Macbook Air SSD failure?

Happened to me as well in august, my SSD drive is also failure! 128GB MBA 2012

If your MBA is just a few months out of warranty, try to call Applecare and reason out that SSD failure at such an early stage is not acceptable. The affected MBAs are mid 2012. Apparently this defect will happen at the start of its first yr or less. Request for warranty extension for one time repair. We all bought MBA for the same reason. So we deserve better. Goodluck.

http://www.toshiba.com/taec/news/media_resources/docs/SSDmyths.pdf

Thanks PlotinusVeritas... From the link you posted: "HDDs are generally expected to last three to five years, and Toshiba SSDs are designed to match this level of performance, both in endurance and data retention."

So I called and they want me to visit an apple store to verify SSD failure before they can even think about a one time warranty extension. Fair enough. I mentioned this thread but the representative said he doesn't see any threads about MacBook Air SSD failure. Shrug. Wish me luck. I'll update tomorrow night.

Had my 128GB Toshiba SSD fail last week on my 4 month old 2012 air, took it in they confirmed and said I would have it back in a few days, but placed a 3-5 normal day time on the repair sheet.. which also stated that the repair cost would of been £300 for the part which I think is a joke, so glad I'm in warranty.

Anyway, 5th day is up today, they still don't have the part and are unsure how long its gunna take! 😟

Just documenting my case. I just had the SSD on my 2012 MacBook Air 11" (that was purchased in early March 2013) fail. The failure was confirmed by Apple repair shop. Thankfully, the MBAir was still under warranty, but they said it will take at least one month for them to get the part and replace it.

The MBAir was purchased in the US, but at the time it crashed it was being used in India. We took it to the biggest Apple certified repair shop (iWorld) in the capital city of Delhi, so we are not talking about some small merchant in some small town where parts would take a while to reach.

They have already told us that they will not be able to recover any data. It sounded like they were going to make no effort to recover any data.

Very disappointing. Hard drives fail occassionally, I understand that, but the long repair time and the unwillingness to retrieve data is very frustrating.

Also, I have several MBAirs, both older and newer, and none of them have had any problems. They are stury little beasts. But There is definitely an issue with the hard drive on the 2012 model. Three of my friends with 2012 MBAirs have had the same exact issue with the hard drive failure. I could chalk it up to coincidence but at this point I am quite skeptical.

Unfortunately ns, ALL hard drives fail eventually, not some, not on occasion,

they all go eventually, some in the first week, some 10 years down the line.

But like a car or a washing machine they'll die eventually.

With that in mind, data is our own responsibility,

the manufactuarer of hard drives / computers have no obligation to recover our data for us.

We need to get into the habit of keeping a backup (storing it in more than one place at a time),

or having failsafes for data loss.

I too lost some data, as most of it is kept in DropBox so it's synced to the internet, but there were a few projects in other folders that I had not backed up. It's my own fault unfortunately.

As for the wait time for the replacement drives to happen,

it loks like because so many of us have had their Toshiba SSD fail, they're short on parts,

so we gotta wait for them to make more to replace them.

😟

ns

They have already told us that they will not be able to recover any data. It sounded like they were going to make no effort to recover any data.

I dont think you know the nature of a SSD, ...but on a crashed SSD,..data recovery is about as easy as wrestling grizzly bears blindfolded and handcuffed. 😊

................unwillingness to retrieve data is very frustrating.

Its not an unwillingness but a total INCAPACITY to do so.

If NASA has redundant data backup on $200,000,000 satellites, you should as well.

Never consider any computer a data storage device, rather a data creation ,sending, and manipulation device. Anyone who thinks data is safe on any computer, even copied upon multiple partitions is making a mistake.

Always consider and expect your computer’s hard drive to completely crash anytime, at all times, regardless of make or model.

Most importantly know that 2 copies of your data is 1, and 1 is none

sorry about your SSD failure.

Thanks for your input. That "all hard drives", or all eqiuipment and devices, "fail eventually" and that "data is our own responsibility" is not something I or most people with even basic intelligence need to be told - we know all these platitudes well. With more than 25 years on Macs and with about 30 Macs purchased and used extensively, I know what to expect. I don't expect SSD's to die in less than 6 months or for repairs to take more than 4 weeks.

My experience with Apple products and service has been exceptionally satisfying and pleasant on almost all occassions spanning many, MANY years. But that doesn't mean that the current experience with the SSD MBAir does not rankle or disappoint.

ns wrote:

... I don't expect SSD's to die in less than 6 months or for repairs to take more than 4 weeks.

Nor should you. There have been enough anecdotal reports of premature failure of the Toshiba SSDs used in 2012 MBAs to suspect something unusual is going on with them. When, how, and if Apple proposes to address this question is unknown.

ns wrote:

They have already told us that they will not be able to recover any data. It sounded like they were going to make no effort to recover any data.

... and the unwillingness to retrieve data is very frustrating.

Any attempt to retrieve data will be futile and a waste of time. It's gone.

It is certainly reasonable for us to expect at least several years of useful life from SSDs or hard disk drives for that matter, but nothing changes the fundamental need for backups. If anything should be frustrating, it's people's inability to appreciate this basic fact of computing life until eventually confronting its consequences.

Whether SSDs last several weeks or several years is irrelevant to that need. If you're fond of your data, have backups. This recommendation is not specifically directed at you, but to everyone.

We do have backups of all data - except, unfortunately, of the critical, sensitive files that were in use at the time of the crash.

Backups when traveling and when dealing with data that requires "prior clearance" to backup to other devices can sometimes get spotty. That, unfortunately, was the case for us in this instance.

I think my drive has failed as well. It stopped working yesterday, also a 2012 MBA, just over a year old (I got the extra warranty free with my machine so no worries there). All I am seeing on the bootup is a folder with a question mark in it. I have managed to get into the Mac OS X Ultilities and tried to run a disc repair, but the test came back clear. I made an appointment to take it to apple, but they had no spaces available until Sunday. I am not impressed, I use that computer for my work and I've spent the last two days trying to get it working because I need the data off the drive. I have three or four files I really need back.

I also noticed that the night before this happened, the computer was running far too hot, I just put it down to me using Photoshop, even though I only had small documents open. This is the second time in the last few months I've had to take the computer into apple to be fixed. The first time the Logic board had to be replaced and it took them two weeks to get it back to me. I also had to wait in the store for two hours for them to see me because of a screw up on their end and eventually they just booked it in without me talking to anyone in tech support.

ns wrote:

We do have backups of all data - except, unfortunately, of the critical, sensitive files that were in use at the time of the crash.

Yet another manifestation of Murphy's Law 😟

Given a choice between following your agency's requirements, and this guy's fate, yours may have been the more prudent course of action.

I agree it's not expected at all for an SSD to fail in under 6 months.
But that's not to completely rule it out.

Repairs are probably being quoted at 4 weeks due to the volume of failures and the lack of replacement parts.

The fact the firmware upgrade was pulled, I'm blaming that for all the current 2012 MacBook Air SSD failures.