Getting NVME error year after SSD upgrade

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Getting NVME error year after SSD upgrade

Hello everyone, hopefully someone can help me out. A year after changing the SSD on my macbook air early 2017 A1466 I started to get kernel panics (full report below). The macbook originally had 128gb and I upgraded to crucial's 1tb CT1000P1SSD8 (https://www.crucial.com/usa/en/ct1000p1ssd8).

I bought the SSD new from ebay with adaptor and macOS 10.14 already pre-installed. Thing is the whole thing worked flawlessly for a year, but now whenever I give it more load like having slack open, opening android studio and an android emulator after a while the computer freezes and crashes (emulator seems to be the main culprit but having other heavy processes running does the same, e.g. it can be xcode + ios simulator + spotify + a bunch of safari tabs + slack etc.).

What's super strage is that when I open the lid, pull out the ssd and put everything back, it works nicely again for a while (can be even weeks), even under huge load.

Also, sometimes (rarely), when it panics and automatically restarts, it fails to boot with the crossed over circle icon until I give it some time. The computer always was warm whenever the panic happens so I think it may be related to heat, but don't understand why pulling the ssd and putting it back works, it's very firmly installed, like the original one was.

I tried to look at the stats using drivedx (and in real time too) and on bootcamp using crucials management app on windows and could not find any issues with heat or other things, health is always very good 0 warnings 0 errors etc. Also tried apple's diagnostics and no issues there too.

The same problems (only in the form of a bsod) are present when using windows 10 via bootcamp. Also would like to mention that apart from changing the SSD I did not do any other modifications (only opened it up to swap the ssd and did it very carefuly, nothing else).

Any suggestions would be appreciated :)

Currently the mac is still on Mojave 10.14.6, this is one of the full crash reports (they are always the same):

https://gist.github.com/pauliusj/aa0c12286ba911817e8774b29d211af2

MacBook Air 13", macOS 10.14

Posted on Jan 23, 2020 10:23 PM

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Answer 1

Top-ranking reply

HWTech

Level 9

60,290 points

Jan 24, 2020 3:43 PM in response to PauliusJJ

You should post the SMART Attributes (health report) from the Crucial management app. Did you run the SSD's internal diagnostics using the Crucial app (run the long/extended test)?

I believe there is a firmware update available for the P1 SSD. You should update the SSD's firmware.

When you pull the SSD out you are unplugging the power & battery which is causing a reset of Logic Board.

Do you have TRIM enabled on the SSD? If not, then you can uncheck the "Put hard drives to sleep when possible" in the Energy Saver System Preferences as this will allow the SSD's internal garbage collection routines time to work when the laptop is not busy. You can also try Option Booting and letting the laptop sit at the Apple boot picker menu overnight so those internal SSD routines have time to work.

Another option is to perform a hardware secure erase on the SSD which will reset the SSD to factory defaults, restore any lost performance, and can sometimes fix odd issues with the SSD. While the Crucial software can do this, you cannot do it while booted from the same drive. The only other way to perform this hardware secure erase is by using a Linux utility. You can use the paid version of Parted Magic which is a customized Linux boot utility disk which includes an easy to use app which can access the hardware secure erase feature.

https://partedmagic.com/nvme-secure-erase/

As @Smokerz mentions using a third party PCIe SSD with a third party adapter is very difficult to troubleshoot since it is a completely unsupported setup. I've even seen all original Apple hardware get these similar NVMe Kernel Panics after upgrading to Catalina. You may want to run EtreCheck and post the report here using the "Additional Text" icon which looks like a piece of paper. There is a small chance you could some third party software which is causing a problem.

Edit: If you still have the original Apple SSD, then see if it also has the issue.

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Answer 2

PauliusJJ Author

Level 1

12 points

Jan 24, 2020 10:15 PM in response to HWTech

Thanks for this very very helpful info!

I finally understand why pulling the ssd out could fix the problem! (at least for a while)

Regarding some of the questions:

Diagnostics:

I was not able to run crucial's diagnostics because it says that I have to use their driver. However I was not able to find one (they have some nvme driver for download but it's a dead link)

Firmware:

I did update the firmware and the crucial's app currently says that it's the latest one, the problem was/is still present unfortunately

TRIM: Yes I have it enabled

I think I'll just buy a bigger original drive to get the smoothest experience (though shame that 512gb is max, having 1TB was awesome). Did not really do any research before upgrading assuming it will be as easy as swapping out a sata drive, but at least I got a year out of it and will try to make it work as external one (will also do a full wipe like you advised) :)

I still have the old drive, so will test out if problems are still there even with it. Also attaching the SMART, EtreCheck and some debug info, if you could have a look, maybe something is glaringly obviously wrong there?

SMART

DriveInfo

EtreCheck

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Answer 3

DonH49

Level 6

16,710 points

Jan 24, 2020 7:12 AM in response to PauliusJJ

it potluck to update an Air with a third party Ssd especially using an adaptor. Not going to try to help a hopeless cause. I'd think a firmware update would solve the problem but good luck finding one or requesting one.

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Answer 4

HWTech

Level 9

60,290 points

Jan 25, 2020 10:57 AM in response to PauliusJJ

Unfortunately nothing stands out.

Good luck.

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Getting NVME error year after SSD upgrade

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