How to secure erase your SSD's on a Mac

[BEASTMAN]

Please Help

Okay, I was following these steps for my Samsung 256gb SSD.

I had my SSD plugged into a drive dock and connected through USB on my Macbook Pro. Every time I used the I would get HDIO_DRIVE_CMD(identify) failed: Invalid exchange

After this I put the SSD in my MBP and while GParted was booted up I unplugged the SATA cable and plugged it back in. This allowed me to finally get past the above error.

Once I verified that the drive was not frozen, I set the password to Eins just like the guide. I verified the password was set.

Then both the window for Gparted and terminal crashed and closed.

Ever since then I cannot see the drive in GParted, I cannot format it in OSX or Windows. It is giving me a resource in use error in OSX and a IO error in Windows. I have tried Drive Genius and it fails that as well. The drive just shows as if it still needs initialized.

So is the drive just locked with that password (and how can I get that off) or did this process just kill my drive?

Please, any help will be greatly appreciated.

 

[GMink]

Okay, I was following these steps for my Samsung 256gb SSD.

I had my SSD plugged into a drive dock and connected through USB on my Macbook Pro. Every time I used the I would get HDIO_DRIVE_CMD(identify) failed: Invalid exchange

After this I put the SSD in my MBP and while GParted was booted up I unplugged the SATA cable and plugged it back in. This allowed me to finally get past the above error.

Once I verified that the drive was not frozen, I set the password to Eins just like the guide. I verified the password was set.

Then both the window for Gparted and terminal crashed and closed.

Ever since then I cannot see the drive in GParted, I cannot format it in OSX or Windows. It is giving me a resource in use error in OSX and a IO error in Windows. I have tried Drive Genius and it fails that as well. The drive just shows as if it still needs initialized.

So is the drive just locked with that password (and how can I get that off) or did this process just kill my drive?

Please, any help will be greatly appreciated.

I'm not 100% sure on this but I think this guide was for Intel based SSD. You may want to look at the Samsung web site to see if they have a CD or DVD based flash utility that you can try to restore the drive by flashing it to the latest ROM.

 

[VirtualRain]

I'm not 100% sure on this but I think this guide was for Intel based SSD. You may want to look at the Samsung web site to see if they have a CD or DVD based flash utility that you can try to restore the drive by flashing it to the latest ROM.

This sounds like good advice. I'm not familiar with Samsung drives. I would try different utilities to see if you can see the drive, whether it's something from Samsung to flash new firmware, HDDerase booted from a PC, or something else. Googling to see if anyone else has had this issue would also be good. Sorry I can't help more. Good luck and let us know the outcome.

 

[copperlab]

Disktester vs hdparm

Has anyone seen this program? It says it can recondition a ssd in a mac. Is it using the same process as hdparm?

http://macperformanceguide.com/Storage-SSD-Reconditioning.html

 

[GMink]

Has anyone seen this program? It says it can recondition a ssd in a mac. Is it using the same process as hdparm?

http://macperformanceguide.com/Storage-SSD-Reconditioning.html

I've seen that article before, If your going to go through all of that trouble (which I've already have done) why not just image the Mac boot drive, reformat the Mac SSD drive in NTFS and run the intel toolkit with it's optimizer, then reformat in HFS+ and image the boot drive back.

Far from being an ideal solution regardless of how you end up doing it! lol

 

[jkozlow3]

I've seen that article before, If your going to go through all of that trouble (which I've already have done) why not just image the Mac boot drive, reformat the Mac SSD drive in NTFS and run the intel toolkit with it's optimizer, then reformat in HFS+ and image the boot drive back.

Far from being an ideal solution regardless of how you end up doing it! lol

Doesn't the Intel Toolkit need a PC with BIOS? I thought I read somewhere that it did. If not, I think your suggestion would be a good one. The steps would then be:

1. Image the SSD onto an external HD using Carbon Copy Cloner or SuperDuper
2. Boot from the imaged external drive
3. Format the internal SSD using NTFS (note: what's the easiest way to do this from OS X?)
4. Boot using the Intel Toolkit CD & restore the SSD's performance
5. Boot back up from the imaged external HD
6. Format internal SSD as HFS+
7. Restore backed up image on external drive to internal SSD


This doesn't sound too bad to me and wouldn't be a big deal to do a couple of times a year. However, I thought Intel's toolkit needed a BIOS (read: PC) to run. Can someone confirm? If that's true, then performing the steps I mentioned but rather using DiskTester's recondition function in lieu of the Intel Toolkit might be the only alternative and DiskTester isn't free.

