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I have recently run into a problem with my NVME M.2 SSD of 1To which i was using as My boot drive. At first it started with windows shutting down accidentally, or being stuck on a boot loop, but then I was completely logged out of the boot drive and the pc would boot into the bios. I turned the drive into an external drive and plugged it into another computer. It appears in disk mgmt as unknown without a letter assigned, and initializing it returns a fatal hardware error. running disk part utilities on it says the disk is 0 bytes in size and 0 bytes left, and has no volumes. I'm at a loss and I need to recover my files from the ssd.

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    Get the maufacturer's drive test app, make a bootable USB for it and test the disk. It appears to have a serious error based on your post.
    – anon
    Commented Oct 12, 2022 at 0:35
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    The disk is very likely dead, without a chance to easily recover your data. Drive failures like this are the reason why backups are so important.
    – mashuptwice
    Commented Oct 12, 2022 at 2:44
  • Be aware that some Windows updates harmed SSD's: hothardware.com/news/… , by "optimizing" them to death.
    – DrMoishe Pippik
    Commented Oct 12, 2022 at 4:08
  • This is a firmware issue that requires specialist equipment to recover data probably.
    – Joep van Steen
    Commented Mar 25, 2023 at 13:35

1 Answer 1

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A SSD reporting incorrect capacity is either inability to communicate with the NAND or a firmware issue. I wish I could tell you "try this and that" but DIY options are as good as non existent.

If you need the data back then best option is to contact a data recovery lab. Success rate for SSD's is low I will tell you in advance.

We could be looking at a physical issue. This needs to be diagnosed and can sometimes be repaired or (depending on actual model) components can be swapped to a donor.

Often it's a firmware issue and succes then depends often on specialist tools supporting a specific SSD model or not. For example PC3000 is widely used by data recovery labs and supported SSD's are listed here: https://blog.acelab.eu.com/pc-3000-ssd-list-of-supported-ssd-drives-regularly-updated.html.

In very rare cases chip-off recovery is possible but almost exclusively on older non encrypting models.

I wrote a more comprehensive answer here: https://superuser.com/a/1758901/705502

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    The issue was a physical issue with the SSD, it got too hot at some point and some glue on it melted and short circuited. So the processor was unable to communicate witht he NAND, luckily after cleaning the melted glue and replacing some components the specialist was able to bring the SSD back to life. advice for everyone, DO not run SSD's in 50c heat of summer without a proper cooling solution.
    – Ali Ouahassoune
    Commented Mar 26, 2023 at 16:48
  • That's awesome!!
    – Joep van Steen
    Commented Mar 26, 2023 at 21:11

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