of the original
controller company.
This is a significant announcement because it makes SandForce SSDs more
attractive in consumer markets. Over 90% of consumers don't do reliable
backups.
new article - SSD Data Recovery Concepts and Technologies
Editor:-
December 1, 2010 -
StorageSearch.com today
published a new article -
Introduction to SSD
Data Recovery Concepts and Technologies - written by Jeremy Brock,
President, A+
Perfect Computers.
It's hard enough understanding the
design of any single SSD. And there are so many different designs in the
market.
If you've ever wondered what it looks like at the other end of
the SSD supply chain - when a user has a damaged SSD which contains priceless
data with no usable backup - this article - written by one of a rare new
breed of SSD recovery
experts will give you some idea. I've waited more than 3 years to find
someone to write an article on this subject for you. And now it's only a click
away - read the
article
bad block management in flash SSDs
Editor:- November
26, 2010 - StorageSearch.com
today published a new article -
principles of
bad block management in flash SSDs.
It's a non technical
introduction to the thinking behind one of the many vital functions inside a
flash SSD controller.
The new article - started out life this morning as a long email reply to one of
my readers with whom I have been discussing various aspects of SSD data
recovery. ...read
the article
Hyperstone will use Toshiba tech in new SSD controllers
Editor:-
October 12, 2010 -
Hyperstone
today announced
that Toshiba
(Europe) has agreed to provide the company with a variety of
ASIC design and
manufacturing services.
New SSD
controllers based on Toshiba semiconductor process technology will sample
in Q1, 2011.
Editor's comments:- Some of Hyperstone's products appear in
consumer SSDs - and this is a market which is noted for its lack of effective
backups (unlike the enterprise
SSD market) - so I asked the company if they had any views about the
emerging SSD data
recovery market.
Axel Mehnert, VP
Marketing at Hyperstone told me - "Regarding data recovery, we do not
really have any particular statement or policy. It depends on the firmware.
Customers (SSD oems) use different implementations. Depending on the deletion
process or errors' root causes data recovery might be possible or, in other
cases, not even desired. Our customers specify their requirements and we adopt
our firmware accordingly. Quite possibly, you will find different types of
implementations when looking at the same controller ID."
SandForce shows x2 SSD controller
Editor:- October 7,
2010 - SandForce
today
announced
availability of its next generation
SF-2000
family SSD processors - for oems designing
SAS 3 class (6Gbps)
enterprise
acceleration SSDs.
The SF-2000 supports 500MB/s sequential R/W,
60,000 sustained random IOPS, wire speed encryption, end to end
data integrity checks
and industrial temperature operation in a
skinny flash
SSD architecture.
Also new in this controller generation is support
for sector sizes additional to 512-bytes e.g., 520, 524, 528, 4K, etc., with
Data Integrity Field (DIF) for true enterprise-class SAS drive behavior and
performance.
Editor's comments:- one simple way of looking at
the SF-2000 would be as an incremental x2 version of what SandForce has
done before - which also demonstrates that the glass ceiling for their
architecture is much higher than some people might have thought.
In a
briefing yesterday I asked about the data recoverability of the SSDs based on
the new controllers - while acknowledging that the market it was aimed at - the
datacenter- does adequate backups so DR shouldn't be necessary.
Kent
Smith, Director of Product Marketing, SandForce told me that in this family of
SSD controllers - the company would be moving even closer towards what already
exists in military SSDs
- and offering the option of having on board
data sanitization.
The data in SF-2000 driven SSDs is double encrypted (encrypted on the way in
from the SATA controller and then encrypted again as it is written to the flash
array. The company's view is that it would be impossible for a DR company to
reconstruct data from the flash chips in the SSD without having access to
the SSD oem's unique key generation technology. (The oem has the ability to do
this as a one time programmable function.) Without that data - even SandForce
would be unable to read the contents of the SSD.
These technologies are
designed to make customer data secure. It would be possible for SSD oems to
select DR partners to whom they entrusted their own keys - but that was a
matter for the SSD maker. Proliferation of such data is likely to be restricted
- because otherwise it defeats the security of the product.
SSD Data Recovery - update
Editor:- September 15,
2010 - regular readers of
StorageSearch.com know that
I'm skeptical about the claims which most data recovery companies put on their
web sites about their abilities to
recover data from
failed SSDs.
David Foster,
General Manager of Memofix
emailed me to say - "I was reading what you were saying about SSD drives
and data recovery. I agree 100% with your view that most recovery companies
cannot deal with most SSD hardware issues. But please remember a large portion
of the cases any recovery company sees are the result of file system damaged or
corruption .. and these cases are easily handled by any half descent DR
company.
"Memofix has only ever seen 3 SSD drives for data
recovery and 2 cases were file system damage including a simple deletion case.
In the other case we were able to replace a non-memory component and make the
device accessible again.
"Additionally we do dozens of
USB flash drives with
anywhere from 1-4 actual memory chips onboard, so we do intimately understand
the intricies of translation tables and putting all the pieces back together."
