Help Diagnosing a bad SSD

[stock2255]

Hello,

I'm attempting to get help to diagnose a bad SSD. I've been hesitant to 100% say it was the SSD, because the problems were mixed in with what looked like crashes caused by overclocking. My computer is:

Asus Rampage IV Extreme
Intel 3930k
32GB Crucial Ballistix DDR3
GTX 1080
Crucial Force GT ~ 223GB
Windows 10 Pro

I initially used Hard Disk Sentinel to properly diagnose and take several old dying Seagate drives out of storage. I've kept it installed obviously because of how well it works, and how good the monitoring system is. Roughly 4 months ago, I started getting occasional freezes that would end up with me booting up into a failed Overclock bios message. This happened a few times, week or two apart, so I obviously reset everything to factory settings, and have been running that way since. Since than, I've been encountering random crashes that sometimes show a overclock fail (3 occurrences since I reset everything to factory clocks), and sometimes show by failing to boot into windows. I've removed all other hard drives

The computer will fail booting into Windows, and I'll end up in various scenarios that cause me to completely reinstall Windows, where everything again works fine for a period of time. At first, the computer would run without issue for a few weeks, but it seems to be dwindling down to working perfectly for about a week before everything acts up and I have to do a clean format and install. The scenarios that cause me to have to reinstall Windows are basically:
a) Windows Boot Manager seems to completely disappear, BIOS boots like there is no hard drive attached)
b) Windows will boot into sign in screen, but lock up immediately after entering password and I have to do a hard shut down
c) Windows will attempt to boot, but fail somewhere in the process, and restart asking for repair
d) I had maybe 2 occurrences in the last few months where the computer booted to a overclock failure (even while on stock settings), but a quick restart fixed this

In all scenarios (except D), all Windows repair functions always end up failing. I've probably done 10 clean reinstalls to this SSD in the last 3 months. Last night, I encountered the issue where Windows would freeze after entering password, and I got the startup tools to attempt to repair a disk, but gave me no information and went back to the standard Windows failed to repair this install, please restart. I reinstalled Windows 10 about 2 hours ago, and reinstalled Hard Disk Sentinel.

The drive in question shows Performance of 100%, and a Health of 70%, with the overview stating:

The drive tried to examine and reallocate data sector(s) 103 times. The examined data area is perfect.
At this point, warranty replacement of the disk is not yet possible, only if the health drops further.
It is recommended to examine the log of the disk regularly. All new problems found will be logged there.
The TRIM feature of the SSD is supported and enabled for optimal performance.

It has showed this health for long before I encountered any issues with this drive, so there hasn't been any recent changes to health status or reallocated data sectors. When I try to run a short self-test or extended self-test, Hard Disk Sentinel gets the error message that it is not responding, and a hard start is required. It has repeated this behavior multiple times. My next step would be to remove the SSD, and attach it to my Surface Pro 3 so I can what happens there, but I think I'm to the point where all signs point that I should suck it up and just order a new SSD, so I suppose I'm looking for a little push in that direction. I'm still concerned about the occasional failure to boot due to overclock fail, and it is weird that the computer does work fine after a clean reinstall. However, I'm assuming this is because initially I'm not using the failing portion(s) of the hard drive, and eventually when I get to them the problems start.

I would appreciate any assistance in the manner, even though I think I know what needs to be done. Kudos again to everyone involved with the software, it is a wonderful tool and well worth the license.

[hdsentinel]

Excuse me, did you try to perform a memory test? Just to make sure that the RAM is working correctly.
The issues you wrote many times related to one or more failing RAM modules.

Yes, personally I'd try connecting the SSD to a different system (for example by an USB adapter) and perform extensive testing, which is a combination of hardware self tests and software testing methods, as described at http://www.hdsentinel.com/faq.php#tests
This way you can be sure that the SSD is working correctly - or can be the problem.

And I'd also test the RAM, just to be sure.

[Tyler]

You could try moving it to another sata port on your motherboard and/or using a different sata cable.

its possible one or both has gone bad.