Wow, Leo! (SpinRite's “Dad”, Steve Gibson, here.) Thank you SO MUCH for that perfect recitation of SpinRite's past and current status. There's literally nothing I would change in your presentation of SpinRite. The only thing I can think to add is that we really are finding that SSDs are dramatically slowing down with use over time. Since this appears to be most significant at the "front" of the SSD where the mostly read and rarely written OS files are, this appears to be a manifestation of "read disturb" which causes bit cell charges to be upset when neighboring regions are read. If you have any older SSD around, try running SpinRite's three-point benchmark on it. If the front of the drive is a lot slower than the middle or end, you'll likely find that a Level 3 pass will bring the front of the drive back up to speed (because that will have rewritten the data bit cells with "undisturbed" data. And, again, thank you SO MUCH! :)
I've had a copy of SpinRite for about a decade or so now. It can be a useful tool, but these days with SSDs its usefulness is waning. And even with hard drives, with the multi-terabyte sizes available these days, it's become a chore to run. It's definitely worth a shot in extreme circumstances.
FWIW, there's a LOT of new stuff happening with SpinRite these days. Leo was talking about v6.1, which even after 20 years, ALL v6.0 owners are welcome to update to for NO charge. In other words, it's FREE upgrade to v6.1. And you'll find that v6.1 is able to zip through SSDs at half a terabyte per hour and even “spinners” FAR faster than ever. And if you find that the front of the SSD benchmarks slower than the middle or end (benchmarking built in), a Level 3 pass will restore its previous performance. 👍
I've been using Spirits for 20yrs. It's recovered data and drives many times. I've never found it to make matters worse. I run it routinely to keep my drives in good shape.
@@SGgrc I'm not sure where to message you in regards to this @SGgrc but I have a WD SSD that one day turned itself in BIO's into a 16kb "Sandisk" drive, would something like Spinrite be able to perhaps fix this issue if the BIO's still reads it? I would happily fork the money to buy the software if you've heard of this issue before being resolved.
@@Kerl_WG Unfortunately, I don't think SpinRite would help with that one. I have a piece of freeware on GRC called "ValiDrive" which is useful for spot-checking the storage surface of solid-state media. It turns out that the market has a problem with fake SSD and Flash "thumb drive" media from overseas. If you do an Internet search for "Fake SSD" you'll see some examples of cheesy SD cards hot glued inside SSD cases. It's horrifying. So I wrote the "ValiDrive" freeware to create some visibility into that, and to allow anyone to quickly check their own media. :)
How much degradation are we talking about 10%, 20%. I have a 15 year old spinrite that I haven’t used for many years, does it have a similar « level 3? » I haven’t visited Steve Gibson web site for a long time. I remember it was a very informative site. It’s great that gurus salute each other.
Wow, Leo! (SpinRite's “Dad”, Steve Gibson, here.) Thank you SO MUCH for that perfect recitation of SpinRite's past and current status. There's literally nothing I would change in your presentation of SpinRite. The only thing I can think to add is that we really are finding that SSDs are dramatically slowing down with use over time. Since this appears to be most significant at the "front" of the SSD where the mostly read and rarely written OS files are, this appears to be a manifestation of "read disturb" which causes bit cell charges to be upset when neighboring regions are read. If you have any older SSD around, try running SpinRite's three-point benchmark on it. If the front of the drive is a lot slower than the middle or end, you'll likely find that a Level 3 pass will bring the front of the drive back up to speed (because that will have rewritten the data bit cells with "undisturbed" data.
And, again, thank you SO MUCH! :)
Thank you Steve! Mind if I copy your comments to the article page askleo.com/spinrite_repair_hard_disk_failures_and_recover_your_data/ ??
@@askleonotenboom By all means, Leo. And thanks again! :)
I've had a copy of SpinRite for about a decade or so now. It can be a useful tool, but these days with SSDs its usefulness is waning. And even with hard drives, with the multi-terabyte sizes available these days, it's become a chore to run. It's definitely worth a shot in extreme circumstances.
FWIW, there's a LOT of new stuff happening with SpinRite these days. Leo was talking about v6.1, which even after 20 years, ALL v6.0 owners are welcome to update to for NO charge. In other words, it's FREE upgrade to v6.1. And you'll find that v6.1 is able to zip through SSDs at half a terabyte per hour and even “spinners” FAR faster than ever. And if you find that the front of the SSD benchmarks slower than the middle or end (benchmarking built in), a Level 3 pass will restore its previous performance. 👍
it would be a dream come true to see the two Leos come together for a show
Its Good that you do these videos Leo, appreciated.
I've been using Spirits for 20yrs. It's recovered data and drives many times. I've never found it to make matters worse. I run it routinely to keep my drives in good shape.
... and if you haven't yet updated to v6.1, you're welcome to for no charge. 👍
@@SGgrc I'm not sure where to message you in regards to this @SGgrc but I have a WD SSD that one day turned itself in BIO's into a 16kb "Sandisk" drive, would something like Spinrite be able to perhaps fix this issue if the BIO's still reads it? I would happily fork the money to buy the software if you've heard of this issue before being resolved.
@@Kerl_WG Unfortunately, I don't think SpinRite would help with that one. I have a piece of freeware on GRC called "ValiDrive" which is useful for spot-checking the storage surface of solid-state media. It turns out that the market has a problem with fake SSD and Flash "thumb drive" media from overseas. If you do an Internet search for "Fake SSD" you'll see some examples of cheesy SD cards hot glued inside SSD cases. It's horrifying. So I wrote the "ValiDrive" freeware to create some visibility into that, and to allow anyone to quickly check their own media. :)
I have used SpinRight many times on many costumers computers going back to DOS 6 may be even on DOS 3
Good information, thank you.
Wow thank you Leo. Hearing Steve's name made me smile. Many episodes of watching Leo Laporte's IT show where Steve would appear was wonderful.
Nice. Thanks.
Thanks Leo
How much degradation are we talking about 10%, 20%. I have a 15 year old spinrite that I haven’t used for many years, does it have a similar « level 3? »
I haven’t visited Steve Gibson web site for a long time. I remember it was a very informative site.
It’s great that gurus salute each other.
Did you know that there are only 3 manufacturers of hard drives
✅ Watch next ▶ You’ve Lost (or Recovered) Your Data. Now What? ▶ ua-cam.com/video/pYa6dq2_jy4/v-deo.html