Robert Niessner wrote:
We have a lot of reports here alone on the forum of failed Samsung drives.
That includes some reports by me of problems with a Samsung T5 on P6K. I hesitate to post here, I hope this is not unwelcome, but the topic is "USB-C" and I have something to add. So indulge me John Brawley this one time. I will depart the topic after this one observation.
I have since not had any problems with the Samsung T5. To recap, the first and major corruption was when the battery browned out in the middle of a recording. I could no longer read the SSD, but some recovery software was able to recover the files intact. So lesson #1 was to never again chance a power outage.
Lesson #2, and the one that applies here in this topic (maybe), is that when the drive gets sluggish, dropping frames, is after doing an in-camera format to erase the files, which does not delete the actual data. When performing an in-camera format, you are re-writing over previously used areas of data that have not been formatted as zeros. The solution I advocate here has worked 100%, and I have had no problems with the same Samsung T5 that gave me the problems, is to do a deep (slow) format, of the same allocation unit size, in the PC writing 0's to all the data areas, followed by a quick format in-camera. The deep format takes some time, the in-camera format takes seconds, the deep format writes 0's to all the data areas, the in-camera quick format only resets the root directory/fat pointers. Once you've finished shooting, don't re-use the SSD until you've repeated the full deep format process. It's been 100% for me. The Samsung T5, and Delkin Juggler (which is approved) can both do (on the P6K) 3:1 CBR with low motion, like capturing the moon moving across the frame. It recorded the full duration (about 20 minutes) without a frame drop at 6K 16:9 50 FPS. Obviously, if the scene has details and motion then 5:1 or 8:1 CBR or Q5. But the larger point, is do the deep format, not the quick format. You can even remove the drive and connect the USB to a PC for file copying or even editing directly on the disk, and immediately go right back to shooting with it in the camera if there is space left as long as you don't do any kind of erasure or quick formatting. The only in-camera formatting I do on USB-C 3.1 SSD is after I have first deep formatted it in the PC.
It's worth a try, that's all. If it didn't work this way on the Ursa 12K, it hasn't cost you anything but a small effort to try. Good Luck, Tom out.