TIL that SSDs can lose data if left unplugged for long periods of time (only required to hold data up to 1 year), unlike HDDs which as long as the material holds it can take years.
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@djlink I've kept one of my external SSDs on top of my computer for like a year, so I haven't been cooking my files so much as I have been flame-grilling them.
@djlink The good news is there's nothing on there I don't have backups of elsewhere.
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TIL that SSDs can lose data if left unplugged for long periods of time (only required to hold data up to 1 year), unlike HDDs which as long as the material holds it can take years.
Edit: added link: https://www.slashgear.com/1893447/dont-leave-your-old-ssd-unplugged/
@djlink I learned this through bitter experience. 6 months in a warm room was enough to lose everything.
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TIL that SSDs can lose data if left unplugged for long periods of time (only required to hold data up to 1 year), unlike HDDs which as long as the material holds it can take years.
Edit: added link: https://www.slashgear.com/1893447/dont-leave-your-old-ssd-unplugged/
@djlink Not only can they lose data but they can simply irrecoverably stop working if you leave them more than a year or so unplugged - dead as a doornail.
Spinny rust these days is not vastly better because the flash holding the firmware is better but not a lot better.
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@lispi314 @djlink @raymaccarthy @funkylab Some years ago a quaker friend was discussing options for electronic storage of their records (which they keep and readable with great care for vast times). They did indeed decide to continue to keep them on paper both because of uncertainties around digital storage media, but also because they were worried that 80 years from now someone might not have the software or information to recover some digital media type.
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@raymaccarthy @djlink I'm really not sure where the idea that a powered SSD would be more reliable than an unpowered one – that could only be true if it would be re-writing itself in the background, which would, counter to the intent, make it wear out faster, unless the SSD is essentially unused and the re-writing was free to use arbitrary much rarely or never used pages to copy the data to. But even that would be very undesirable – who wants an SSD with a standby power usage as if written to?)
@funkylab @raymaccarthy @djlink Modern SSDs do patrol scrubbing so they do indeed rewrite bad information or marginal data when needed.
Spinny rust has btw done the same thing for many years too, some spinny rust is even smart enough to relocate data behind your back so you don't even find out about the bit of the disk that's getting dodgy for some reason. -
@funkylab @djlink
Not powered off they don't.
An HDD can wear out with use but 25 years is easy for storage in a drawer or box in the attic. Floppy storage is far trickier.
Tape needs carefully stored.
Pressed DVDs* and especially pressed CDs are OK, but "written" ones can fade in daylight.[* Assuming no manufacturing defects]
@raymaccarthy @funkylab @djlink Hard disks also wear out if stored. However your wear is mostly component failures, oxidisation and so on so quite slow. The flash chips on the hard disk drive today will also eventually dribble their brains out and it won't work any more but the flash used is generally rather less vulnerable than the very high density flash used in an SSD.
Unlike the SSD though your HDD media is more recoverable even if the electronics is dead.
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@raymaccarthy @funkylab @djlink Hard disks also wear out if stored. However your wear is mostly component failures, oxidisation and so on so quite slow. The flash chips on the hard disk drive today will also eventually dribble their brains out and it won't work any more but the flash used is generally rather less vulnerable than the very high density flash used in an SSD.
Unlike the SSD though your HDD media is more recoverable even if the electronics is dead.
@etchedpixels @funkylab @djlink
One person had a PSU that fried everything. Tops blown off chips on the HDD PCB. I swapped the PCB for one off a same model 1T HDD & was able to recover all the data.
Electrolytic capacitors can dry out & the old paper ones before the 1960s went high leakage, though only an issue on higher voltages.
People have restored electronics up to 100 years old without much bother. After the 1960s mostly some electrolytic capacitors. Replace NiCd with NiMH batteries etc. -
@funkylab @raymaccarthy @djlink Modern SSDs do patrol scrubbing so they do indeed rewrite bad information or marginal data when needed.
Spinny rust has btw done the same thing for many years too, some spinny rust is even smart enough to relocate data behind your back so you don't even find out about the bit of the disk that's getting dodgy for some reason.@etchedpixels @funkylab @djlink
SMART reporting on HDDs should reveal lots. Most Linux distros have a tool already installed to read SMART data and test HDDs. -
@raymaccarthy @djlink I'm really not sure where the idea that a powered SSD would be more reliable than an unpowered one – that could only be true if it would be re-writing itself in the background, which would, counter to the intent, make it wear out faster, unless the SSD is essentially unused and the re-writing was free to use arbitrary much rarely or never used pages to copy the data to. But even that would be very undesirable – who wants an SSD with a standby power usage as if written to?)
@funkylab Honestly you come across as condescending with your posts. Please don't.
- Trimming, voltage drift scrubbing, and wear leveling will cause data to constantly get re-written.
- While Single Level Cell NAND can hold your data for a decade, QLC can lose data within 1-2 years when left unpowered.
- Controllers are aware of this and can counter this if they're powered.Example sources:
- https://www.xda-developers.com/your-unpowered-ssd-is-slowly-losing-your-data/
- https://www.seagate.com/files/staticfiles/docs/pdf/whitepaper/tp618-ssd-tech-paper-us.pdfSSDs are leaky capacitors.
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