I bought my first PNY XLR8 240GB SSD less than two years ago. That drive failed within 6 months (became completely unresponsive.) I received a replacement (same model) which also failed within 6 months. I received another replacement (this time a 240GB CS2111) in October, and it looks like this one is about to fail as well, (same symptoms as the previous failures, but I was luckily able to get it to work for a few hours while I made additional backups of all my files.)
Now these drives seem to have pretty high ratings on all of the websites that they are sold on, and I haven't really found any other people who were having similar issues with the drives. I was wondering if the issues I am having with the drives could possibly be a side effect of some other problem with my system.
(I apologize if the system info is a bit verbose, but I want to rule out all possible other avenues.)
Info about my system: I have a higher-end desktop pc that I use for gaming and software development. The case is well ventilated and I blow the dust out of the fans and heat sinks pretty regularly. In terms of power consumption, I have an i7, no overclocking, with the standard cooler: a Radeon HD7970, standard cooler, no overclocking: 2 Case fans: 2 240GB SSDs: 3 HDDs: 4x4GB DDR3: a bevy of connected USB devices: all hooked to a Corsair 650W PSU. I know that this seem a bit low for the power supply, but it's 200 W above what the calculator at outervision.com/power-supply-calculator suggests I use, and I have never experienced any problems that would lead me to believe that the wattage was too low.
I have not had a single problem with any other part in my system EXCEPT for the PNY drives, (one of the HDDs is over 10 years old, so I imagine that would be more sensitive to problems than a brand new SSD.) I built the computer (and had the OS installed on an HDD) about 18 months before I got the SSD and moved the OS onto it. During this time, I had more or less the exact same components and had absolutely no hardware problems.
There are two SATA3 ports on the MOBO: I always leave the SSD plugged int one of these ports, and have had the them fail while plugged into either. I have had them fail while all the other drives were plugged into the SATA2 ports, and I have had them fail while one of the other drives was plugged into the other SATA3 port. Again, none of the other drives have ever given me a problem, which leads me to believe there is no problem with the SATA ports.
The drive has failed when it was on it's own power cable, and it has failed when it shared a cable with one/more of the other drives, so I also assume that there is no problems with the power cables.
Both times I have replaced the SSD, it seems to fix all the issues I'm having, and I have no other hardware problems until the drive starts to fail again.
I find it hard to believe that I'm am just that unlucky, but as far as I can tell, all signs point toward the PNY drive being the problem. I would really appreciate any light than anyone could shed on this issue.
Please let me know if you would like me to post any other details.
A couple things to note:
-I have only had the second SSD (Crucial BX200 240GB) for about 3 months, so it's a bit too early to say whether or not it exhibits the same issues
-The PNY SSD is, and has always been (the only component) mounted to a front bay USB 3.0 hub with a bracket almost identical to this, although I highly doubt it is the cause of any issue
-Whenever one of the drives fails, I am still able to launch Ubuntu from a flash drive without changing or removing any hardware component
Complete build specs:
HW:
MOBO: ASROCK z77extreme 6
CPU: i7-3770k (standard cooler)
GPU: AMD Radeon HD7970
PSU: Corsair CX 650W
RAM: 4x4GB DDR3 (2x1600, 2x1866 (I think))
2x240Gb SSD:
-PNY CS2111
-Crucial BX200
2xHDD 5400RPM:
-WD Green 3TB
-Seagate 200GB
1xHDD 7200RPM
-WD Black
TP-LINK N900 Wireless Dual Band PCI Express Adapter
2x120mm case fans
SW:
OS: Windows 7
Now these drives seem to have pretty high ratings on all of the websites that they are sold on, and I haven't really found any other people who were having similar issues with the drives. I was wondering if the issues I am having with the drives could possibly be a side effect of some other problem with my system.
(I apologize if the system info is a bit verbose, but I want to rule out all possible other avenues.)
Info about my system: I have a higher-end desktop pc that I use for gaming and software development. The case is well ventilated and I blow the dust out of the fans and heat sinks pretty regularly. In terms of power consumption, I have an i7, no overclocking, with the standard cooler: a Radeon HD7970, standard cooler, no overclocking: 2 Case fans: 2 240GB SSDs: 3 HDDs: 4x4GB DDR3: a bevy of connected USB devices: all hooked to a Corsair 650W PSU. I know that this seem a bit low for the power supply, but it's 200 W above what the calculator at outervision.com/power-supply-calculator suggests I use, and I have never experienced any problems that would lead me to believe that the wattage was too low.
I have not had a single problem with any other part in my system EXCEPT for the PNY drives, (one of the HDDs is over 10 years old, so I imagine that would be more sensitive to problems than a brand new SSD.) I built the computer (and had the OS installed on an HDD) about 18 months before I got the SSD and moved the OS onto it. During this time, I had more or less the exact same components and had absolutely no hardware problems.
There are two SATA3 ports on the MOBO: I always leave the SSD plugged int one of these ports, and have had the them fail while plugged into either. I have had them fail while all the other drives were plugged into the SATA2 ports, and I have had them fail while one of the other drives was plugged into the other SATA3 port. Again, none of the other drives have ever given me a problem, which leads me to believe there is no problem with the SATA ports.
The drive has failed when it was on it's own power cable, and it has failed when it shared a cable with one/more of the other drives, so I also assume that there is no problems with the power cables.
Both times I have replaced the SSD, it seems to fix all the issues I'm having, and I have no other hardware problems until the drive starts to fail again.
I find it hard to believe that I'm am just that unlucky, but as far as I can tell, all signs point toward the PNY drive being the problem. I would really appreciate any light than anyone could shed on this issue.
Please let me know if you would like me to post any other details.
A couple things to note:
-I have only had the second SSD (Crucial BX200 240GB) for about 3 months, so it's a bit too early to say whether or not it exhibits the same issues
-The PNY SSD is, and has always been (the only component) mounted to a front bay USB 3.0 hub with a bracket almost identical to this, although I highly doubt it is the cause of any issue
-Whenever one of the drives fails, I am still able to launch Ubuntu from a flash drive without changing or removing any hardware component
Complete build specs:
HW:
MOBO: ASROCK z77extreme 6
CPU: i7-3770k (standard cooler)
GPU: AMD Radeon HD7970
PSU: Corsair CX 650W
RAM: 4x4GB DDR3 (2x1600, 2x1866 (I think))
2x240Gb SSD:
-PNY CS2111
-Crucial BX200
2xHDD 5400RPM:
-WD Green 3TB
-Seagate 200GB
1xHDD 7200RPM
-WD Black
TP-LINK N900 Wireless Dual Band PCI Express Adapter
2x120mm case fans
SW:
OS: Windows 7
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