I would prefer a solution like this over having to open up the bottom case of my MBP and hot-swapping drives to keep them from being locked. Only because unscrewing everything is a bit of a PITA.

 

[GMink]

I can confirm that no BIOS is needed for the Intel Toolkit Optimizer. It runs fine on my Mac Pro on the NTFS partion and of course will not work on the HFS+ partion.

It has to have the standard Microsoft drivers installed in windows for it to pass the cammands along to the drive. Will not work with Intel AHCI drivers altho I hear they are working on getting revised drivers out. It will work with the Microsoft AHCI standard driver.

I just booted into windows 7 bootcamp and formatted the drive to NTFS, then ran the optimizer. Then boot back into your OSX backup image and go from there.

EDIT: I just read your post again and your talking about using the Intel toolkit CD? I've not done that I just ran it from within windows on my mac.

 

[jkozlow3]

I can confirm that no BIOS is needed for the Intel Toolkit Optimizer. It runs fine on my Mac Pro on the NTFS partion and of course will not work on the HFS+ partion.

It has to have the standard Microsoft drivers installed in windows for it to pass the cammands along to the drive. Will not work with Intel AHCI drivers altho I hear they are working on getting revised drivers out. It will work with the Microsoft AHCI standard driver.

I just booted into windows 7 bootcamp and formatted the drive to NTFS, then ran the optimizer. Then boot back into your OSX backup image and go from there.

EDIT: I just read your post again and your talking about using the Intel toolkit CD? I've not done that I just ran it from within windows on my mac.

Gotcha. I was thinking about the old Intel bootable CD - HDD ERASE which I read requires a BIOS. Anyway, I don't have a Bootcamp partition installed - I use VMWare Fusion to run Win7 in parallel with OS X and don't really wish to install Windows on a Bootcamp partition. So it looks like using DiskTester's recondition function from an imaged external hard disk is the only way to restore the performance of the internal SSD without physically opening the machine and disconnecting the drive at this point.

So the revised steps would be:

1. Install DiskTester on your internal SSD
2. Image the SSD onto an external HD using Carbon Copy Cloner or SuperDuper
3. Boot from the imaged external drive
4. Format/erase the internal SSD
5. Run DiskTester's recondition function
6. Restore backed up image on external drive to internal SSD
7. Boot back up using the internal SSD drive

 

[VirtualRain]

4. Format/erase the internal SSD
5. Run DiskTester's recondition function

Has anyone seen this program? It says it can recondition a ssd in a mac. Is it using the same process as hdparm?

http://macperformanceguide.com/Storage-SSD-Reconditioning.html

I would not recommend this Disktester solution. It sounds like it's just filling the drive, not using the ATA command to secure erase (free all blocks) on the drive.

From Intel:

An alternative method (faster) is to use a tool to perform a SECURE ERASE command on the drive. This command will release all of the user LBA locations internally in the drive and result in all of the NAND locations being reset to an erased state. This is equivalent to resetting the drive to the factory shipped condition, and will provide the optimum performance.

From AnandTech:

Based on my explanation there’s one sure-fire way to make your drive fast again. Formatting/deleting everything on the drive won’t work because those pages on the drive will remain full of data.

If you are doing a clean setup of your machine and want to restore your drive to its native state you’ll have to perform a secure erase. Intel distributed a tool with the first X25-M review kits called HDD ERASE. This tool will take any SSD and free every last page on the drive. Obviously you’ll lose all of your data but your drive will be super fast again!

The Secure Erase process I articulated in the original post, utilizes the same ATA command as HDD Erase, it just does so without requiring a boot to BIOS or Windows.

 

[jkozlow3]

I would not recommend this Disktester solution. It sounds like it's just filling the drive, not using the ATA command to secure erase (free all blocks) on the drive.

From Intel:



From AnandTech:



The Secure Erase process I articulated in the original post, utilizes the same ATA command as HDD Erase, it just does so without requiring a boot to BIOS or Windows.

