Alienware owners with Samsung PM800 SSD - TRIM now available!

[Mk4ever]

I have followed this thread for quite some time now. It's time to participate.


Nearly 2 weeks ago, I got a used Samsung 256GB SSD


Specifications:

MMDOE56G5MXP-0VBD1
FW: VBM15D1Q (unfortunately)
SSD came originally from a DELL laptop


At first, I didn't want to flash as the risk of bricking my SSD was really scary, I hardly could afford buying this used SSD. After all, curiosity conquered caution, and I started trying the procedure described in this thread.


SSD NOT detected on this hardware

At first I tried the procedure on my HP tx2510us (which I bought the SSD for). my HP has a AMD 780G northbridge + 700 southbridge. My SSD was not detected, and I believe it didn't work because BIOS options are very limited.


SSD detected with this hardware

Later, I tried in my Desktop. I have a Gigabyte GA-MA69VM-S2, based on the AMD 690V northbridge + SB600 southbridge. Though it only supports ACPI 1.0b, choosing the right combination in BIOS, and trying several SATA ports, my SSD was detected.


Flash did not work - Steps

I am attaching pictures I took while performing the procedure (sorry for the low quality, I modified them to reduce size as much as possible)


I think it didn't work because

I read a lot, but I'm not an expert. I wish I knew why it didn't work. I think it is one of these possibilities:

1. The flash program (intentionally or by mistake) doesn't support flashing SSDs with old firmware (remember the program is originally made specifically for SSDs released later from manufacturers like OCZ, Corsair, Mushkin, etc, while Samsung SSDs were shipped much earlier before that to Dell, Lenovo, Apple and other OEMs)

2. The old firmware itself actually requires different, specific instructions (ie, different code) to be flashed, other than what's in the flash program we got from mushkin

3. SSDs with old FW simply aren't capable of flashing by users (I think it is a very remote possibility, especially considering that Samsung SSDs from previous generation were flashable by users)

IMHO I believe the first possibility is the most probable, in such case maybe someone experienced could hack the program and modify it.


Can Dell FW for older Samsungs help?

Older Samsung SSDs (from previous genenration) already had flashable FW, and it was released by Dell, and probably other OEMs as well. Did anyone try them? Could they be useful for us (people stuck with VBM15D1Q) in a way or another?


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[zAlienz]

Mk4ever

well, at least you know why you want to do all of this.....but please pardon my ignorance...

everyone talks knowing what TRIM is and what is it good for, etc...

I tried searching the web for what all of this meant, but I could not find an explanation.

Could some one spill out the newbie explanation?
What the heck is tony-trim, what is it for?, and why this whole hype about our SSD drives?

I get the sense that all of you are doing this because of a "reason" that after you do this the hardrive will be faster? or will what?

Sorry, I know I may be very annoying asking this, but everyone here knows what's going on, I guess except for me, but I too have the samsung ssd and would like to learn what going on. I just downloaded crystaldiskmark and got the following readings:

Seq 206.5 171.8
512K 165.1 130.9
4k 13.5 6.373

So what? what's the benchmark?.... on the upper selections there was preselected a "5" and the 100MB

Thanks for all your help guys,

I'm running the ssd in my AW m15x.

[clarkezone]

In crude terms TRIM is a Windows 7 technology that cleans up deleted data in the background to workaround a limitation with SSDs that can cause slow writes when overwriting previously written data

[KracsNZ]

Try here and here.

The anandtech one is fairly simple to understand.

[zAlienz]

I found the specs for the drive, I guess the advertised sequential read/write are
"up to" 220 / 180

that would mean that mine is going at 206 and 171 of those "up to" speeds right?

[littlezipp]

Mk4ever,
You and I are having the EXACT same problem and are both using VBM15D1Q firmware drives with very similar serial numbers (perhaps even same batch). I can select option 1 or 2 for download main or initialize firmware and get the same results of "Erase Fail." I have ensured IDE (also tried all other options), reformatted the USB boot disk with 3 different bootfiles and tried multiple computers. I have tried the firmware files from both Mushkin and OCZ and neither work.
People successfully updating are you all coming from 18 series firmwares or are any of you from the 15 series?
Thanks!
Paypal coming for anyone to solve...

[fjnask]

Can you flash this new firware without wiping the drive?

[dave-p]

No the firmware update wipes the drive

[littlezipp]

Just got off the phone with Alienware tech support to ask about the official Dell firmware update for our drives. Rep knew what I was asking about and proceeded to put me on hold while he "checked with the engineers." He was gone for a few minutes and either took a donut break and just lied or actually talked to them because he had good news when he got back.
"The engineers have the update and are putting it through validation testing right now." He proceeded to tell me that it should be "a couple of weeks" according to the engineers if all goes well.
I'm not always that confident with customer service rep answers, but if he is correct our wait for official support for the Dell PM800 series SSD is almost over!

[Mk4ever]

@ littlezipp

Thank you for the news. I really hope it's true, although I still don't get why it's taking so long with Dell specifically.

As far as I know:
- OCZ, Corsair, Mushkin, SuperTalent, Lenovo all released FW.
- Only Samsung and Dell (Apple, IIRC, don't need TRIM yet as the OS still doesn't use it) haven't released FW.

Are there other samsung rebranded SSDs that I forgot?

Now FWIW:
- Dell supported customers with older samsung generation, and released firmwares which I saw on their website.
- For the current samsung generation, Dell SSDs so far have the biggest number of different firmware versions (On ebay and other places, I've seen Dell's SSDs shipping with at least 5 different firmwares). This shows that they have a special relationship with samsung regarding firmwares .
- And considering users reports that TRIM isn't working as it should, maybe DELL indeed skipped releasing this version, and is testing the next version.

Guys, please don't take anything I wrote in this post as a solid fact. I am just trying to think out loud and share my thoughts with you.

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