I built a PC about three years ago with a 500GB NVMe drive for the operating system and a 2TB TEAMGROUP CX2 SATA SSD for games and photography files. The SATA drive worked perfectly for roughly a year, but then games began taking a long time to launch and started stuttering. Some newer games would not launch at all, although they ran normally when installed on the NVMe drive.
Over the past year and a half, the problem has become much worse. Games are now effectively unplayable from the SATA SSD, and the drive has occasionally stopped responding during file transfers. A full system reset is needed before it becomes accessible again.
CrystalDiskInfo reports no obvious problems, and CrystalDiskMark shows normal transfer speeds. The drive also has plenty of free space, so I am not sure what is causing the issue. I have contacted TEAMGROUP support, though the three-year warranty has now expired. Since the problems started while it was still under warranty and I am in Australia, I am hoping consumer protection laws might still help. Is there anything else I should test, such as the SATA or power cables, before assuming the SSD is failing?
2 Answers
Before declaring the SSD dead, replace the SATA data cable and try another motherboard SATA port. Also test it with a different SATA power connector from the power supply, making sure every connection is firmly seated. A damaged cable, loose connector, or unreliable power connection can cause dropouts, freezing, and failed transfers while still allowing occasional normal benchmark results.
A drive can slow down when it is nearly full, but that does not sound like the cause here if you have already removed most of the data and there is plenty of free space. SSDs can also develop intermittent failures even when diagnostic tools report healthy status and benchmark speeds look normal. The drive freezing during transfers is particularly concerning and could indicate a hardware problem that short tests are not detecting.
There is plenty of free space on both drives, and I even deleted almost everything from the affected SSD. Unfortunately, the behavior did not improve.
I have reseated the connections and tried another SATA port, but I have not tested a different data cable yet. I will also try another power connector, since intermittent cable or power problems could explain why it sometimes disappears completely.