Ssd Eol?

How can you tell if a SSD has gone kaput if you can't boot? Suddenly the SSD in my old PC won't accept an image restore or even a clean install - keep getting the message 'Your device ran into a problem and needs to restart. You can restart'. Restarting triggers a repair but the repair fails. A clean Win 10 install appears to go normally but on restart at completion it just returns to the setup screen and waits for you to start the install again, over and over. I'm guessing the SSD has failed though it has never exhibited any problems at all previously. I'm no novice and have tried everything I know to get over this but it does look as if it has had its day. Any thoughts?

 

This sounds more like the OS is corrupt. Do you see the drive in the BIOS setup menu?

Do you see the drive in Windows File Explorer?

 

If the drive wasn't visible to the BIOS I wouldn't be able to select it when trying to reinstall would I? As it won't boot, File Explorer isn't available but when I boot to my Macrium rescue media the drive is available, as are its partitions. However if I go ahead and restore my image I then get the 'Your device ran into a problem' message again on restart. The image does verify ok and if I try to restore an earlier image, that gives the same error too. All the images verify and this old PC has always been a model of reliability.

 

Are you saying that the drive is not visible in the BIOS? because if that is the case, then this is not good news.

Since it appears that you cannot boot your system, from what you are saying, then in your shoes I would do the following

If you have another pc, install a copy of HD Sentinel on it. It is a paid for program but has a 30 day trial period.

Then remove the (failing?) SSD and connect it to the pc with HD Sentinel on and check out what that program reports.

The reason I mention HD Sentinel is that I know that it can detect drives that are connected via USB since I use the paid version. Others such programs such as Crystal Disk Info cannot detect drives connected via USB, or at least I have never been able to get that function to work.

With older, traditional, hard drives, manufacturers used to have a drive diagnostics programs available which you could run from say a disc or a usb stick which would run a diagnostics on the drive but I have not run across any for ssds that I know of.

Good luck

 

Or, if you have another PC, temporarily install this SSD in that computer as a secondary (not boot) drive first, see if you can "see" it, and then if you can, run some diagnostics on it. By installing it in the 2nd PC, no need to worry about USB interfaces at all.

 

Thanks for the inputs guys. The drive is visible to the BIOS and I can clean install Win 10 to it or restore an image but in both cases, on reboot I get the error and can go no further. With SSD prices so low I'm not going to waste more time on it, just replace it and restore an image.

As to testing it in another system, this was my spare system and holds mostly backups, so I'm down to just having my laptop atm but that isn't a big issue as I'm sure I can revive it with a new SSD.

 

After removing the SSD from the PC and attaching it to my laptop by USB I was able to restore an image in a clean environment, i.e. completely free of any influence by the PC it belongs to. It hasn't made any difference at all as when reinstalled in the PC I get exactly the same error at boot. Virtually certain now it's a rootkit though lord knows how it acquired it. Have ordered a replacement and will install Win 10 to it using the laptop before reinstalling it in PC. Gotta hope the rootkit hasn't somehow invaded the PC's HDD too and able to reinfect the SSD. Serious advice would be very welcome.

 

Well if the saved image that you were trying to restore has any kind of virus on it, whatsoever it may be, then re-installing the saved image onto a new SSD will copy that same virus onto the new disc unfortunately.

2 ways to move forwards from here in my opinion.

1. Run an anti virus scan from a disc or usb on the old SSD drive to check it

or

2. Check the old SSD with HD Sentinel (as per my comments above) since it could be some issue with the ssd (and to rule out that it isn't).

Good Luck

 

I had tried restoring three different images, all predating this problem appearing, and all failed on boot with the same error. It was this that convinced me that I had somehow picked up a rootkit. I did check the SSD in HD Sentinel and it was good so I got really rough with it, disconnecting the HDD and completely zapping the SSD with bootable Partition Wizard and after that I was able to reinstall Win 10 and boot to it. I decided not to restore any image so busy now reconfiguring everything - bit of a bore but at least it's working. Thanks again