OCZ Filing for Bankruptcy

[whs]

In the interim, this may be a good compromise - especially for laptops.

WD Black 2 Dual Drive - Laptop Hard Drives - CNET Reviews

 

[Everlong]

The big debacle they had over their vertex 3 Sandforce SSD? You don't know about that? It was crashing many customers computers and loosing data. Thre customers just got the run around of try this and firmware after firmware revisions over and over and over, when it was controller bugs and they couldn't do anything about. There were also incidents where they advertised performance for one of their SSD then silently changed the chips to fewer, denser 25 nm which dropped the performance. They ended up having to rename the model for that there was such a backlash. You can't find this on their support forums because they would purge all of the bad stuff.

We had bought one for work for some tests (against my advice). It died in two days. They wouldn't honor the warranty because it was being used in an enterprise environment - never mind that we used it in spec.

IDK, maybe you got lucky, a lot of people didn't and they lost a lot of their customer base. I don't think it had anything to do with financiers.

Every company has some rough patches though. A friend of mine suffered with the Seagate 7200.11 incident where the drives would just brick themselves. Or I had Western Digital's issues where the drive would spin down too soon, which in some scenarios would mean the drive is constantly spinning up and down, which in turn ruins performance.

Or there was a firmware update for the Crucial M4, which started shipping with them, which had an issue and stopped some PCs from booting up altogether. And another issues that some Mac users had with the M4 that would keep freezing the Mac for short periods of time.

OCZ still had some great products, but I never understood why they dropped everything and just focused on SSDs back in the SSD boom days. My Vertex 2 died a month before it's 3 years warranty was up, and they replaced it with an Agility 3, which is running great. Sandforce has had quite a bad rep for a long time, it's just OCZ get the main bulk of the complaints because they happen to use it in their drives.

 

[linnemeyerhere]

I'm sure if we watch we'll be able to score some killer OCZ deals as they are blown out of dealer stock. I see a MIR bundle deal today that is amazing but it has a software package that I'm suspect of but if it's MIR is good who cares !

OCZ Vertex 450 128GB Solid State Drive and Total Defense Premium Internet Security Bundle at TigerDirect.com

 

[whs]

I'm sure if we watch we'll be able to score some killer OCZ deals as they are blown out of dealer stock. I see a MIR bundle deal today that is amazing but it has a software package that I'm suspect of but if it's MIR is good who cares !

OCZ Vertex 450 128GB Solid State Drive and Total Defense Premium Internet Security Bundle at TigerDirect.com

That's really a good deal - and the software that comes with it you sell on eBay, LOL.

 

[linnemeyerhere]

Precisely !

 

[sygnus21]

Well my OCZ Vertex 2 drive is suddenly going bad, had it since Dec 2010. Anyway I was going to replace it with a 256gig Vertex 450 until I ran across an article comparing it to the Samsung 840 Pro and decided to go with the Samsung. Now I visit here and see OCZ is filling for bankruptcy so I feel even better about moving now.

BTW my OCZ Vertex 4 is still running like a champ so....

Here's the article comparing the two drives - Speed Test OCZ Vertex 450 256GB vs Samsung 840 Pro VTX450-25SAT3-256G MZ-7PD256BW

 

[Lebon14]

I have a 3.5" 90GB OCZ Vertex 2 (SATA 2). Never had any problems with it. I'm running an old firmware but why would I update when I know that the current is working and stable? However, after the Vertex/Agility 2, things went bad for OCZ and my image of them worsened and I wouldn't recommand their product because of all I'vw heard bad and (crazy) high return rates.

 

[carwiz]

The only problem with buying any OCZ product now is the lack of any warranty or support (firmware). I would imagine that products in the retail tubes right now are going to be on "clearance". As such, you may be taking all the risks. You certainly can't sue and the vendor can just pass on any responsibility. It's no bargain if you bought a "brick".

 

[HerrKaLeun]

I don't want to sound mean, but they had it coming and i wondered how they stayed in business for so long.

For computers reliability is King. Especially the part that contains all the data. When did you ever hear of a CPU failing (except OC)? When did brand-name RAM ever fail?

No one cares if an SSD is 5% faster with nowaday speeds. No one cares if it cost 5% less if it is not reliable. Even when warranty is given, no one pays for the lost time dealing with firmware upgrades.

It is like the commercial airliner industry. If you sell an airplane that is 5% cheaper, but has a (perceived or real) track record of unreliability - no one will buy it. Even if it flies 5% faster than the competition.

I never owned an OCZ SSD, so what do i know. But I can read and read about thousands of firmware upgrades people had to go through with OCZ. I've owned a Samsung SSD for over a year and still have the original firmware, which still is the current version. HDD didn't need FW upgrades, so why would an SSD need one? Especially since upgrading FW requires re-imaging. Who pays for that time?

And were OCZ really faster SSD? Maybe some tests sugested that. But they only were fast under mysterious conditions, like only being less than half full etc.

They won't be missed.

 

[crankypenguin]

I wish Mushkin made more SSD's. Now there is a stable company, others should look up to. Been in business since 1994 and if their SSD line is anything like their RAM, I would never buy any other SSD but a Mushkin SSD. And even thought I have never owned a OCZ, it is true that there are indeed a lot of postings on computer forums about problems. This I can attest to as I read a few and I constantly see people complaining.