But is there a way to secure erase without having to open up your MacBook and disconnect the drive? I'm not suggesting that your solution isn't a good one, but it's not my preferred one. I have to imagine there's a way to clone your internal SSD drive to an external, boot from external, format and secure erase the internal SSD and re-clone from external to the internal SSD all without removing your drive, no??

 

[VirtualRain]

But is there a way to secure erase without having to open up your MacBook and disconnect the drive? I'm not suggesting that your solution isn't a good one, but it's not my preferred one. I have to imagine there's a way to clone your internal SSD drive to an external, boot from external, format and secure erase the internal SSD and re-clone from external to the internal SSD all without removing your drive, no??

I'm not aware of any way to do this. Is it a big deal to remove the drive from the machine?

 

[jkozlow3]

I'm not aware of any way to do this. Is it a big deal to remove the drive from the machine?

Not a huge deal, no. Just looking for an easier way that doesn't include unscrewing all those damn screws on the bottom panel of the MBP

 

[dclaessen]

I found a solution to my SSD ATA secure erase problem WITHOUT using an "external enclosure":

Here are the steps:

0. Back up my SSD, using SuperDuper app to another regular 2.5 hard drive

1. Put in the Gparted Live CD created with the downloaded ISO and turn off my MacBookPro (MBP)

2. Open the back of my MBP and removed SSD and leave the MBP back open. I put MBP on a phone book so that the hard drive wire is exposed to the side.

3. Boot with CD, without any drive or SSD connected. Will boot straight from CD.

4. After completely booted into Gparted Live, plug in the SSD to the internal SATA cable in the back of my MBP. I like to stress that this is the internal cable for the internal drive and NOT cables from any external enclosure whatsoever.

5. Then I did a hdparm -I /dev/sda and see that my drive is NOT "Frozen". This is the only way to have your SSD NOT frozen.

6. I then proceeded with setting a password and could secure erase my SSD with success. These steps were outlined from the first post of this topic.

I am back with incredible speed just like when I first got it.

I did exactly this and my SSD drive feels as new. No more freezes, beach balls!

Dennis

 

[ildondeigiocchi]

I did exactly this and my SSD drive feels as new. No more freezes, beach balls!

Dennis

When I boot to the GPartedLive CD and execute hdparm -I /dev/sda ... It doesn't show FROZEN or NOT FROZEN i.e. Security but rather information about the drive.

 

[slicedbread]

I used the method outlined by VirtualRain in his first post to restore my Intel X25-M 160GB (gen 2).

• Downloaded gparted-live-0.5.2-8.iso, burnt to a cd and booted of it.
• Followed the instructions. Be sure to follow it to the letter, even the correct case! -i and -I give different results.
• In part 3 the command output looks slightly different to their version on the website. My output was 3 rows of timings, not "0+0k 0+0io 0pf+0w" as quoted.
• I had the SSD in bay 2 of my 2006 1,1 Mac Pro. The drive was frozen after the first "hdparm -I /dev/X" command, so I quickly slid the drive in and out of the machine. After a few seconds the machine re-recognised the drive and the second "hdparm -I /dev/X" showed the drive to be unfrozen.
• It took about 54s to restore the drive.
• I tried this method with a generic USB - 2.5" SATA enclosure, however the drive was always stuck frozen. Using the pull out/reinsert method in the SATA bay it worked.

The SSD is my main drive, and I've used it for about 6 months. It was only about 50GB full, but here are some benchmarks pre- and post- erase. Xbench 1.3 disk test - results are the average of 4 tests.

Pre:
259.89

Post:
315.90

It seems that though the falloff in performance is measurable, even degraded SSDs will blow the pants off and mechanical HDD. For reference the 250GB 7200rpm Seagate drive I cloned my install to had an average score of 45.3

 

[paulpet]

What about just using the "dd" command?

Does anyone know if you can achieve something equivalent to a ATA Secure Erase by just using the "dd" command? In which case, all you would need to do is boot from a cloned external drive and then run the "dd" command to overwrite every sector of the SSD with 1s? Then run superduper and clone the external drive back on to the SSD, avoiding the hassle of opening the machine up.

 

[VirtualRain]

Does anyone know if you can achieve something equivalent to a ATA Secure Erase by just using the "dd" command? In which case, all you would need to do is boot from a cloned external drive and then run the "dd" command to overwrite every sector of the SSD with 1s? Then run superduper and clone the external drive back on to the SSD, avoiding the hassle of opening the machine up.

