Dell Latitude E4200 Info

Has anyone successfully used HDDERASE to secure-erase the E4200 Samsung SSD? I tried, but the program hangs on the screen where it is supposed to show the drives in the system. Have done all the required stuff, like setting SATA mode to ATA, using a boot-up disk, etc. Also tried both version 3.3 and 4.0.

It is very frustrating that Samsung does not support the older SSD's at all. No garbage collection program, no trim support. No firmware upgrade available. I'll tell friends to stay away from Samsung SSD's.

 

Tried quite a few things, and finally have recovered some of the lost speed. I used Gparted-live on USB to boot up, and deleted the partition with OS on it. Unfortunately the Dell BIOS does not allow the security-erase command to pass through: I get a I/O error, like other people have. At that point I was pretty disgusted with Dell and Samsung. Then I used Acronis to recover the image previously saved. Took a long time because of the low write speed, I guess. Of course, the laptop won't boot up because the partition was previously deleted, so I used GParted-live to make the new partition active (boot) again. After that the laptop boots into Windows 7 correctly.

Re-ran CrystalDiskMark, and now the sequential write speed is up to 66MB/s. It was in the low 20's before the deletion. So apparently just deleting the partition and restoring an image helps. When the laptop was new, the same write was in the 70MB/s range, so I think it probably has lost about 10 to 15% of its write speed.

It is truly disgusting that Dell/Samsung does not provide a firmware upgrade, and that they have locked out features so that we cannot do a security-erase on the drive. My recommendation now for friends is not to buy any SSD from Dell.

 

Turns out I could security-erase the drive by disconnecting the drive cable and reconnecting it after boot up using GParted-live. Now the drive is back to its original, mundane, performance level.

 

Hi chunglau,

Could you please describe how you managed to get the secure-erase command to work without the I/O error.. I have an E4200 with 128GB SSD and it is ATA password locked.. Have tried Gparted with the hotplugging but still getting the I/O error.. You're help would be greatly appreciated!

Thanks

 

From my searching on the web it would look like a Intel X18-M has the right connector to work in a E4200 but the problem is the size of the drive with cover that it wont fit.
Has anyone tried to disassemble a X18-M to see if the size fits without the "shell" or Cover?

Looking here it seems at least that a X25-V is rather easy to disassemble:
Intel X25-V SSD Review (40GB) | StorageReview.com

And looking here for the connectors and how the E4200 drive looks like:
replacing Dell E4200 SSD? 2.5" or 1.8" - [H]ard|Forum

It would be so nice to be able to drop in a X18-M in the E4200

 

I actually found a picture of the X18-M without the cover:
IDF 2008 - Intel Solid State Drives and Inside The X18-M - Inside the Intel X18-M SSD - Legit Reviews

 

It's been a while since I checked this thread. Please follow this:

http://forum.notebookreview.com/har...marks-brands-news-advice-542.html#post6382916

and also read the next several posts on that thread.

 

Anyone has problem about AC adapter = not installed. My Bios is A16 and now I cannot charge battery. Any help is highly appreciated.

 

Make sure that you didn't accidentally disable charging with Fn+F2.

John

 

I guess not since it cannot recognize its ac adapter at all.