Just got some new Samsung 840 series SSDs in stock and read the little included warranty booklet (on dead trees). It's the first I've seen to include bytes-written count as a warranty parameter! It states you get 3-years OR "when the SSD has exceeded its TBW (Total Bytes Written, though some websites call this Terabytes Written, but those are 2 hugely different things!) threshold as may be indicated by Samsung's Magician Software", whichever comes first.

Not a bad idea, really, although:

a) How the heck can we as users estimate how many bytes we're going to write in the average year, even within 2 orders of magnitude?

b) I assume the "Magician Software" will not run on linux/bsd.

Their 840 PRO series gives a 5-year warranty and what sounds like a higher TBW. Now that Intel is moving to 1 and 3-year warranties, and Samsung drives so far don't sound (in reviews/comments) like total garbage, they might be worth looking at.

Looking at their web site, I see some conflicting information.

http://www.samsung.com/global/business/semiconductor/minisite/SSD/global/htm...

says "Samsung is so confident that a typical client-PC user will never be able to exhaust the lifespan of the drive that it is guaranteeing its SSDs for unlimited mileage - there are no workload restrictions in the 840 Series’ 3-year limited warranty."

Huh? Doesn't that contradict the dead tree in my hands?

You can see a copy of the dead tree here: http://www.samsung.com/global/business/semiconductor/samsungssd/warranty.htm...

Nowhere can I see to find the exact for-warranty-purposes TBW number for the 840 series. Oh well. I guess the warranty is 3 years unless their RMA dept determines that you've exceeded some magic unknown threshold that probably only they know about and always works in their favor ;-)