This will not work, in fact it fills your drive with data. Please see post #34... all these secure erase solutions that over-write data with 1's or 0's ARE NOT GOOD FOR SSD's.

 

[dr96m]

I found a solution to my SSD ATA secure erase problem WITHOUT using an "external enclosure":

Here are the steps:

0. Back up my SSD, using SuperDuper app to another regular 2.5 hard drive

1. Put in the Gparted Live CD created with the downloaded ISO and turn off my MacBookPro (MBP)

2. Open the back of my MBP and removed SSD and leave the MBP back open. I put MBP on a phone book so that the hard drive wire is exposed to the side.

3. Boot with CD, without any drive or SSD connected. Will boot straight from CD.

4. After completely booted into Gparted Live, plug in the SSD to the internal SATA cable in the back of my MBP. I like to stress that this is the internal cable for the internal drive and NOT cables from any external enclosure whatsoever.

5. Then I did a hdparm -I /dev/sda and see that my drive is NOT "Frozen". This is the only way to have your SSD NOT frozen.

6. I then proceeded with setting a password and could secure erase my SSD with success. These steps were outlined from the first post of this topic.

I am back with incredible speed just like when I first got it.

I followed these instructions but at step 4 when I plugged back in the SATA connector the MBP reset. Is there a way to plug in the connector to unfreeze the drive which doesn't cause the machine to reset?

 

[bearcatrp]

Been reading this thread for info as I am considering an ssd drive for my 2008 Mac pro. Since trim is not supported yet, has anyone tried formatting it using fat32 (after backing up) then formatting back to whatever you want to clean it up? Would think this would do it but since I don't own one yet, can't confirm it will work.

 

[VirtualRain]

I followed these instructions but at step 4 when I plugged back in the SATA connector the MBP reset. Is there a way to plug in the connector to unfreeze the drive which doesn't cause the machine to reset?

Hopefully someone familiar with this method can help you out. Otherwise you can get an enclosure and try the steps I outlined in post 1.

Been reading this thread for info as I am considering an ssd drive for my 2008 Mac pro. Since trim is not supported yet, has anyone tried formatting it using fat32 (after backing up) then formatting back to whatever you want to clean it up? Would think this would do it but since I don't own one yet, can't confirm it will work.

Reformatting a drive is a file system level operation and will do nothing to change the underlying physical media. The only way to restore an SSD to it's factory condition is to mark all blocks as unused. Currently, SSDs only do this when they receive the ATA Secure Erase command as outlined here.

 

[DoFoT9]

This will not work, in fact it fills your drive with data. Please see post #34... all these secure erase solutions that over-write data with 1's or 0's ARE NOT GOOD FOR SSD's.

we need a low level app that resets everything based on the cell contents, not just binary numbers.

writing 0s and 1s are not good for PERFORMANCE of SSDs, but it will surely erase all the data

i wonder if the companies firmware apps work on the low level?

 

[VirtualRain]

we need a low level app that resets everything based on the cell contents, not just binary numbers.

writing 0s and 1s are not good for PERFORMANCE of SSDs, but it will surely erase all the data

i wonder if the companies firmware apps work on the low level?

What we need is TRIM support and then it would be all automatic and none of this nonsense would be necessary. In the interim, the process outlined here, although not convenient, is effective.

 

[DoFoT9]

What we need is TRIM support and then it would be all automatic and none of this nonsense would be necessary. In the interim, the process outlined here, although not convenient, is effective.

TRIM support would surely be nice, but needs to be implemented at the FS level. so maybe by 10.8?

is it effective for MLC or SLC SSDs, or both? because as i understand it SLC has 1 bit cells, where as MLC has 2 bit cells. this results in completely different methods to handle setting cells to "empty".

 

[VirtualRain]

TRIM support would surely be nice, but needs to be implemented at the FS level. so maybe by 10.8?

is it effective for MLC or SLC SSDs, or both? because as i understand it SLC has 1 bit cells, where as MLC has 2 bit cells. this results in completely different methods to handle setting cells to "empty".

I believe for this purpose the NAND is managed at the block level.

 

[DoFoT9]

I believe for this purpose the NAND is managed at the block level.

you would hope that it truly is a secure erase of sorts then, not that i had looked into it. forgive my ignorance.