Editor:- it's good to hear from people who know what they're doing in
this new area of SSD data recovery. David Foster also writes a
blog in which he
discusses storage
reliability and recovery in a more informative way than many others I've
seen - based on his long experience in the industry.
For example - did
you know that 2.5"
drives are more recoverable than 3.5" drives? - I didn't - and would
have expected it to be the other way round.
new article - SSD training and education
Editor:-
July 19, 2010 -
StorageSearch.com today
published a new article and directory on the subject of -
SSD training and
education.
There are many people out there on the web who say
they can help you. But choosing an SSD training supplier could be as tricky as
finding a new SSD - or as risky as choosing an SSD recovery company.
Recalibrating Consumer Assumptions about SSD Data Recovery
Editor:-
December 7, 2009 - this is an update on the theme of
Data Recovery for
flash SSDs.
The ability to recover data (or not) from a damaged
flash SSD could become an important way of segmenting SSD products. In this
context (as always) an
SSD is
defined as a device which has internal
wear-leveling - as
opposed to simpler flash
drives which don't. The loss of data which maps logical to physical
addresses inside the SSD
controller presents a tough challenge for recovery.
SSD Data
Recoverability segments can be broadly defined as
- easily recoverable. This includes devices which have internal
support to facilitate data recovery - designed into the controller architecture.
Although such products are in the design stage - they are not yet widely
available. This type of SSD could be as economic to recover as a current
notebook hard drive.
- recoverable at high cost. This is the case for nearly all flash
SSDs currently shipping. (See comments from a
data recovery expert
below.)
- non recoverable (unlucky). This is one step beyond the category
above. Most flash SSDs with internal encryption would not be economic to recover
- if the internal translation tables were corrupted. This includes many new
notebook SSDs
- and will come as an unwelcome surprise to their owners should they be unlucky
enough to need data recovery services.
- non recoverable (intrinsic). These are SSDs which have been
specifically designed
to thwart any prospects for data recovery. In these SSDs - data destruction
circuits are part of the product design - and you pay more for this feature.
I've
been talking to data recovery experts about SSD recovery for many years - but
it's only recently that the market has reached the size where this is starting
to become part of their daily experience.
Andy Butler, founder
of ABC Data Recovery
today told me - "I have 3 technicians who all trained on NAND
readers. On average we do about 30 per week but can handle more. It gets
more time consuming - therefore costly - as you move into larger SSDs. A
64GB PCIe SSD unit
could take a technician over a week of nonstop work.
" It's more complex than a
RAID recovery, but consumers
assume their data is safe and a recovery will be cheap because it's not a
mechanical repair. As the recovery tools / technology develops we should be
able to speed the process up, but for the time being any SSD over 8GB are
charged on a case by case basis. Anyone with an encrypted SSD should be
warned to backup, if the
controller gets damaged, it's most likely we would only recover encrypted data."
| |
| . |
|
Data Recovery
for flash SSDs? - don't count on it |
Editor:-
September 24, 2007 - if the
flash SSD market
reaches the levels of penetration predicted by many
analysts - then in a
handful of years nearly half of all new
notebook
PCs will use flash SSDs instead of
hard disk drives.
What
happens when those SSDs inevitably fail - and there's no
backup?
Most
consumers don't do regular backups - and most small businesses don't either.
When
hard drives fail, get
submerged in
water or get damaged in fires - the solution of last resort - is to call a
data recovery company.
These superheroes can often recover a lot of data - even if the pcbs
and chips in the disk drive have been damaged. Superheroes don't come cheap.
The cost for a difficult recovery can run into thousands of dollars (for a
single disk) but for many satisfied customers that's a much better result than
being left with no business or months of lost time rewriting reports, novels
etc.
Although flash SSDs are new to the consumer market - they've been
around for many
years in markets which absolutely needed their levels of ruggedness (and
could bear the high cost). So you may be thinking that there's a well
established industry already out there ready to process your flash SSD - if you
are unlucky enough to need a data recovery service today.
You would be
wrong.
The reason is that the biggest traditional customers of flash
SSDs have been the military
or industrial users who didn't want enemies / competitors stealing their
secrets.
Erstwhile flash SSD manufacturers like
Adtron,
BiTMICRO and
STEC specialised in
having on-board
disk sanitization
of various forms to make sure that that the data is never recovered by the wrong
people.
So there isn't an established data recovery market track
record for flash SSDs in those applications which have been around the
longest.
The nearest that the market has to offer - is experience
with recovering data from simple
flash memory storage
(like USB keyring style
devices or camera memory cards). Unlike SSDs - those devices aren't designed for
intensive write applications - and there is nothing very complicated between the
interface controller and the flash chips themselves. So if the controller gets
zapped by static - or crunched by your car driving over it - the data is
relatively easy for experts to recover from the flash chips.
That isn't
the case with most flash SSDs - which use complicated
controller technology
to extend the reliability
and speed of storage. The architecture inside a high performance SSD is more
complicated than that in most
RAID systems. The
algorithms which map addresses to physical media locations vary from
manufacturer to manufacturer - and in many cases - like the
formula for making
Coke or Pepsi - the details are closely guarded commercial secrets.
