How to optimize SSD to prevent wear

Question

I am upgrading my system (2011 MacBook Pro) by installing an SSD. I was wondering if there is any sort of configuration in Ubuntu that will help prolong the life of the drive?

I'm not even sure if there is any, I just seem to recall doing something similar on windows a couple of years ago.

I am using version 14.04

Answer 1

1. Change SATA configuration to AHCI in BIOS

2. Over-provisioning

   it's used for prolonging life of SSD, by leaving some part of your SSD unformatted/ unallocated - 7% should do, but some people go to 28%. Considering the fact, that SSD still aren't "cheap" and disk space is priceless, I don't use this technique at all.

3. Format as EXT4 (but I guess that's common sense, also relevant only if you are going to do clean install)

4. sudo nano /etc/rc.local

   this method will perform TRIM on every boot, but it won't slow it down, trust me, I'm using this setup myself. Put fstrim before line exit 0. That must be done for every automaticaly mounted EXT4 partition. Example bellow:

   fstrim / 
   exit 0
   

   Also you can adapt the code to make logs about TRIM

   LOG=/var/log/trim.log
   fstrim -v / >>$LOG 
   echo “Time: $(date)” >>$LOG
   exit 0
   

   If you have separate home partition, you need to add fstrim /home etc.If you have separate /boot/efi, don't TRIM this partition, also never run TRIM on SWAP.

   save and reboot

5. Disable the unnecessary weekly cron job for TRIM, as it will be performed on every boot

   sudo mv -v /etc/cron.weekly/fstrim /etc_cron.weekly_fstrim.bak
   

   you will basically move this command elsewhere, so it won't be performed

---

6. Decrease SWAPiness

   • check your swappiness level, by default it's 60:

     cat /proc/sys/vm/swappiness
     

   • sudo nano /etc/sysctl.conf after it opens, put these line to the end of file:

     # Sharply reduce swap inclination
     vm.swappiness=1
     

---

7. DO NOT USE HIBERNATION!
8. Reboot

That's all I did, but there are other approaches, for example with cron job, which I've disabled, or by discard ...

Answer 2

This topic is here to read AS thread too :

https://superuser.com/questions/308251/how-to-trim-discard-a-whole-ssd-partition-on-linux

You can try different things with hdparm too, but mostly this is not necessary today any more compared to days where SSD were something more exotic.

This second link is oder for more details simply read man hdparm :

http://howto.unixdev.net/Test_LVM_Trim_Ext4.html