 

[HerrKaLeun]

I wish Mushkin made more SSD's. Now there is a stable company, others should look up to. Been in business since 1994 and if their SSD line is anything like their RAM, I would never buy any other SSD but a Mushkin SSD. And even thought I have never owned a OCZ, it is true that there are indeed a lot of postings on computer forums about problems. This I can attest to as I read a few and I constantly see people complaining.

OCZ used to make RAM and powersupplies. In fact I owned some. But making good RAM doesn't qualify you for SSD. Especially since their SSD parts were purchased, like the darn Sandforce controllers.

Come to think about the RAM, it was sold as 1066, but never made it above 800. When I complained to OCZ, their support just told me JEDEC stanard is 800 and i have to go shut up. So they had a history of lying about their specs.

 

[whs]

There is a whole line of Mushkin SSDs. But right now they are not on sale like the other day.

Newegg.com - mushkin ssd

 

[crankypenguin]

There is a whole line of Mushkin SSDs. But right now they are not on sale like the other day.

Newegg.com - mushkin ssd

I reside in the Eu where newegg does not exist. It is not as easy to find a good lineup of Mushkin products here, but I have friends in the US that can send it to me. But yes, you are right they do have quite the lineup on newegg.

PS, Last I checked, Newegg does not ship to the EU, has that changed perhaps?

 

[whs]

Practically no US company of that sort ships to the EU. Here is a company in Germany that sells Mushkins. I am sure they would ship to you. And their prices are not out of line.

ALTERNATE

 

[Indianatone]

Krakoom! OCZ flies into the ground. Time to salvage the engines and look around

From the Register, read more here:
Krakoom! OCZ flies into the ground. Time to salvage the engines and look around ? The Register

 

[GeneO]

I don't want to sound mean, but they had it coming and i wondered how they stayed in business for so long.

For computers reliability is King. Especially the part that contains all the data. When did you ever hear of a CPU failing (except OC)? When did brand-name RAM ever fail?

No one cares if an SSD is 5% faster with nowaday speeds. No one cares if it cost 5% less if it is not reliable. Even when warranty is given, no one pays for the lost time dealing with firmware upgrades.

It is like the commercial airliner industry. If you sell an airplane that is 5% cheaper, but has a (perceived or real) track record of unreliability - no one will buy it. Even if it flies 5% faster than the competition.

I never owned an OCZ SSD, so what do i know. But I can read and read about thousands of firmware upgrades people had to go through with OCZ. I've owned a Samsung SSD for over a year and still have the original firmware, which still is the current version. HDD didn't need FW upgrades, so why would an SSD need one? Especially since upgrading FW requires re-imaging. Who pays for that time?

And were OCZ really faster SSD? Maybe some tests sugested that. But they only were fast under mysterious conditions, like only being less than half full etc.

They won't be missed.

Reliability and support are king. Sure every company has their black marks, but it is how they respond to customers if things go wrong that really counts. It appears OCZ didn't cut the mustard there.

 

[carwiz]

Krakoom! OCZ flies into the ground. Time to salvage the engines and look around

From the Register, read more here:
Krakoom! OCZ flies into the ground. Time to salvage the engines and look around ? The Register

There's some key NAND chip makers in that article. Might be worth paying attention in the future.

"... Micron-Intel, Samsung or Toshiba-SanDisk or SK-Hynix ..."

 

[Solarstarshines]

I don't want to sound mean, but they had it coming and i wondered how they stayed in business for so long.

For computers reliability is King. Especially the part that contains all the data. When did you ever hear of a CPU failing (except OC)? When did brand-name RAM ever fail?

No one cares if an SSD is 5% faster with nowaday speeds. No one cares if it cost 5% less if it is not reliable. Even when warranty is given, no one pays for the lost time dealing with firmware upgrades.

It is like the commercial airliner industry. If you sell an airplane that is 5% cheaper, but has a (perceived or real) track record of unreliability - no one will buy it. Even if it flies 5% faster than the competition.

I never owned an OCZ SSD, so what do i know. But I can read and read about thousands of firmware upgrades people had to go through with OCZ. I've owned a Samsung SSD for over a year and still have the original firmware, which still is the current version. HDD didn't need FW upgrades, so why would an SSD need one? Especially since upgrading FW requires re-imaging. Who pays for that time?

And were OCZ really faster SSD? Maybe some tests sugested that. But they only were fast under mysterious conditions, like only being less than half full etc.

They won't be missed.

You really had my Heart in this post ,I have had that struggle with Firmware and getting my OCZ Agility back to proper form it runs well now but trying to update the damn thing was hell honestly

The way they set it up either bootable usb or have it as a second hard drive and update it that way

I never had issues with my Corsair Force 80gb almost considering swapping them but my WEI would go down :shock:

 

[HerrKaLeun]

There's some key NAND chip makers in that article. Might be worth paying attention in the future.

"... Micron-Intel, Samsung or Toshiba-SanDisk or SK-Hynix ..."

That was just another OCZ problem, they didn't really produce anything, just repacakging. what is the proposition whne the chipmakers make SSD themselves?

 

[carwiz]

There's some key NAND chip makers in that article. Might be worth paying attention in the future.

"... Micron-Intel, Samsung or Toshiba-SanDisk or SK-Hynix ..."

That was just another OCZ problem, they didn't really produce anything, just repacakging. what is the proposition whne the chipmakers make SSD themselves?

They already do and have been making SSDs.