A6-PACK ☆ ISK 300-90 picoPSU HTPC A6-3500 Very Silent!

fingers crossed

Dude! That's weird! I was pushing my A6 pretty hard last night. Added a bunch of cartoons to sickbeard for the kids. It was downloading, unpacking, and post-processing like crazy. All the while we were watching old school Beastie Boys videos on YouTube in memory of Adam Yauch (RIP).

All of a sudden, I had a BSOD for a split second, then a reboot. Next came the error message, "please use a valid boot device, blah blah blah". The MoBo didn't recognize my OCZ SSD. I took it out and tested it on a different PC, same results. Booted into Parted Magic, still nothing. This SSD is toast. Probably couldn't handle the load of all the Usenet app activity. Luckily, it came with a 3 year warranty, so I started the RMA process last night.

I happened to have a old 250GB WD Caviar Blue that came out of a Dell desktop (which is now a Unraid server). I put it in my A6 pack, ran secure erase with Parted Magic, loaded Windows 7, XBMC, SAB, Sickbeard, Couch Potato, and configured everything again.

My suspicions about SSDs have been confirmed. The ONLY difference it made with this A6 pack I just built was quicker boot times. Navigating through XBMC menus and libraries is actually quicker with the WD Caviar Blue HDD. Just thought I'd let you guys know.

Also, I still have to do all the Usenet stuff at night, or I get buffering while watching movies, listening to music, etc. I'm for sure moving the Usenet apps to my Unraid box because of this.

well, OCZ SSD's, they aren't recommended...

(2012-05-06 06:30)eskro Wrote:  well, OCZ SSD's, they aren't recommended...

beat me to it..

(2012-05-06 06:22)maddog808 Wrote:  Dude! That's weird! I was pushing my A6 pretty hard last night. Added a bunch of cartoons to sickbeard for the kids. It was downloading, unpacking, and post-processing like crazy. All the while we were watching old school Beastie Boys videos on YouTube in memory of Adam Yauch (RIP).

All of a sudden, I had a BSOD for a split second, then a reboot. Next came the error message, "please use a valid boot device, blah blah blah". The MoBo didn't recognize my OCZ SSD. I took it out and tested it on a different PC, same results. Booted into Parted Magic, still nothing. This SSD is toast. Probably couldn't handle the load of all the Usenet app activity. Luckily, it came with a 3 year warranty, so I started the RMA process last night.

I happened to have a old 250GB WD Caviar Blue that came out of a Dell desktop (which is now a Unraid server). I put it in my A6 pack, ran secure erase with Parted Magic, loaded Windows 7, XBMC, SAB, Sickbeard, Couch Potato, and configured everything again.

My suspicions about SSDs have been confirmed. The ONLY difference it made with this A6 pack I just built was quicker boot times. Navigating through XBMC menus and libraries is actually quicker with the WD Caviar Blue HDD. Just thought I'd let you guys know.

Also, I still have to do all the Usenet stuff at night, or I get buffering while watching movies, listening to music, etc. I'm for sure moving the Usenet apps to my Unraid box because of this.

Man thanx for this... I will always avoid that brand of SSD.....

Oh yes my Lian Li Phenom 4 when I have all that stuff in the background and it starts to transfer files to the server and watching a VID on xbmc is when it will starts to buffer....

That is why I went with just a dedicated system for HTPC..... nothing else to run in the background.

Now I just have to get it to work again...... LOL damit!



RIP Adam Yauch .....Beastie Boys ROCK!!!!!!

Dam I was listening to there album Hello Nasty this past Friday on my way to work... great album...

Ill Communication my favorite!

"Make Some Noise"

(2012-05-06 06:30)eskro Wrote:  well, OCZ SSD's, they aren't recommended...

Actually, when I bought it September 2010, OCZ was HIGHLY recommended by someone who used to be as active on this forum as you are now. Many even called him the "XBMC hardware guru".

Just goes to show how with this technology, nobody really knows anything. It all changes too rapidly to get a feel for what is good. I'm positive that some product you personally love now, will someday be "not recommended"

(2012-05-06 08:38)maddog808 Wrote:  

(2012-05-06 06:30)eskro Wrote:  well, OCZ SSD's, they aren't recommended...

Actually, when I bought it September 2010, OCZ was HIGHLY recommended by someone who used to be as active on this forum as you are now. Many even called him the "XBMC hardware guru".

Just goes to show how with this technology, nobody really knows anything. It all changes too rapidly to get a feel for what is good. I'm positive that some product you personally love now, will someday be "not recommended"

Maddog, I looked thru some of your posts, if you are having problems with a 60GB Vertex you may be okay.
My brother bought that drive and had problems with it. OCZ sent him a destructive flash with instructions. Based on the serial number of his drive, he was able to flash it to a TURBO! That was over a year ago and the drive is still running.
Contact OCZ and give them your serial number.

If that doesn't work out for you, that drive is End Of Life - you may get a better drive as a replacement.

Do you feel lucky? You may come out of this ahead of the game.

The Vertex has a Indilinx Barefoot controller.

(2012-05-06 09:27)Driver 944 Wrote:  

(2012-05-06 08:38)maddog808 Wrote:  

(2012-05-06 06:30)eskro Wrote:  well, OCZ SSD's, they aren't recommended...

Actually, when I bought it September 2010, OCZ was HIGHLY recommended by someone who used to be as active on this forum as you are now. Many even called him the "XBMC hardware guru".

Just goes to show how with this technology, nobody really knows anything. It all changes too rapidly to get a feel for what is good. I'm positive that some product you personally love now, will someday be "not recommended"

Maddog, I looked thru some of your posts, if you are having problems with a 60GB Vertex you may be okay.
My brother bought that drive and had problems with it. OCZ sent him a destructive flash with instructions. Based on the serial number of his drive, he was able to flash it to a TURBO! That was over a year ago and the drive is still running.
Contact OCZ and give them your serial number.

If that doesn't work out for you, that drive is End Of Life - you may get a better drive as a replacement.

Do you feel lucky? You may come out of this ahead of the game.

The Vertex has a Indilinx Barefoot controller.

That's great! I'm glad your brother lucked out like that! Mine is actually
Agility, not Vertex. I sent OCZ a RMA request last night with the serial number. We'll see what happens. Thanks, 944!!

So much for the Turbo idea .... The Agility is still a Indilinx Barefoot controller and EOL.
Maybe I got 2 out of 3 right?

Best of luck!

(2012-05-06 06:30)eskro Wrote:  well, OCZ SSD's, they aren't recommended...

Funny. My Seagate Momentus drive on my laptop just bit the dust for the second time last night, just reformatted the partition that the OS was on and am trying to reinstall Windows 7 with no luck (stays at 0% copying of files).

Knock on wood I'm on my second OCZ drive without issue thus far, outside of having to install new firmware on both right off the bat for them to work properly.

With this crap is seems the luck of the draw wins.