How can I reset my OWC SSD to factory performance?

[macpokerstars]

Hi,

I bought the OWC Mercury Extreme 3G 120 Gb a year and a half ago, and it now writes at 60 Mb/sec and reads at 70 Mb/sec, which is slower than a normal hard drive.

How do I format it so that it is reset to factory settings (and initial performance)? Do I use Disk Utility? Is secure erasing through Disk Utility bad for the SSD?

Is there an in-house program I have to use for OWC SSD’s?

I am looking to totally wipe out my hard drive and re-install the OS, so you can make me erase it all.

Thanks in advance

 

[Tucom]

Sounds like the drive has worn out, which OWC says they shouldn't do, so I would call OWC first and tell them what your write and read speeds are and see if they'll replace it for you, as they DO have a lifetime warranty.


And, actually, before you do any of that: How much free space is there on the drive? What's the capacity and how much is used? That could be it, and you could try reformatting and re-installing a fresh OS on there, but if that doesn't work, give OWC a call.

 

[macpokerstars]

Hi, thanks for your response.

I have 83 Gb of free available space and I have never had less than 70 Gb of available space.

I haven't made huge amounts of erasing and writing on that disk, even though I've been using it for a year and a half.

Thanks for your help

 

[Mr. Retrofire]

I bought the OWC Mercury Extreme 3G 120 Gb a year and a half ago, and it now writes at 60 Mb/sec and reads at 70 Mb/sec, which is slower than a normal hard drive.

Do you use TRIM?

 

[macpokerstars]

Do you use TRIM?

Hi,
I don't use it, because OWC SSD's already have a garbage collection feature built-in.

 

[Mr. Retrofire]

Hi,
I don't use it, because OWC SSD's already have a garbage collection feature built-in.

Garbage Collection has nothing to do with TRIM. Garbage Collection is a firmware feature and TRIM is a OS-level feature. Only the OS knows, which block in a file system is unused (if you delete a file in the OS X Finder). The SSD firmware does not know anything about HFS+, the standard OS X file system format. That is the reason why newer versions of OS X support the TRIM command.

 

[Weaselboy]

Do you use TRIM?

TRIM would still only impact write speeds. I think something is wrong with OP's SSD and he should RMA it. No way is 70Mbps read speed normal.