OCZ offers free 25nm solid-state drive replacements

Jos

Posts: 3,073   +97

OCZ Technology has delivered a new update on their forums in response to the recent controversy surrounding the transition to 25nm NAND flash on some of their solid-state drives. Essentially the problem revolved around an issue with write-cycle endurance of the smaller NAND, which had to be compensated with a process called "over-provisioning" and resulted in a drop of usable storage space compared to the same drives equipped with 34nm NAND.

Making matters worse, OCZ kept both 25nm and 34nm-based products on the market but failed to make any clear branding distinction between them. This meant that retailers had both versions selling for the same price -- despite the reduced cost of the smaller 25nm flash -- while anyone who got the newer drives would see around 4-5GB less of usable storage space and apparently also some loss in performance under certain conditions.

Customers were rightfully displeased. The good news is that those who are affected will be taken care of, as OCZ has pledged to replace the drives with new ones and cover any shipping fees. The updated model will still retain the smaller 25nm NAND flash, but they have moved back to using 32Gb ICs like in the previous 34nm models rather than 64Gb ones. This not only lowers the amount of reserve capacity for stuff like wear leveling so you won't see a drop in usable storage space, it also should solve performance issues by filling all available channels connected to the controller.

Lastly, the company is also releasing a software tool next week that will help users identify which version of the drive they have. OCZ is taking support requests via its in-house ticketing system, and is asking customers to remain patient if they don't get answers right away, as they are currently busy with the added load from replacement requests.

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Good, must have ticked off enough people that they had no choice. Since OCZ is putting all their eggs in the SSD market they might want to avoid this kind of deception in the future.
 
This is stil unacceptable. They are just giving you back part of the space that is dedicated to increasing the lifespan of the drive... What they need to do is give the product a new model number/name and sell it as that. They are still selling it as if it is the drive that got all the great reviews and praise when in fact it is not. Look on Newegg, the 60gb version still says Voted "Best of the Best" by Maximum PC magazine when in fact this is a totally different drive. I feel cheated to say the least.
 
Yeah the main problem is with sites like newegg that do have the awards listed right in the search. I know when I see that "best of the best" or "Customer Choice Award Winner" however many years that it factors into my overall decision in which product I choose. If the product I am buying isn't the product that one the awards than it should have a new model number so I know it is a new product.
 
This might sound like a dumb question but, how would I know how my drive is built? In other words, how would I know which chips are used in my SSD????
I have an OCZ Vertex 2 90GB
 
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