A word of Caution regarding Sata SSDs In drive dock enclosures.
One of my Sata SSD started exhibiting erratic speeds, slowing down randomly to a meager 10MB/s, then jumping to 100MB/s, then 200MB/s, to slow down again to sub 10MB/s operating speed.
I started questioning the dock I'm using, the cables. I swapped the dock for another one, swapped cables, used a different usb connection, no go. Erratic behavior re. operating speed.
I'm used to a consistent 300-350MB/s with this exact SSD in the same dock, so what's happening? I almost started a RMA with the manufacturer, then decided to test further.
I wiped the SSD clean, formatted it anew. No change. Again getting speeds in the 240MB/s, to slow down randomly again to 100MB/s and 20MB/s or even less. Swapped dock enclosures again, used different cables, plugged it to a different computer even. Same erratic behavior.
Could it be the heat? I let it completely cool down, I added an external fan blowing directly onto it. And, same slow erratic speed, out of whack performances.
Mind you, it didn't stopped working or failed completely. It passed all fix disk and other tests. Just being slow to goddam slow like molasses.
Totally puzzling.
Then I don't know why I thought about the SSD Sata connectors. What if they were dirty? Now I realize I should have looked with a magnifying glass to see if I could identify any dirt / hair / some crap sticking to the connectors, but I didn't.
In any case, I proceeded to gently wipe the gold connectors with a piece of cloth, reset the SSD into the dock, fired Disk Speed Test, and what do you know? Full speed ahead!
So the lesson is: if you are using SSDs in drive docks (or HDDs as well I suppose, although SSDs might be more sensitive to this than HDDs?) and all of a sudden are experiencing erratic, slow speeds, think about checking the disk connectors, and wipe then clean gently with soft cloth before trying anything else. Chances are debris are stuck in there, creating some electrical interference, and somehow are affecting the drive performances.
