PNY Prevail Elite SSD in US, Francd & Italy

[yankee495]

Hi everyone,

Before I buy something I research it pretty good. I bought two 120GB HyperX 3K SSD's. One was $59.99 and the other was $69.99. I just couldn't get another $60 deal because they sellout fast. This is a really good SSD and a steal at $60 or $70. There is a HyperX line that uses 5K NAND flash memory and these use 3K NAND memory. The 3K and 5K has nothing to do with the amount as you are used to. It is referring to the program and erase cycles (P/E cycles). A 5K is supposed to out last a 3K and either will last a long time on a desktop. Server SSD's use 10K or more because of the high workload. The higher the P/E cycles the more it cost to build.

Now, the PNY Prevail Elite SSD's use 10K NAND. They were on sale here in the US for $100 which is a fantastic deal (list $399). The pictures I have seen of them show "Firmware 5.0.2". I posted on the PNY blog and ask if there was a firmware update because of the TRIM issue on Sandforce based SSD's. In short, TRIM allows the drive to delete files by a command from the OS. A SSD can write one bit of data at a time but has to erase it in blocks. When enough stuff gets deleted to equal a whole block, a TRIM command is issued to the drive and it deletes the block or blocks. This space is not usable while this is pending.

Sandforce issues the base firmware and individual companies tweak and customize it etc. All Sandforce based SSD's were found to have broken TRIM (Google TRIM Lost and Found). The OS reports it as working but it is not. Turns out the bug was in the base firmware that everyone else based their firmware on so all SF SSD's were affected. The result is the drives performance drops like a rock because it runs out of space very quickly.

So, I posted on the PNY blog asking about a firmware update and got an email response that they were up to 5.0.4 on their drives. It was not posted pubically on the blog. My friend Tom (a new Mageia user) bought one upon hearing that news. Well it had 5.0.2 firmware and PNY refuses to release an update for it. He returned it and also got an additional $20 credit from the site for his trouble.

PNY, at first, claimed to not be aware of it. Later, after a long run around their stand was that they know about the TRIM issue and are not going to release a firmware update "in the foreseeable future". Tom told them to have fun looking at those warehouses full of unsold (and returned) drives. Notice I didn't buy one? All of the forums I found where people were talking about them were in France and Italy etc. Their complaint is that the warranty in the US is 5 years and the PNY policy for France dictates 3 years. They are hoping to get that changed for the sake of fairness.

None of my emails to the guy at PNY who told me they had firmware 5.0.4 have been returned (for a month) so now I am posting this warning worldwide...as Mageia users speak many different languages from all over the world. PNY's great drives have defective firmware!

If anyone has one of these SSD's please reply. No one in the US is buying them. They appear to be a very good drive except for the firmware. We did benchmark it and it is faster than a HyperX...Not by much but it is faster. It read and wrote at about 500MB/s with really good overall speed.

The HyperX 3K is no dog by any means but that PNY uses the best 10K NAND Intel makes and it is a crying shame it is paired with crippled TRIM. After dealing with PNY I don't think I would buy one even if it came with the good firmware. They were evasive, dishonest, and what turned out to be an "We don't care if your drive don't work right attitude". Maybe we could have thrown a fit but if you have to do that, what will happen next time?

We didn't even ask about sending it in for service. This should not be necessary as every other SSD maker has released TRIM fixing firmware.