Corsair Announces Recall of Force 3 SSD 120GB
Corsair gets proactive about Force 3 defect.
Corsair's Force 3 SSDs are fast – so fast that they left the production plant before Corsair could catch a show-stopping defect that means that all the 120GB drives out there in the wild must now all return home.
Below is the statement we received from Corsair:
Over the past several days, we have analyzed issues associated with the stability of our recently released 120GB Force Series 3 SSD (Corsair part number CSSD-F120GB3-BK). Our review has identified that a significant percentage of these drive do not operate to specification. The solution will require changes to both the SSD firmware and the hardware components of the SSD itself.
We’ve worked closely with our partners to determine a root cause but there is no single issue at fault. I’m sure you’ll have questions about how this could happen but we can only say that our production test did not catch this combination of issues and we have implemented multiple corrective actions, involving both firmware and hardware, and are confident we have resolved all currently known issues.
This is our fault, our production tests didn’t catch the issue before the drives were shipped to the consumer and we take full responsibility for our products, which is why we’re asking for them to be returned and will be picking up return shipping.
For those affected, Corsair is directing everyone to its support forums where customers can arrange for their free return.
- The Crowds of E3: Welcome Back E3 of Old
- EA Booth Hands-On: Battlefield 3, Star Wars: The Old Republic
- Deals June 7: Alienware Aurora Rig Bundle $1699
- It's A Fanless Cooler For Your 2.5" Drive
- Mass Effect 3, Far Cry 3 Dated for 2012
- Dungeon Siege 3 Demo Launched on Steam
- Win8 Will Push ARM into 40% of Netbooks By 2015
- AMD Reviving FX Brand For High-End Platforms
- Tom's Advocate: Got A Manufacturer Grievance?
- Deals June 8: GeForce GTX 460 + 2 Games $99
- Hands On With OnLive's Android/iPad Client
- Tom’s Hardware Hammer Time in June!
- Sony Unveils 3D All-In-One VAIO L Desktop
- GamersGate Offering Free Ad-Based PC/Mac Games
- Seven Injured in Explosion At Intel's Arizona Plant
- E3 and Bethesda Softworks: Rage, Skyrim and Prey 2
- Steve Jobs Wants to Build Apple Spaceship Office
- Carmack "Happy" About Engine Licensing Biz







bad product, good Company
good on you Corsair
if only other companies were like this...
Too bad, was looking foward to buy one of those.
instead of trashing the hdds, i wish they would sell them on the cheap, to people who know their is a defect.
Well darn.... I have one of those. Still, good thing they acknowledge the problem.
I guess its sort of lucky that I did not purchase on yet as I have been planning to but never got around to it. Exactly the size I wished to purchase too. Corsair still has my respect and I will still be making said purchase in the near future.
"This is our fault." Now that is refreshing. OCZ is having massive problems with their SandForce 2000-based drives and have opened several stickies in the forum asking owners to test and reinstall with other tests trying desperately to make the product work. They say the issue Corsair has doesn't affect OCZ drives because OCZ is special. Just visit the OCZ forum and look at all the threads reporting problems (before OCZ deletes them).
The problem here is beta testing. OCZ has a tight knit club of "elite" technically inclined fellows who beta test the products and participate in the "elite" forum. This group continually fails to test properly.
OCZ doesn't admit to their faulty vertex 2... thats why i go with Intel ssd's. Intel extended their warranties on their SSD's.. for performance and reliability.. intel gets my money.
I guess its sort of lucky that I did not purchase on yet as I have been planning to but never got around to it. Exactly the size I wished to purchase too. Corsair still has my respect and I will still be making said purchase in the near future.
Same here, I was bout to pick one up but luckily, decided to wait a few days to see the reviews. Thank god I did because everyone was reporting errors. If the new wave of reviews are good, I'm gonna hop on board with this ssd, i love corsair
OCZ doesn't admit to their faulty vertex 2... thats why i go with Intel ssd's
Oh... I just replaced my Corsair X128 because it failed, now I'm hearing the Vertex 2 is faulty? I just got one of those!
If it were NVIDIA they would have kept it quiet and we wouldn't hear about it unless there's a class action lawsuit brought against them !
Good to see there are some honest companies around.
Marcus, your article title doesn't match the product. It's a 120GB drive, not a 128GB one.
now how many of you are wondering....how am i going to fully delete all the porn...wait i can't, lol
maybe it's time to pull out that good old hdd
Does this apply to all the Corsair Force 3 120gb SSDs or only a certain number of them?
They said it was the Corsair part number CSSD-F120GB3-BK though I don't know if all of them are or just like a specific patch.
Does this apply to all the Corsair Force 3 120gb SSDs or only a certain number of them?They said it was the Corsair part number CSSD-F120GB3-BK though I don't know if all of them are or just like a specific patch.
"CSSD-F60GBG3-BK, CSSD-F240GBG3-BK, and Force GT are NOT affected by this issue." -Corsair's reply
only the 120gb version is affected. if u got the 60 or 240, ur good.
http://forum.corsair.com/v3/showthread.php?t=95825
now how many of you are wondering....how am i going to fully delete all the porn...wait i can't, lol
Actually you can, altho not a secure wipe the trim will clean up the data pretty well...
