I have an Intel P3600 SSD that got slightly wet, unfortunately while in operation.
Now I’ve put it in a drying oven for a couple of days, so I’m confident it’s dry now, but it is not a happy camper:
It doesn’t show up as data storage and I can’t do anything within the Drive Toolbox, it just says:
“Drive health is degraded. Contact your reseller or local Intel representative for assistance.”
I am aware that data center ssd’s intentionally take themselves out of operation when there is a problem and not hang around half dead like a consumer ssd would.
And the data on it isn’t life or death important, but do you guys have any tricks I could try to get the data off, or do you think it’s a lost cause?
Distilled water with a tiny amount of copper sulfate. So I’m sure it had some conductivity, but I can’t see any residue now.
And I’m reluctant to do any kind of immersion, because I think it’s still under warranty.
You got it wet and you believe the warranty covers this?
As far as software recovery tricks go, I got nothing. If the fluid was very conductive it could be that the data is already gone since it was in operation when it happened, especially so if things were being erased/written because of the way erasing works on SSDs. Professional help should be sought in this case I think. You might risk loss of the data just by attempting to use the drive.
Well, apart from you and me, nobody has to now it caught a tiny drop of water … shhh
And if I can’t see any water damage, maybe …
However dipping it into baths of solvents is another story.
The data is not important enough to warrant professional help, I just want to know if there are (software) tricks to get the ssd talking again.
What exactly does this mean? Something like a food dehydrator? Air below 10% relative humidity can be extremely susceptible to static electricity which would likely cause harm to the SSD. I know HDD’s come with a warning in the manual about that as it can destroy the controller.
Copper sulphate can leave behind solid residue after drying. I wouldmimagine that this is what has happened.
In which case i would think re soaking and a good clean out is definitely in order if you want to fix it.
Edit:
It is also known to take in water from the air. So a tiny piece can be bridging to start with from the drying and it could be taking in water making it (more?) conductive.
And from reading it can be used in copper plating experiments… This could be bad.
You could try some commercial data recovery software but I would either send it back under warranty or disassemble the card and wash it with soap and water…then rinse it really well in distilled water ….last off use a hair dryer on it for as long as you want and let it sit on sunny dry windows sill for a few days…You will need thermal pads and interface material to reassemble…Used to work at an electric restoration outfit and we would wash sensitive electronics all the time…its fine as long as there is no current and you don’t leave the water on there any longer that you have to …
So first things first.
If you’re not sure what you’re doing, stop what you’re doing.
When electronics get wet you don’t want them dry, you want them clean. Same principle as wiping a butt
If you dry them with whatever residue still on them, the problem can get much-much worse. Electronics that get wet in operation ‘corrode’ - particularly if the solution spilled on it contained copper-sulphate.
Option X is to entirely disassemble the card and clean it with cleaning alcohol and a brush, focus only on the affected area of spillage. Dry well. Any issues that are uncovered or created during this process are entirely your own problem. If you discovered that the board / Flash / controller has partly exploded PCB traces / parts - goodbye SSD if you’re not an electronics wizard.
Option Y send it to professional data recovery services (assuming you don’t have a backup) - but seeing it’s an enterprise SSD I hope you do.
Option Z send it to warranty and pray to any gods of your choosing.
Alright, alright, I will try cleaning it in an ultrasonic bath.
And while it’s drying again I will make some conductivity tests on the fluid.
Will be back in a couple of days.
The forum software removes tags where the content is already in the title. In your case you mentioned “helpdesk” in the title, so it did not show up as a tag. I changed it, so the tag is there now.
Good luck with your SSD issue, unfortunately I can’t help there.
If everyone followed that mantra, things would only be done by people who think they know what they are doing. In my opinion those are the most dangerous of them all
