Not-So-Solid SSD

Anand Lal Shimpi:

Let's start with the elephant in the room. There's a percentage of OCZ Vertex 3/Agility 3 customers that have a recurring stuttering/instability issue. The problem primarily manifests itself as regular BSODs under Windows 7 although OCZ tells me that the issue is cross platform and has been seen on a MacBook Pro running OS X as well.

How many customers are affected? OCZ claims it's less than two thirds of a percent of all Vertex 3/Agility 3 drives sold. OCZ came up with this figure by looking at the total number of tech support enquiries as well as forum posts about the problem and dividing that number by the total number of drives sold through to customers. I tend to believe OCZ's data here given that I've tested eight SF-2281 drives and haven't been able to duplicate the issue on a single drive/configuration thus far.

Well that sucks. A few people are having a problem with this expensive bit of technology but nobody knows exactly what's causing the problem. Ergo, it can't be fixed.

I was thinking of upgrading from my Vertex 120GB to a Vertex 3 240GB drive. But after reading a lot of horror stories I'm now reluctant. There seems to be an incompatibility issue with the new SSD and the overall system of those who are affected. So, going back to a store and exchanging the drive won't solve the problem!

The new solid state disk from OCZ kicks butt but needs to be more reliable given its huge price premium. I'll wait for the next generation tech that'll likely debut in 2012.