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OWC 1TB SDD Failed for Third Time

R

rbender

macrumors newbie
Original poster
Sep 28, 2009
4
0
Philadelphia, PA
Last year I was getting tired of always having to clear up space on my 11" 2012 MacBook Air's 256GB SSD. So in May of last year I spent $530 on a 1TB SSD from Other World Computing. That September the SSD failed and I was sent a replacement. A year later it failed again and I was sent a second replacement. Now that replacement has failed after a little more than a month.

Has anyone else has such a bad experience with OWC? It's hard to believe I would get 3 bad drives in 18 months, but I've always been careful with my laptop. Are they selling drives that aren't fully compatible with the Air? At this point I really want nothing more to do with their SSDs, but I seriously doubt they'll give me a refund. I might see if my credit card's purchase protection can help.
 
Old Muley

Old Muley

macrumors 6502a
Jan 6, 2009
761
188
Titletown USA
In a similar vein, I've had 3 OWC enclosures fail. Two were the Mercury Elites and one was a Mercury Elite dual. These were the older FW400/800 drives and in each case the drives inside eventually became un-mountable. If I pulled the drives, put them in a different enclosure and reformatted them the drive would work fine.
 
R

rbender

macrumors newbie
Original poster
Sep 28, 2009
4
0
Philadelphia, PA
Finally heard back from OWC. They're offering another replacement, but said I can't get a refund because it's been over a year since I bought it. I'm going to talk to my credit card company to see if they can help.

In the meantime, does anyone have better contacts at OWC that might be able to help me get my money back? Thanks.
 
RedTomato

RedTomato

macrumors 601
Mar 4, 2005
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.. London ..
Left4DeadBoy

Left4DeadBoy

macrumors regular
Sep 20, 2015
174
16
hi I believe its the model; when it was made; that model line which has a conspicuou-s failure; due to a failure of manufacturing . An earlier model I believe wouldnt suffer from it .
 
B

Brammy

macrumors 68000
Sep 17, 2008
1,718
690
RedTomato said:
Won't work with yours, which uses PCIe interface for the SSD. PCIe is far faster than SATA. No SATA SSD will work with yours. Most PCIe SSD won't work either, thanks to Apple's unique form factor. Your best bet for a reliable upgrade is to buy a larger SSD pulled direct from a MBA made between 2013 and 2016.
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OWC Makes one that fits in mine.

I'm still waffling between my 2011 15" MBP and the 2014 11" Air. If I do decide to make the Air my primary I'll probably order the 1tb drive.
 
N

newdeal

macrumors 68030
Oct 21, 2009
2,521
1,816
If they are still using sandforce controllers that is the problem. Those controllers are crap. I had the very first SSD that they released, it failed in two weeks. Crashed the system and just gave a folder with a question mark on reboot and was not detectable. The replacement failed in three weeks doing the same thing and I demanded my money back
 
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usagora

usagora

macrumors 601
Nov 17, 2017
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organisum said:
Over the last 12 years, every-single-OWC-SSD we've sold has failed. The one we've used in our own machines... all have failed. Most within 2-3 years of use. They are complete garbage.
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I'm surprised to be reading all these complaints (yes, I know this thread is 5 years old). I've always heard only good things about OWC and I replaced my 2012 iMac's HDD with a 1TB OWC SSD many years ago and it's still performing flawlessly. But that was a 2.5" SATA SSD (the kind that's within an enclosure and not a bare chip). Maybe it's just the other types of SSDs that they have issues with.
 
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usagora

usagora

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Nov 17, 2017
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organisum said:
macOS will not report a bad drive until it has become more than obvious it is failing. As the case with our current server drive. Many of the OWC drive equipped machines we get in with failures have already failed beyond the ability for full data recovery. Not many folks will spring to spend $20-$200 for monitoring software, and Apple's operating system will hide issues until the very end.

Have you checked that drive with a 3rd party utility?
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Well the OP is talking about mere months before failure, and mine has been running fine for 3+ years. No, I haven't checked it with a third party utility any more than I checked the original hard drive or SSDs on my other Macs when there's absolutely no sign of issues. But I guess I might just for fun. Not sure why macOS would intentionally hide issues.
 
usagora

usagora

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Nov 17, 2017
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organisum said:
We are also unsure why Apple would choose not to report the issue early, perhaps so they can hide the failures in their own drives.
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I wouldn't think so, because if it totally fails, then it would be known anyway. Also, aren't pretty much all hard drives or SSDs like the cliche about life: "The day you're born you start to die?" In other words, there will inevitably be some degree of failure in all drives as they age?
 
usagora

usagora

macrumors 601
Nov 17, 2017
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organisum said:
That's not how it works. Once bad blocks start getting allocated, it's the beginning of the end. That OWC's own software indicates the drive is about to fail leaves nothing to dispute. Whenever I see this, they always fail. OWC will replace them with this warning. HDD or SSD, when I see bad blocks start adding up, there's data corruption, overlapped files and the like. Most of my clients with this issue don't find out until they open a file and it's trashed.
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This is what I'm referring to:

Screen Shot 2021-12-24 at 3.04.06 PM.png


What you seem to be describing is a premature "death" due to a cancer-like failure.

organisum said:
I've also seen a good number of Apple SSD failures in 2015 machines. No warning in those either, they just stop booting. Dropbox and iCloud backups are always enabled on the failed machines. Especially when they are both running and scanning the crap out of the drive. And especially for users that store everything on the desktop. (facepalm)
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Well, it would be unwise not to have a regular backup, so that's sort of inevitable wear/tear. Not that I store everything on the desktop, but why would the hdd/sdd care what directory in your home folder that you store your files (e.g. desktop vs documents)?
 
usagora

usagora

macrumors 601
Nov 17, 2017
4,869
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organisum said:
Your link is outdated info. 3,500 hours of use is nowhere near an inevitable failure. I have drives that are over 20 years old and test fine. Drives with 80,000 hours of use and test fine. It's an issue with cheap hardware and lousy design.
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I'm not sure where you're seeing anything about "hours of use" in the article I linked. Also, the article is only about a year and a half old.

organisum said:
The OS doesn't care where you put the data but when it's on the desktop Dropbox and iCloud want to back it up by default and most folks don't catch this. Same goes for other folders too, so gotta watch what companies try uploading from you by "default". So iCloud fills up right away, Apple tell you to purchase more iCloud storage and your hard drive gets a workout constantly syncing. Especially when the desktop is holding lots f data and the sync invariably fails due to lack of cloud storage. Then it trys again later, and again and again... Each time the drive gets scanned first. Spotify was killing drives in a similar fashion.
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Still not following you here. As you said: "other folders too", so it doesn't really matter if you store things on your desktop vs. the documents folder, as they are both default backup locations for those cloud services.
 
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