Samsung SSD 840 EVO 120GB Secure Erase

[EvoMan]

Hi all!

I was wondering if anyone could provide me with a somewhat detailed guide to wiping the disk clean/restoring it to factory state. I understand why it must be done outside of Windows. However, I don't understand what kind of bootable DVD/USB should be created.

I have a Windows 7 Home Premium ISO image burned on a DVD. Can I simply use that?

What I would like to do is make the disk "clean", i.e. completely erase it, and start from scratch - just like I did when I first got it. I want to delete everything, and simply do a clean install of Windows again.

What exactly needs to be done to accomplish this successfully?


Thank you in advance!


EDIT: I have Samsung Magician software btw.

EDIT 2: I would also like to know whether I can just boot from the above-mentioned DVD, format the disk, and do a clean install? What's the difference between formatting it and securely erasing it? In essence, what's the best/quickest/safest way to completely erase the disk and do a clean install of Windows on it? I'm running Windows 7 right now. Thanks!

 

[Hellhammer]

Samsung's SSD Magician includes a bootable secure erase tool that can be installed to a DVD/USB to secure erase the drive.

 

[EvoMan]

Ah makes sense, I get it now. So I use the bootable DVD/USB created by Samsung Magician with the tool on it to erase the disk, and then I can clean install Windows using my DVD. The disk will be the same as it was from day 1, and unpartitioned?

 

[Hellhammer]

Ah makes sense, I get it now. So I use the bootable DVD/USB created by Samsung Magician with the tool on it to erase the disk, and then I can clean install Windows using my DVD. The disk will be the same as it was from day 1, and unpartitioned?

Yes.

 

[EvoMan]

Thank you!

 

[Coup27]

One thing to be aware of. When you launch the secure erase utility it will tell you your disk is frozen and you need to remove the SATA power connector and reconnect it to remove this frozen state. To relaunch the application, you type SEGUI0.exe not SEGUIO.exe (zero, not letter O). I have seen this catch out a few people. The font isn't too clear when you first look at it.

 

[EvoMan]

I've created the bootable DVD, and it asked me whether I wanted to reboot and erase the disk. I selected Cancel because I plan to do it later. When will I get this message, and why do I need to relaunch it like that? I've seen people get that, and disconnecting and reconnecting the disk didn't help. I'm now kind of scared I won't be able to use the disk if I attempt to erase it. Why is it so complicated?

 

[aviator79]

I've created the bootable DVD, and it asked me whether I wanted to reboot and erase the disk. I selected Cancel because I plan to do it later. When will I get this message, and why do I need to relaunch it like that? I've seen people get that, and disconnecting and reconnecting the disk didn't help. I'm now kind of scared I won't be able to use the disk if I attempt to erase it. Why is it so complicated?

I don't understand your problem. If the DVD was created successfully you can always reboot, hit like F10 or F12 to select your DVD-Drive as boot device and do the secure erase. You do not need a Software-prompt. Just reboot and boot from the created DVD instead of your HardDisk/SSD.

 

[EvoMan]

I apologize, there is no problem as I haven't done the Secure Erase process yet. I've only created the DVD. However, what happens if it tells me the disk is "frozen"? When does that happen in the process and what exactly do I need to do if it happens? Does the Magician display that message in Windows when I proceed with the Secure Erase process, or when I boot with the disk? And what do I do if I get the message? When should I disconnect the cable? I don't understand how it works and it seems hugely complicated. I've run into many posts like this:

http://www.tomshardware.co.uk/forum...tate-including-enhanced-instructions-fix.html

and I'm afraid to erase the disk now. Is there a detailed step-by-step tutorial on how to do this?

I also hear people getting BSODs caused by the Magician software.


Thank you for your help btw.

 

[Coup27]

Firstly, this task is not complicated at all. For anybody who likes to "play" with computers it is not difficult to figure out what to do. If you are genuinely as concerned as you are, then you probably should not be messing around with all of this in the first place.

Let's think about this logically however. You want to totally erase your SSD. You currently have Windows installed and booted on our SSD so how can you erase it while you're using it? You can't. So to erase it, you have two options. Option 1 is to connect the SSD in another computer and erase it. Option 2 is to boot a secure erase DVD / CD / USB stick and erase the SSD while you are not using it. You used Magician to make this bootable DVD. This will allow you to boot a utility to wipe your SSD while you are not using it. So, step by step:

1. Use Magician to create a secure erase USB stick, DVD or CD.

2. Ensure you are ready to erase your SSD. Everything will be deleted and nothing can ever be recovered, not even by the NSA.

3. Restart your computer with the DVD in your drive. Your computer will then launch the DVD instead of Windows. If this does not happen, you need to change your boot order in BIOS so your DVD drive boots before your SSD.

4. The utility will boot and scan your system. It will then ask if you want to secure erase your disk. Press Y. It will then tell you your disk is "frozen". This simply means you need to pull the power connector, wait 5 seconds and reconnect it. Press a key to acknowledge the frozen message on screen. The utility will now exit to DOS.

5. Remove the power connector from your SSD, wait 5 seconds and reconnect it.

6. Now type, SEGUI0.exe This will relaunch the application. Remember, it's a zero and not the letter O.

7. Follow the steps now on screen, such as press Y and your disk will erase. After a few seconds, it will finish and exit to DOS. You will now need to swap the DVD for your Windows DVD or whatever OS you are loading. Shut down, wait 5 seconds, power on and install your new OS.

