Doubt Winbond SpiFlash on Seagate Drive

Semiconductor Integrated Circuits (ICs)
1

SpiFlash (Serial Nor Flash) can retain data for how many years and at what storage temperature 35C?

2

Please refer to the Macronix Technical Note here about program/erase cycling endurance and data retention in NOR Flash memories.

3

Hi @kesadav882 there is no generic answer for this. It completely depends on the manufacture of the SpiFlash. Every manufacture has a their own ratings.

If you think about how ā€œflashā€ works, you stick a voltage into cell to create a 0 or 1 SLC flash (it gets more complex with MLC/TLC/QLC flash!) Over time that cell will deplete without management and your data will be gone.

Basic rule, SPI flash or any flash is terrible for retaining data over the long term.

Please expand with what you are trying to do, youā€™ve asked a lot of random questions. It sounds like you are trying to ā€˜saveā€™ something.

Regards,

1 Like
4

manufacturer is Winbond
produces spiflash serial nor flash for store firmware/bios of hdds

5

and the part number is?

Regards,

6

winbond 25q80bws42
winbond W25X20CL

7

For Winbond,

For W25Q80BW they advertise 20+ Year of retention, with no other notes: https://www.winbond.com/hq/search/newIndex.jsp?q=W25Q80BW&__locale=en

For W25X20CL they advertise 20+ Year of retention, with no other notes: W25X20CL - Serial NOR Flash - Code Storage Flash Memory - Winbond

Regards,

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8

20 years at what temperature? Does the number of erases and writes performed have any relation to the longevity of data retention? When data retention reaches 20 years, will they be destroyed? Do these chips with HDD BIOS firmware have constant erase and write cycles when using the HDD?

9

Feel free to register with Winbond to get access to [AN0000029 Winbond NOR Flash Memory Endurance and Data Retention]: https://www.winbond.com/hq/support/documentation/downloadV2022.jsp?__locale=en&xmlPath=/support/resources/.content/item/DA01-AN0000029.html&level=2&line=/product/code-storage-flash-memory/index.html&family=/product/code-storage-flash-memory/serial-nor-flash/index.html

Youā€™ll need to contact the manufacture of the HDD for that. You could sniff the SPI bus to see what the manufacture does, but most likely the manufacture will not share any information.

Regards,

10

This email address for Winbond technical support doesnā€™t work. Iā€™ve entered several emails to receive a response and Gmail Outlook doesnā€™t work.

I contacted Seagate and they donā€™t know anything about technical information.

11

Iā€™m sorry, you havenā€™t been able to get a response, thereā€™s not much we can really assist you with Seagate. Your best bet is Winbondā€™s AN0000029, but YOU need to sign up to get access to that document. We do not carry Seagate, not that we would have access to any of their proprietary information.

Your best bet is to stick a SPI based bus pirate and decoded the spi signals, Iā€™m guessing itā€™s mostly just reading SPI data from the SPI Flashā€¦

If you have the knowledge and spare time, there is an open source ā€œssd/ideā€ design here: GitHub - dosdude1/2.5-inch-ide-ssd: A custom-designed IDE SSD for use in any machine that utilizies a 2.5" IDE hard disk. It relies on the default firmware of the Silicon Motion SM2236 but atleast youā€™d have access to more information.

Regards,

1 Like
12

winbond technical support appears: Invalid e-mail address, please check and provide your company email.

13

With Winbond try your work email, in either case, thatā€™s a Winbond decision and not something we can assist with.

Regards,

14

what mail? notfound