Look
at the server market and data recovery (at the single SSD level) is not a
burning issue for datacenter applications - because most often the SSDs operate
in some kind of RAID
protected array - and are also backed up (internally or externally) to other
disks.
One thing
missing in the consumer
notebook SSD
market is a clear signal by oems - that data in their devices can be easily
recovered - if there is no backup - or the backup failed. Maybe the next
generation of products will address that issue. It would be another way of
segmenting the consumer flash SSD market - and a market need and opportunity
which hasn't been understood by SSD product marketers at the close of 2008.
Although
flash SSDs are inherently much more
reliable than hard
drives - that's no consolation for the customers who will be the pioneers in SSD
data recovery. | |
| |
|
|
| What do
data recovery stats tell us about HDD vs SSD comparative reliability? |
Editor:- November 7, 2010 - there has been a lot
of speculation in the storage market about the
reliability of flash
SSDs in the field - as opposed to their theoretically calculated lifetimes
due to factors like write intensive
wear-out.
Having said that - the MTBF figures quoted in some company's
datasheets become fiction for
flaky SSDs - which
fail at the start of their life because the design was wrong - and which need
euphemistically called "firmware upgrades" to make them work properly.
How
can you get an undistorted industry wide view of the SSD reliability
experience?
SSD data recovery
is a subject I've discussed in detail with many leading DR companies.
In this context I mean trying to recover data from an SSD in situations where
there is no useful backup.
The main causes of SSD failure are power
surges, static, environmental stress, software anomalies and ineffective flash
wear leveling.
Extrapolating from the data I've seen suggests that the industry is
handling in the low hundreds of SSD recoveries per month. That compares to an
installed base of around 40 million SSDs.
What can you infer
from this?
If
hard disks were as
reliable as SSDs - the data recovery business would be much smaller than it is
today.
SSD data recovery is a tiny business today.
It's so
small that it's not economically viable for any DR companies to advertise
their SSD recovery services here on StorageSearch.com.
That may be
bad news for SSD market publishers - but it's good news for prospective SSD
buyers. The message from the data recovery market experience is - that if you
choose the correct type of SSD for your application - it will be much more
reliable than any hard drive. | | |
|
|
|
| Can you believe the
word "reliability" in a 2.5" SSD ad? |
Editor:-
Reliability is an
important factor in many applications which use
SSDs.... but can you trust
an SSD brand just because it claims to be reliable?
As we've seen in
recent years - in the rush for the
SSD market bubble -
many design teams which previously had little or no experience of SSDs were
tasked with designing such products - and the result has been successive waves
of flaky SSDs and
SSDs whose specifications
couldn't be relied on to remain stable and in many products quickly
degraded in customer sites. |
 |
As part of an education
series for SSD product marketers - this case study describes how one company -
which didn't have the conventional background to start off with - managed to
equate their brand of SSD with reliability in the minds of designers in the
embedded systems market. ...read the article | | | |
| . |
What is Data Recovery?
Selecting
a Data Recovery Provider
SSD news
SSD Bookmarks
the Fastest SSDs
the SSD Buyers Guide
SSD Jargon Explained
After SSDs... What Next?
What's a Solid
State Disk?
the Top 10 SSD Companies
Increasing Flash SSD
Reliability
Can
you trust your flash SSD specs?
SSD Myths and
Legends - "write endurance"
How Bad is - Choosing the
Wrong SSD Supplier?
Z's Laws - Predicting
Future Flash SSD Performance
Why Consumers Can Expect
More Flaky Flash SSDs! |
| . |
| Are MLC SSDs Safe
in Enterprise Apps? |
This is a follow up article to the
popular
SSD Myths and
Legends which in
2007
demolished the myth that flash memory wear-out (a comfort blanket beloved
by many
RAM SSD makers at the
time) precluded the use of
SLC flash in heavy
duty datacenters.
Are MLC SSDs Safe? - has also become a classic
and very popular article. It looks at the risks posed by MLC Nand Flash SSDs
which - having hatched from their breeeding ground as
chip modules in
cellphones - have morphed and crept into
hard disk form
factors.
In a
notebook
(where you aren't exactly aiming for a 99.999% uptime quality data
experience) MLC SSDs can be a good thing from the
reliability and
cost point of view.
But in the datacenter?
First published in
2008 this
article has been extensively updated in 2010 - to answer common reader
questions - and because the risks from newer MLC flash are even greater than
they were when the article originally appeared.
It starts down a
familiar lane but includes many technology twists. You'll realize that patching
the hole in the bottom of the leaking data bucket isn't much good - if the whole
bucket can tip over and splash your data beyond
ECC limits due
to factors which no SSD
controller guarantees to protect you from. That's because there's a lot
more to MLC data integrity risk than endurance! |
 |
Knowing what these risks are can help you
decide if your enterprise app is inside or outside the vulnerable to data
loss zone.
...read the
article | | | | |