 

[EvoMan]

Thank you very much for the exhaustive description! I will let you know how it goes when I get around to doing it, although it might not be anytime soon.

Btw, my disk's capacity is 120 GB, and it's the only disk I have in the computer. I use external drives for data. I do plan on installing games on the SSD however. I have only one game installed at the moment, and it takes up around 38 GB of space (DLC and expansions etc.), leaving free only 24,5 GB. My question is - how much space should I leave empty at all times?

Also, I know writing "degrades" an SSD. Is it okay if I installed games like this and then deleted them to make room for others?


Thank you again for your patience and knowledge, I will save your instructions for when I decide to erase the disk.

 

[Coup27]

You do not need to leave any space free. The drive already has some space free on it which you cannot see or access. Due to the way SSD's work internally the more free space there is the better, but you do not need to leave more and you are unlikely to notice the difference if you do.

SSD's store their data on flash chips called NAND. You can only write to these NAND a certain number of times before they fail. The NAND in the 840 EVO is called TLC NAND and it can be written to approximately 1000 times before it fails. All of this may sound scary, but it needs to be placed into context. The article below does an excellent job of discussing the endurance of NAND and why in all consumer cases, endurance is a non-issue. Only in a high write workload such as a database server for example are you likely to exceed the lifespan of your NAND.

http://www.anandtech.com/show/6459/samsung-ssd-840-testing-the-endurance-of-tlc-nand

 

[EvoMan]

I see... Would erasing the disk like we discussed "reset" the number of writes before potential failure?

 

[Essence_of_War]

Absolutely not.

Don't worry about the flash endurance unless you're doing something crazy like trying to run a high-traffic database server off of your SSD.

 

[EvoMan]

I thought secure erasing it would return it to factory state, and restore write performance. You're saying this is not the case?

 

[Coup27]

and restore write performance.

No offence here, but you're obviously doing some research into SSD's. If you're going to go down this road you need to finish your research before asking all these questions here. You are struggling to understand the very basic's of what's going on and then asking about restoring write performance? You're only making this harder on yourself. I suggest you find some SSD articles for beginners and have a good read.

In answer to the recent posts, as mentioned, a secure erase will not rewind the amount of writes performed before it was erased. A secure erase will wipe the contents of the NAND. It will not change the fact you have already wrote to it a number of times.

To use a rather bad analogy, think of a car. If you drive 20,000 miles in a car and then take it through a car wash, it comes out clean. It may look new, but it doesn't change the fact the engine has driven 20,000 miles.

Restoring write performance is also a non-issue. When you delete a file from Windows it sends a command called TRIM to your SSD. Your SSD will then erase the NAND automatically so the next time you need to write to it, it is as fast as it was when you first bought it.

 

[EvoMan]

I've read about TRIM as well, and have it enabled. Didn't know "write performance" is a particular jargon term, I just used it to try to describe what I'm getting at. I'll try to read this when I get the time: http://www.anandtech.com/show/2738

Do you have any better references for a beginner?

EDIT: Just so it's clear, it's perfectly okay if I get a red bar in explorer due to little empty space left on the disk , i.e. it's just an indicator? It's almost filled now, with around 7 gigs left. I assume that's what the "spare space" is for.

 

[BonzaiDuck]

I FEEL like a beginner, but I've got two 60GB SSDs, an 840 Pro 512GB and two ~500GB Crucial MX100's allocated across my systems. Some of these are "recycled" and "repurposed."

I downloaded Parted-Magic and paid the 5-bucks. It was a little scary, because one of two options puts your machine asleep, and if you don't know what's happening, you might panic and try to hit the kill switch on the system -- which I did.

Second time around, I found the other option for unplugging the SSD, the 30-second wait times, etc. Apparently I didn't do any damage the first time, but I think there are warnings that damage is possible.

It would seem you could go either way: Use Samsung Magician's tool, or use something like Parted Magic.

By the way. An engine with 20,000 miles on it is better than a new engine still going through the 3,000 mile break-in period. I don't "do" that stuff anymore, though. I'm too darn old. I pay a mechanic.

 

[Essence_of_War]

I thought secure erasing it would return it to factory state, and restore write performance. You're saying this is not the case?

As Coup27 said, it will restore write performance, it will not restore the endurance of the underlying flash cells. Any data stored on the drive will be gone, but all of the writes that have been made have had an impact on the long term flash cell endurance. Now, unless you're planning on writing much more than 10 GB/day (on avg) to your SSD, you're unlikely to use up this endurance, so I wouldn't worry too much about it.

EDIT: Just so it's clear, it's perfectly okay if I get a red bar in explorer due to little empty space left on the disk , i.e. it's just an indicator? It's almost filled now, with around 7 gigs left. I assume that's what the "spare space" is for.

It's not great for the performance of an SSD (or the filesystem in general!) to be backed into a corner. Modern drives are factory over-provisioned, but they'll perform best if you leave ~25% of their accessible space free.

 

[EvoMan]

Thank you very much! Btw, should I have Firefox use memory cache instead of write files to SSD?

EDIT: I did it, set it to 50 mb. I have 8 gb of RAM btw.

 

[Essence_of_War]

Do it if you want. It probably doesn't matter. This was an optimization people did in the early SSD days, but it's not necessary now.