How Many Terabytes Has My SSD Written ?

[bob466]

This has bothered me for some time...according to Samsung my 500GB SSD TBW (Terabytes Written) is 2400 and has a 5 year warranty.

This SSD is nearly 5 years old...so how many Terabytes has it written ? The answer is simple and easy to work out...those who are scared of the Terminal look away now.

We need this “smartctl” tool installed and this web site...
https://dannyda.com/2020/09/06/how-to-convert-smart-attribute-241-total_lbas_written-to-mb-gb-tb-pb/

First run this command

sudo smartctl /dev/sda --all |grep "Sector Size"

Now run this command...

sudo smartctl /dev/sda --all | grep Total_LBAs_Written

Now copy the LBAs number in to Input and hit Enter.
Output/Results will show all information...including...Total Bytes Written (TB).
In my case it's 22.97 TB...still have a long way to go to 2400 TBW but that doesn't mean the SSD won't fail before then either...fingers crossed.

 

[wizardfromoz]

Just to clarify on

Now copy the LBAs number in to Input and hit Enter.

That's copy it to the Input field on the website, and then hit enter.

(autistic) Wizard, lol

 

[wizardfromoz]

512 for me. Interesting.

Ta for sharing, Bob

 

[wizardfromoz]

Whoops, it's only 4.91, I misread it (told you I was autistic)

 

[bob466]

To be clear...enter this number...

To get these results...

At the end of the day...what manufactures say and what happens are two different things.

If anything I'll look at the TBW before buying an SSD now apart from warranty. It seems the smaller SSDs (under 500GB) don't last as long because of TBW...you learn something every day.

 

[CaffeineAddict]

@bob466
Thank you very much for sharing, this is very useful method!

Here is my output:

Now if only there would be a method to know factory maximum for my SSD?
Perhaps anyone knows what would be generally suggested maximum for arbitrary SSD?

 

[bob466]

I didn't know what to look for until now either and we hope the TBW is true. Off their websites...all 2.5" SSDs.

Lexar 500GB 1 year warranty TBW 256
Samsung 870 evo 500GB 5 years warranty TBW 2400
Kingston 480GB 3 year warranty TBW 300
Western Digital 500GB Red 5 year warranty TBW 2500

Take your pick.

 

[CaffeineAddict]

Lexar 500GB 1 year warranty TBW 256
Samsung 870 evo 500GB 5 years warranty TBW 2400
Kingston 480GB 3 year warranty TBW 300
Western Digital 500GB Red 5 year warranty TBW 2500

Take your pick.

I think the chain is as strong as it's weakest link, therefore 256 TBW in general should be a good time to start suspecting in healthiness of SSD.
But 2400 sounds like hell a lot!

 

[bob466]

Maybe it's advertising...if you read what they all say...theirs is the best...only time will tell.

 

[Disabled]

Take your pick.

Before doing that..
That list.. is quite a mess there bob, so, what...what..what happened !

• "Poor" Lexar.. poor puppy . Nowhere to be found the "1 year warranty"
• An Kingston SSD for masses have 160 TBW... but a 480GB enterprise ssd have 876 TBW
• Samsung(yours) have 300 TBW not 2400 .. according to tomshardware .
• Western Digital...

So I guess now..for you, is less linuxing(data writing)
Yeah and.. talk to that emoji of yours, tell him to put the cross away, because micro$oft do love you , and
it just want to say hello!

 

[KGIII]

Note: This is only for the current use/current installation.

If you've reinstalled, that data isn't counted.

(I'm pretty sure, by checking the data across a few installs.)

 

[Disabled]

that data isn't counted.

Are you sure ?
Overwritten is same as written data.

 

[bob466]

Before doing that..
That list.. is quite a mess there bob, so, what...what..what happened !

• "Poor" Lexar.. poor puppy . Nowhere to be found the "1 year warranty"
• An Kingston SSD for masses have 160 TBW... but a 480GB enterprise ssd have 876 TBW
• Samsung(yours) have 300 TBW not 2400 .. according to tomshardware .
• Western Digital...

View attachment 19329

So I guess now..for you, is less linuxing(data writing)
Yeah and.. talk to that emoji of yours, tell him to put the cross away, because micro$oft do love you , and
it just want to say hello!

Didn't know there would be a test...everyone lies...the magic words are...up to.

Take a look here under Full Specifications...
https://www.westerndigital.com/products/internal-drives/wd-red-sata-2-5-ssd?sku=WDS500G1R0A

​

 

[KGIII]

Are you sure ?
Overwritten is same as written data.

The numbers would suggest that. I have an older drive that I recently moved to a new system and that drive is listing very low written data - like less than 500 GB.

If I check a newer drive, one that has been in the same system since first usage and without a clean install, that drive has much more use - even though that's a 'backup' system that gets very little use.

Checked on a third system, one that gets regular use with quite a bit of data written to it, the numbers look more appropriate.

So, I think so but am too lazy to set up a control to verify. Thus the caveat of 'think'. I'm not 100% certain.

Also, how would the system know? If SSDs store and report that information, I can find no reference to it when searching online. That'd be mentioned somewhere, I'd think. But, again, my search terms could be inadequate for the job at hand, thus the caveat.

 

[Disabled]

Take a look here under Full Specifications...

For the magic words ?


A magic word will be MLC...
A 500GB capacity like yours, will have 4.5PB as TBW with a "reliability prediction" of 228 years, but from manufacturer you will get only 3 years warranty.
Couldn't find(maybe are there..somewhere) an mlc-ssd with more then five-year warranty, so...

Expect any ssd to die(ex: controller) after 5 years.
The secret of a "everlasting" ssd lies somewhere around 2D NAND but that have "increased latency".

But people wanted more performance...more and more, like it was not enough the ssd performance compared with hdd, and now we have 3D NAND...I have that, you have it... almost all mortals .

 

[bob466]

You get what you pay for, and let the buyer beware.

Why is a Samsung SSD 500GB and has a 5 yr warranty yet a Kingston SSD only 480GB and 3 yr warranty.

I'm sure the TBW is different too..shop around.

 

[etcetera]

To clarify, the app needs to be installed first:\

# Debian/Ubuntu/Kali Linux etc.
sudo apt install smartmontools
 
# RHEL/CentOS/Fedora
sudo dnf install smartmontools

Find Sector Size and Total_LBAs_Written

# To get Sector Size
smartctl /dev/sda --all |grep "Sector Size"
 
# To get 241/Total_LBAs_Written
smartctl /dev/sda --all | grep Total_LBAs_Written