SSD's are overpriced no matter which brand, this article just game me another reason to wait for prices to drop (TRULY DROP) and now for them to resolve all the issues that people are complaining about.
Corsair: Ah crap we effed up. My bad.
OCZ: You obviously screwed something up. Here's a massive ten page forum to solve your own problems.
Just echoing the sentiments of alot of the posters here, I'm rapidly becoming a Corsair fan. Not many companies act as honestly and admirably as they do. I've just bought Corsair products for the first time in my latest PC build and I will continue to do so in the future.
Way to step up and take your lumps like a respectable company Corsair. I've been using their memory products for many many years. The few times I have ever had to deal with them has always been a trouble-free experience with fast turnaround times for replacements. Once it wasn't even their products fault but they offered to replace anyway. Good company, good policy.
@more_questions: I really don't think beta testing was to blame. Look at the trouble Intel had with their earlier SSD products. The technology is not perfect yet, expect issues. At least this company is honest enough about it and pick up shipping to boot.
Wow Corsair. I've always been a huge fan of your PSUs and RAM but have not purchased any of your other products.
Because of this gesture I will go out of my way to purchase Corsair SSDs, cases and coolers whenever possible for my own builds as well as builds for others (when they can afford the best).
What a rock solid company. How refreshing in this day and age.
"This is our fault" Thumb up for this acknowledgment. Someone else would have said: "There is nothing wrong with our product. You just held it wrong"
This is why I'm not ready to trust a SSD drive with my data just yet. If issues like this go unnoticed through QA, imagine how hard it would be to catch something like silent data corruption or the flash cells losing their charge after 2 years...
"This is our fault" Thumb up for this acknowledgment. Someone else would have said: "There is nothing wrong with our product. You just held it wrong"
+1 I like to hear a company admit that they're at fault in something like this. I'll give business to Corsair just for this when I have a need for one of their products. See corporations!? Admitting fault when you screw up draws business!
Customer - My drive has had 4 BSOD in 2 days, my Intel SSD, HDD's, etc seem ok.
OCZ - Go read our guides.
Customer - OK I will try.
Customer - I did a fresh install as the sticky guide suggested, just had another BSOD.
OCZ - Its your motherboard's fault.
Customer - I did an install to check my hardware with a HDD and everything was fine. I even tried the Intel SSD.
OCZ - There is a problem in SATA spec.
Customer - But what about my drive?
OCZ - Did you even try the guides?
Customer - I did, I did the first SE, second SE, created a linux install and tried the 3rd SE and reinstall. Same problem.
OCZ - We are working on it.
Customer - It has been days, any progress?
OCZ - Did you even try the guides?
Customer - I did, it doesn't help.
OCZ - You can't set power options the way you normally do, you can't overclock, you need to do a fresh install every day. This has worked for us.
I would like to add that corsair is one of the few enthusiasts hardware companys to offer global RMA ( the other being Seagate, which i have promised myself never to buy again). The 2 times that i had to RMA a dominator RAM they quickly gave me an RMA number, without hassle and shipped me a brand new kit within days. I had to pay the sending costs, but the new RAM came free of charge, from california to Brazil.
Still, i would go with Intel 320 series. Nothing beats these SDD when it comes to data protection and safety.
is this what we get when intels sata 2 controllers were crappy with sandybridge? it would explain how this happened!
"It's OUR fault."
And there picking up all costs to have the units returned as well.
I agree Corsair is ONE of the FEW that will accept responsibility for their errors and spell it out in PLAIN ENGLISH!
Put me on the list to purchase from them in the future.
I do agree about SSDs being too expensive for now.
Some of the comments on here and on Engadget are blatantly from Corsair employees. Try to make it less obvious next time.
Some of the comments on here and on Engadget are blatantly from Corsair employees. Try to make it less obvious next time.
You mean like this post?
Wow Corsair. I've always been a huge fan of your PSUs and RAM but have not purchased any of your other products.Because of this gesture I will go out of my way to purchase Corsair SSDs, cases and coolers whenever possible for my own builds as well as builds for others (when they can afford the best).What a rock solid company. How refreshing in this day and age.
That just screams Corsair employee....
I use ASRock motherboard exclusively due to my own personal experience with their products and tech support. I've had ASRock offer an RMA with absolutely no evidence of their product being at fault. I had the same offer from BFG over the same incident. Unfortunately, BFG went bankrupt. These 2 companies made their RMA offers with nothing to gain...or to lose. ASRock's Tech Support actually offered an RMA on the same board twice....though it was never returned to them and is still in my posession. Those 2 cases actually impressed me. This incident with Corsair on the other hand, doesn't impress me in the slightest. Corsair is simply trying to protect their company image while avoiding a potential lawsuit. This type of action shouldn't motivate consumers to jump on the bandwagon of loyalists. Corsair was negligent in their product testing and should not be rewarded for it in any way.
Corsair didn't earn its good reputation for doing anything less!