OCZ Releases Firmware Update for SandForce SF-2281 SSDs

OCZ released a new firmware release for its high-performance solid state drive series based on second-generation SandForce controllers, which presumably fixes all the problems faced by users of these SSDs until now.

The company confirmed the fact that SandForce SF-2281 SSDs are affected by a series of firmware issues in early June, with problems ranging from BSODs and BIOS detection errors to random freezes and RAID failures.

Since these were first reported, OCZ has been working with SandForce in order to resolve the issues and has dropped a number of firmware releases, the latest of which being the 2.13 version that just arrived.

The changelog accompanying the release is rather scarce in details, but it mentions that OCZ has fixed a corner-case issue in drive recovery after unsafe power cycles as well as an issue with secure erase, and improved bad block management after repeated unsafe power cycles.

The version 2.13 firmware is designed to be used with OCZ's consumer solid state drives based on the SandForce SF-2281 controller.

This list includes the Vertex 3, Vertex 3 Max IOPS, Agility 3, Solid 3, RevoDrive 3 and RevoDrive 3 X2. Together with the revised 2.13 firmware, OCZ has also introduced a new version of the Toolbox application that is used for flashing the FW.

Both the tool and the new firmware can be downloaded from OCZ's Website by following this link. A firmware update guide for Windows and Linux users is also available on the same page.

As usual, the update should be non-destructive in nature, but backing up the drive before proceeding is highly recommended as there is a chance for data corruption to occur.

OCZ is not the only company to experience problems with the second-generation SandForce SSD controllers, as Corsair's 120GB version of the Force 3 solid state drive also suffered from similar problems.

Download the firmware here