Q: Is my data safe when I send my SSD back to Kingston for warranty replacement/repair?

<p>Kingston realizes the importance of keeping our customers&rsquo; personal data and information confidential and secure. Kingston takes measures to ensure the security of all of our customers&rsquo; personal information when a Solid State Drive (SSD) is returned to our RMA facility for warranty replacement or repair. When an SSD reaches our repair center, it will undergo a thorough testing process. During the first phase of testing, an ATA Secure Erase is performed on the SSD which erases all data and information.ATA Secure Erase is federally-approved by the National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST 800-88) for legal sanitization of confidential user data. If the SSD is not in a functional state and not capable of undergoing an ATA Secure Erase, the SSD is dismantled and the NAND Flash Memory is destroyed.</p>

Question 1

What is ESD?

Accepted Answer

ElectroStatic Discharge, ESD is simply the discharge of built up static electricity.ESD should not be taken lightly as this is one of the few things an individual can do to damage or destroy their computer or hardware components.It is like when you rub your feet on the carpet and you touch something metal.ESD can occur without the user feeling a shock and will occur when only working on the inside of the computer or handling hardware.

How to help prevent ESD
The best method of preventing ESD is to use an ESD wrist strap or a grounding mat or table.However, because most users do not have access to these items, we have included the below steps to help reduce the chance of ESD as much as possible.

Standing – We recommend that you are standing at all times when working on the computer. Setting on a chair can generate more electrostatic.
Cords - Make sure everything is removed from the back of the computer (power cord, mouse, keyboard, etc).
Clothes - Make sure not to wear any clothing that conducts a lot of Electrical Charge, such as a wool sweater.
Accessories - To help reduce ESD and help prevent other problem, it is also a good idea to remove all jewelry.
Weather - Electrical storms can increase the ESD risk; unless absolutely necessary, try not to work on a computer during an electrical storm.In very dry areas, the air itself becomes a part of the electrostatic build-up mechanism every time there is an air flow (wind, air conditioning, blower) passing over an insulated surface.Do not let high humidity levels build a false confidence, and beware of corrosion problems with interconnects and other electrical interfaces.

To learn more about ESD and how to protect your electronics, please refer to the below site.

ESD Association
https://www.esda.org

Question 2

How do I Secure Erase my SSD drive in Linux?

Accepted Answer

Secure Erase User Guide for Linux

This guide will walk you through securely erasing your Kingston SSD using Linux tools.

SATA Secure Erase Procedure

Warning

Please make sure to have a full backup of any important data before you proceed!

Prerequisites

You must have root privileges.
You must have your SSD connected to the system as a secondary (non-OS) drive.
You must have lsscsi and hdparm installed. You may need to install them with your distribution’s package manager.
Your drive must not be in a security freeze.
Your drive must not be password protected.

Instructions
1. Find the device name (/dev/sdX) of the drive you wish to erase:

# lsscsi

2. Make sure drive security is not frozen:

# hdparm -I /dev/sdX | grep frozen

If the output shows "frozen" (instead of "not frozen") then you cannot continue to the next step. You must try to remove the security freeze by trying one of the following methods:

Method 1:
Put the system to sleep (suspend to RAM) and wake it up. On most distributions the command to suspend is:

# systemctl suspend

Now issue the hdparm command again. If it worked the output will show "not frozen" (instead of "frozen").

Method 2:
Hot plug the drive. This is done by physically unplugging the SATA power cable from the drive and plugging it back in while the system is powered on. You may need to enable hot plug in BIOS. Not all systems support hot plug.

Now issue the hdparm command again. If it worked the output will show "not frozen" (instead of "frozen").

3. Set a user password on the drive. The password can be anything. Here we are setting the password to "p":

# hdparm --security-set-pass p /dev/sdX

4. Issue the secure erase command to the drive using the same password: 1234567890 - 1234567890 -

# hdparm --security-erase p /dev/sdX

This command may take a few minutes to complete. The drive password is removed upon successful completion.

If the secure erase is interrupted or otherwise fails your drive may become security locked. In this case you can remove the security lock using the command below and then try the secure erase procedure again:

# hdparm --security-disable p /dev/sdX

SATA Secure Erase Example

NVMe Secure Erase Procedure

Warning

Please make sure to have a full backup of any important data before you proceed!

Prerequisites

You must have root privileges.
You must have your SSD connected to the system as a secondary (non-OS) drive.
You must have nvme-cli installed. You may need to install it with your distribution’s package manager.
Your drive must not be password protected.

Instructions

1. Find the device name (/dev/nvmeXn1) of the drive you wish to erase:

# nvme list
2. Issue the format command to the drive. Here we set the secure erase setting to 1 which indicates a user data erase:

# nvme format /dev/nvmeXn1 --ses=1

This command may take a few minutes to complete.

NVMe Secure Erase Example

Question 3

Why is the available storage capacity of my product slightly less than the advertised capacity?

