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Should I buy a used SSD?

S

Scipio Africanus

Member
I usually just read the anandtech articles religious I figured I could tap the mighty anandtech braintrust here for a question.

I bought a X25M-G2 labeled "new" figuring it was just sitting in a box for awhile. Turns out its been pretty beat on. I fired up Intel SS Toolbox and SMART data had host writes at 13tb and power-on hours at about 700 days. I asked for refund and the seller sent a counter offer with a discount. This will basically bring down the cost for me to $40.

So, should I keep it?

I want to use it in a file server/HTPC box where there will be very little installs or writes. I would just slap Win7 on it, a few programs like VLC, and call it a day. The most intensive use will be for the paging file I would guess. Most other disk activity will be to the HDDs instead. Box is an old Athlon II x4 with 4gb of RAM.
 
If you have use for it you might as well just hang onto it.

I've bought a few used Intel SSD in the past and they've held up alright... just depends on how hard the previous owner ran it. Much like buying a used car...
 
Yeah, I'm going to be using it gently but have heard Windows can be hard on it with paging. With 13tb already written just under 2 years, I'm just a bit worried about how much longer it'll last.
 
Depends on where OP got it... if this is like ebay and they listed as "new" you should file a claim, unless the counter offer has already been agreed to.
 
Wear shouldn't be an issue, for such a drive, with so little written. It should be good for 150TB or more.

But, it is not as described.
 
It's ebay where I bought it for $60 and then I filed a claim saying not as described. So I can do a return where I'd eat the shipping both ways ($12) or take his offer of $20 off. If it'll last longer, I'm tempted to do the $40. Otherwise, I'll fish for some newegg refurb Crucials or something.
 
The problem you have is not that the SSD is used. The problem is that the seller lied to you. I would not want any product from that seller regardless of what condition the item is in. I have bought several used SSDs before and not had a problem but for you, I'd say get your money back.
 
Scipio Africanus said:
It's ebay where I bought it for $60 and then I filed a claim saying not as described. So I can do a return where I'd eat the shipping both ways ($12) or take his offer of $20 off. If it'll last longer, I'm tempted to do the $40. Otherwise, I'll fish for some newegg refurb Crucials or something.
Click to expand...

You should at the very least get refunded original shipping. Regardless of all ebay's policies, if they (the seller) committed fraud, it is the sellers responsibility to reclaim the item.
 
Scipio Africanus said:
Its all a bit confusing. It states "total 4KB random writes spec from 7.5TB - 15TB" here: http://www.anandtech.com/show/3965/intels-3rd-generation-x25m-ssd-specs-revealed

The X25M-G2 manual says "Minimum Useful Life: X25-M & X18-M: [MLC] 1.2M hours MTBF; 5 years - 35TB written, up to 20GB/day for 5 years"
Click to expand...

I got 10TB writes on my 3 year old 160GB G2 and its still 90%+ life remaining. Mostly linear writes and 4k writes cause completely different wear levels. Here a 40GB G2 lasted 180TiB writes before hitting spec write cycles.

Whats the estimated life remaining % in Intel ssd toolbox?
 
Scipio Africanus said:
Its all a bit confusing. It states "total 4KB random writes spec from 7.5TB - 15TB" here: http://www.anandtech.com/show/3965/intels-3rd-generation-x25m-ssd-specs-revealed

The X25M-G2 manual says "Minimum Useful Life: X25-M & X18-M: [MLC] 1.2M hours MTBF; 5 years - 35TB written, up to 20GB/day for 5 years"
Click to expand...
That's based on worst-case: 4K-at-a-time writes, fully random, with a full drive, no TRIM. Typical WA for those drives tends to be <1.2, so wearing it out, without trying to, is going to take a very long time.

I agree with the others as far as the eBay part goes, however.
 
I'm heeding the advice here and sending it back. I just didn't want to deal with it but its the right thing to do. Besides, there's some good stuff over at newegg for nearly the same price.
 
I have a used G.Skill sniper 60 GB SSD I bought off Ebay and Crystal disk info says it's 100% and has only 3 GB written to it. Not bad for 60 bucks. I think that's what I payed for it.
 
Puffnstuff said:
Personally I'd never buy a used drive but that's just me.
Click to expand...
When I upgraded to a Samsung 840 Pro 256, I sold my gently used Samsung 830 128 here on Anandtech, and I assume the buyer is happy because I never got a complaint. I'd feel confident buying used in the classifieds here knowing that the owner was probably just upgrading.
 
I probably would have kept it for $40, but the seller was definitely trying to pull a fast one by selling it as new, so probably good you sent it back.

I have an X25M-G1 (Gen 1) as the OS drive for my home server, and it runs great, and it has 15196 power-on hours with no re-allocated sectors (but it only has 4.2 TB of writes).
 
$40 is a fair price for a used 80GB G2. It is certainly better than sending it back and eating shipping costs. By the time that drive fails you will be able to buy a new one for $10 on ebay. By then all these 128GB samsung, crucial, and sandisk drives will be worth nothing. As long as you're buying intel you can be fairly confident, but watch out because intel is the only thing I would recommend below 120GB. Do keep in mind that there are some kingston models that have intel guts and those can be found for a good price too.
 
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