Hi, I do the clean install when I install Windows 10 or 11 on my machine. I've two SSDs connected, I use one for Operating System and the other for normal data storage. These are the steps I run in PowerShell admin mode in the Windows PE environment: Spoiler: Steps DiskPart select disk 0 clean convert gpt create partition efi size=512 format quick fs=fat32 label="System" assign letter="S" create partition msr size=32 create partition primary shrink minimum=1024 format quick fs=ntfs label="Windows" assign letter="W" create partition primary format quick fs=ntfs label="Recovery" assign letter="R" set id="de94bba4-06d1-4d40-a16a-bfd50179d6ac" gpt attributes=0x8000000000000001 remove list volume exit exit The reason for asking is that my SSD suddenly is not shown on my computer, and I tried several tools and it is not detected. So does my behavior of frequently installing Windows 2 or 3 times per month damage the SSD? Each time I install it I run these steps in the admin shell, then use the WINNT tool to install it. I am trying different software and this is why I install Windows frequently.
Doesn't matter how you wrote to that drive, you didn't kill it with that install method. It's probably just a bad drive. Sometimes there are firmware updates that improve compatibility & fix bugs. You could give the contacts a clean &/or try a different slot..
You could use something like "CRC Contact Cleaner". Power off & unplug power. Take out the ssd. spray the socket on the board & the contacts of the drive. It's a solvent & dries real fast. I use it on ram, ram slots, video cards, pcie slots, etc... Sometimes just blowing out the dust isn't enough. Actually I was thinking you were talking about an M.2 SSD.
NAND flash has limited write cycles. SSDs can be powered on and reading data from them almost indefinitely, but the writes kill them. Manufacturers typically list the write endurance in the specifications sheet. If you have a cheap SSD with low quality NAND flash, expect for it to die with no warning signs.
Diskpart CLEAN or CLEAN ALL writes zeros to every sector of the disk, just like data shredding software. If this disk is an SSD, this should be avoided. Writing to every sector reduces the life of the SSD. Instead, you should use the manufacturer's Secure Erase option. By reading what you did, you were indeed quite shortening the life of your drive. Whether it is now corrupted is impossible to say, it also depends of very many other things, everything is possible. In future do not do so no more.
What is the recommended way to do a Windows 10/11 full clean install? Do I have to format all partitions before doing a full clean install? I mean the partitions created using the steps in my first post. There are 4 partitions created using these commands, do I have to format it each time I do a full clean install? Or only clean the primary big partition?
@jineso In general, I don't want to give any advice to anyone on this forum after the very rude behavior of some people, but okay, I'll just say how I've usually have done it myself. I don't see any need to delete anything at all and even there is no need to reformat. I usually use inplace reset or reinstall with keeping my files, sometimes even with keeping my filesand settings, and if everything done, I simply delete the Windows.old folder and then run Trim and that's all I do. If is needed to remove all, I use for example AOMEI Partition Assistant or something similar and delete whole disk or Windows partition (there is special option for SSD) and then simply create new partition or partitions and install new OS. The best is if You do as the SSD producer recomnds. Finally. Decide for yourself what and how you will do.
I am sorry if anything wrong happened to you earlier. But speaking about myself, you were accommodating and many members in this forum are beneficial I owe this forum a lot of debt for the knowledge and the time being saved, or the solutions I follow, and the people around me in my real life consider me a genius geek because of that.
"clean all" will overwrite all the blocks. But "clean" just wipes the partition table. In my previous job, our imaging servers were designed to wipe themselves clean and re-install every time from scratch. We had a pattern of repeated failures where every Samsung SSD failed, but I noticed it was always for servers that were in service after a specific number of months. After much finger pointing from HP (our vendor) and Samsung (their supplier), they determined our frequent re-installs triggered some stupid firmware bug. The drive was physically fine, but the firmware left the drive unusable. My point is sometimes it's just reliability issues with specific SSD models.
@kaljukass I just did the PC reset per your advice and it is much more comfortable and easier, but why no old Windows folder? It only produces one original windows folder and everything is reset to its default set and status. Thanks a lot