Accepted Answer

This is common for flash storage, whether internal SSD, Flash Card, or external USB storage, and is due in part to a variance in how flash memory vs spinning platter hard drive manufacturers calculate megabyte. Hard drive manufacturers calculate a megabyte (or 1,000x1,000 bytes) as 1,000KBs, whereas the binary calculation for flash-based storage is 1,024KBs.

Example: For a 1TB flash-based storage device, Windows will calculate it as having a capacity of 931.32GB. (1,000,000,000,000÷1,024÷1,024÷1,024=931.32GB).

Furthermore, Kingston reserves some of the listed capacity for formatting (e.g., File Allocation Table) and other functions such as firmware and/or controller-specific information, and thus some of the listed capacity is not available for data storage.

Question 4

What is TRIM and Garbage Collection?

Accepted Answer

Trim and garbage collection are technologies that modern SSDs incorporate to improve both their performance and endurance. When your SSD is in its fresh out of box condition all of the NAND blocks are empty so the SSD can write new data to the empty blocks in a single operation. Over time most of the empty blocks will become used blocks that contain user data. In order to write new data to used blocks the SSD is forced to perform a read-modify-write cycle. The read-modify-write cycle hurts the SSDs overall performance because it now must do three operations instead of a single operation. The read-modify-write cycle also causes write amplification which hurts the SSDs overall endurance.

Trim and garbage collection can work together to improve SSD performance and endurance by freeing up used blocks. Garbage collection is a function built into the SSD controller that consolidates data stored in used blocks in order to free up more empty blocks. This process happens in the background and is completely handled by the SSD itself. However the SSD may not know which blocks contain user data and which blocks contain stale data that the user has already deleted. This is where the trim function comes in. Trim allows the operating system to inform the SSD that data has been deleted so that the SSD can free up those previously used blocks. For trim to work both the operating system and the SSD must support it. Currently most modern operating systems and SSDs support trim however most RAID configurations do not support it.

Kingston SSDs take advantage of both garbage collection and trim technologies in order to maintain the highest possible performance and endurance over their lifetime.

Learn More

Question 5

Will the SSD experience a performance decrease? If so, is there a way to reset the drive to a factory default?

Accepted Answer

Performance decrease has been reported on some of the SSDNow drives. If you have an older SSD drive that does not have effective Garbage Collection, SSD drive performance will drop over time.This is due to the way the system overwrites data that has been flagged for deletion.

Try using the Secure Erase tool like HDDErase to wipe the drive and restore it to original condition.

FAQ: KSD-011411-GEN-12

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Try using the Secure Erase tool like HDDErase to wipe the drive and restore it to original condition.

Question 6

Can I use two or more SSD drives in a RAID?

Accepted Answer

Any of our SSDs can be used in RAID. But due to endurance specifications, only certain part numbers should be used in RAID. For servers, please contact Kingston to determine the best Kingston SSD to use for your workload.

FAQ: KSD-052511-GEN-17

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Question 7

What is S.M.A.R.T. and do the SSDNow drives support it?

Accepted Answer

Self-Monitoring, Analysis, and Reporting Technology (S.M.A.R.T.) is a built-in monitoring capability in hard drives and SSDs. It can allow users to monitor the health of a device. It does this through monitoring software designed specifically for the S.M.A.R.T. feature. All of our SSDNow drives support S.M.A.R.T.

FAQ: KSD-011411-GEN-10

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Question 8

Is my data safe when I send my SSD back to Kingston for warranty replacement/repair?

Accepted Answer

Kingston realizes the importance of keeping our customers’ personal data and information confidential and secure. Kingston takes measures to ensure the security of all of our customers’ personal information when a Solid State Drive (SSD) is returned to our RMA facility for warranty replacement or repair. When an SSD reaches our repair center, it will undergo a thorough testing process. During the first phase of testing, an ATA Secure Erase is performed on the SSD which erases all data and information.ATA Secure Erase is federally-approved by the National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST 800-88) for legal sanitization of confidential user data. If the SSD is not in a functional state and not capable of undergoing an ATA Secure Erase, the SSD is dismantled and the NAND Flash Memory is destroyed.

FAQ: KSD-022411-GEN-15

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Question 9

When I connect my SSD as a secondary drive, it is seen as new hardware but I cannot see it as a usable drive within the OS. How can I resolve this?

Accepted Answer

In Windows - Open the control panel, open administrative tools and then open computer management. Click on Disk Management and see if the SSD drive is seen in the right window pane. If it is, right click on where it is labeled as disk 1, disk 2, etc and select "Initialize disk" (this may come up automatically when you go to Disk Management). Next, right-click on the area to the right of the disk label and choose "New Simple Volume". Continue with the wizard by choosing the size, drive letter and formatting of the partition.

In macOS - A "disk insertion" window will appear. Click on the "initialize" button. This will take you to the disk utility. Select the Kingston drive from the list of drives on the left side of the Window. From the actions available, choose partition. For the "Volume Scheme", choose "1 partition". For the format, choose MacOS extended for a permanent drive. Choose ExFAT for an external drive (available on MacOS 10.6.6 and above). Click Apply. A warning windows will appear stating you will erase all data from the drive. Click on the partition button at the bottom.

Question 10

Should I defragment the SSDNow drive to maintain optimal performance?

Accepted Answer

SSDs do not require defragmentation. Since there are no physical disks, there is no need to organize the data in order to reduce seek time. Therefore defragmenting an SSD is not effective. Also, defragmenting an SSD can put undue wear on specific areas of the drive. SSDs are designed to write data as evenly as possible over the entire drive to reduce undue wear to any one location. Nonetheless defragmenting your SSD drive a couple of times will not harm it. However if it is done continuously over a long period, it may reduce the life of the drive.

FAQ: KSD-011411-GEN-03

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Question 11

Why didn't my primary HDD transfer rate score in the Windows Experience Index (WEI) go up after installing the new SSDNow drive?

Accepted Answer

The Windows Experience Index (WEI) merely measures the relative capability of components. The WEI only runs for a short time and does not measure the interactions of components under a software load, but rather characteristics or your hardware.

Thus the WEI does not measure performance of a system, but merely the relative hardware capabilities when running Windows 7. An article about the WEI can be found here: http://blogs.msdn.com/b/e7/archive/2009/01/19/engineering-the-windows-7-windows-experience-index.aspx

In Vista, the WEI scores ranged from 1.0 to 5.9. In Windows 7, the range has been extended upward to 7.9.

Question 12

How do I verify the TRIM Command is enabled in Windows 7?

Accepted Answer

First, open an Elevated Command Prompt window.

To open an Elevated Command Prompt window: Click on Start Orb > Type "CMD.exe" in Search box > Right click on "CMD" and select "Run as Administrator" (If you receive a prompt confirmation, click YES)

To verify the TRIM command is enabled, type the following and press enter in the Elevated command:

fsutil behavior query disabledeletenotify

The results will be as follows: DisableDeleteNotify = 1 (Windows TRIM commands are disabled) DisableDeleteNotify = 0 (Windows TRIM commands are enabled)

To enable the TRIM command,type the following and press enter in the Elevated command:

fsutil behavior set disabledeletenotify 0

To disable the TRIM command,type the following and press enter in the Elevated command:

fsutil behavior set disabledeletenotify 1

Question 13

The toolbox will not see my drive. It states "No SandForce drives found" or "No Kingston drives found". How do I resolve this?

Accepted Answer

If your computer has an Intel based system, you may need to disable the Intel RST driver and revert back to the Microsoft default AHCI driver and then run the toolbox. On an AMD based system, the AMD AHCI driver may be blocking the toolbox.

The Windows AHCI driver must be loaded. To do this, right click on Computer and choose manage. Go to IDE ATA/ATAPI controllers>AMD SATA Controller or Intel SATA Controller. Right click on this and choose Update Driver software. Select Browse>Let me pick. Choose "Standard AHCI" from the list. Then reboot the computer. Then you should be able to run the toolbox.

Question 14

When I try to install Windows 7 from my installation disk, it will not detect the new SSD. But the drive is seen in the BIOS. How do I resolve this?

Accepted Answer

When the SSD is recognized in the BIOS, but Windows 7 installation does not detect the drive, follow these steps:

Disconnect any other hard drives or SSDs. Boot the Windows 7 installation disk. Choose repair, then advanced, then command prompt. Type: "diskpart" without quotes and press Enter. You will see a prompt labeled "diskpart". Type the following commands and press enter after each one.

Diskpart > Select Disk 0
Diskpart > Clean
Diskpart > Create Partition Primary Align=1024
Diskpart > Format Quick FS=NTFS
Diskpart > List Partition
Diskpart > Active
Diskpart > Exit

Then reboot the computer to the Windows 7 installation disk.

Question 15

How do I enable the security on an encrypted solid state drive?

Accepted Answer

Encrypted solid state drives utilize the hard drive security command available on most business class computers and motherboards. It is accessed through the BIOS. This will allow you to create a password for many HDD’s and SSD’s and to securely erase the drives if needed. Some computers will not have this feature. If this is the case, the drive can still be used, just without these security features. Be sure not to confuse BIOS password with the hard drive security password.

FAQ: KSD-011411-ENC-01

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Question 16

If I enable security for my encrypted solid state drive, can I use it on another computer that is compatible with hard drive security mode?

Accepted Answer

You can but you first must disable the security for the drive in the original computer. Then you can enable it again in the new computer.

Question 17

If I enable the ATA security on my SSDNow drive and forget my password, can I reset the drive in order to use it again?

Accepted Answer

No. If you forget the password for this drive, it cannot be accessed.

Be aware that forgetting your password is not covered under Kingston's warranty.

The only exception to this is using a master or administrative password for the drive.

The BIOS would have to support this and it would have to be enabled at the time you initiated the ATA security for this drive.

Using a master password would allow an administrator to reset the drive.

KSD-011411-ENC-03

SSDNow mS200 Drive - Support

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