How do I configure Samsung 850 Pro for more overprovisioning?

How do I configure a Samsung 850 Pro for more overprovisioning.

With some other SSD's there was vendor supplied software
that allowed you to decrease or increase the space that Windows
and BIOS, etc., would see, so that you could interchange
various size disks, even though some were 120gB, some 120gB,
some 128gB, and some 128GB. You pick the smallest size
(120gB) and set the other SSDs with enough overprovisioning
so all have the same size in the Master Boot Record or
Guid Partition Table; in fact, you could specify
things so that even the 120gB file would have more
overprovisioning than the disk manufacturer's default.

However, when I tried the software that
came with the Samsung UPC 8 87276 08430 5, Model MZ-7KE2T0
disk, the software refused to run on a new disk
(no MBR, no GPT) and showed messages that seemed
to indicate that all that would happen as that
the MBR or GPT would hide some space (i.e., only
increasing overprovisioning, not decreasing) from
normal operating system programs.

In particular I used:
Windows 7 Ultimate.
Connected drive to eSATA connection
used Samsung Magician 4 from:
CD: Samsung Solid State Drive
One-stop install Navigator
Manual & Software
Version 4.5
{part number} LA81-01025A

This has an entry for "Over Provisioning" under
"SYSTEM MANAGEMENT" and the program displays in red:
Uninitialized disk found. You can initialize the disk using...

If you click on the link it opens
It also displays in dark orange at some point:
/!\ Note: Using a RAW partition may damage your data.
OP can be set or cleared only from the last accessible partition.

(If you use Magician with a partitioned disk it shows you the
current partition layout and recommends a 10% increase in
the "working" space, and show you which partition will be trashed
if you have no un allocated space.

This display makes me think that you could add some "working"
space to an SSD that space not allocated to a partition and
might even be able to get the last allocated partition shrunk,
but this still would not produce the desired result, which
is to have the overprovisioned space hidden from the raw
partition or MBR or GPT, and also be able to decrease the
"working" space for the controller at the cost of a shorter
device lifetime.

I called Samsung support and they said use Magician and
didn't seem to understand that hiding space in the MBR
was not the same as hiding space from the MBR.

Does anyone know of a Samsung utility that will
allow for decreasing and increasing the "working" space
for the controller?

Thank you.

On Fri, 09 Oct 2015 15:49:16 -0400, Mark F wrote:

| How do I configure a Samsung 850 Pro for more overprovisioning.

I prefer to make my own overprovisioning arrangements. Rather than reserving
unallocated space for possible future need, I just make sure the SSD partition is
twice the size I'm ever likely to use. Then I keep an eye on it. That gives data
plenty of "elbow room" and negates the possibility of any slowdown due to
overpopulation.

Larc

On Fri, 09 Oct 2015 15:49:16 -0400, Mark F
wrote:

How do I configure a Samsung 850 Pro for more overprovisioning.

With some other SSD's there was vendor supplied software
that allowed you to decrease or increase the space that Windows
and BIOS, etc., would see, so that you could interchange
various size disks, even though some were 120gB, some 120gB,
some 128gB, and some 128GB. You pick the smallest size
(120gB) and set the other SSDs with enough overprovisioning
so all have the same size in the Master Boot Record or
Guid Partition Table; in fact, you could specify
things so that even the 120gB file would have more
overprovisioning than the disk manufacturer's default.

Not sure what the BIOS has to do with overprovisioning. It identifies
the geometry, hopefully, beyond which a successful format is liable to
occur.

The distinctions for interchanging brand/model, dissimilarities
between "G and g," MBR, Microsoft GUID, *NIX schemes, are not
contingent upon provisional utilities from Samsung, in any sense sole
partitioning utilities. In fact, quite the opposite. Samsung's sole
provision is in it's garbage collection software/driver interface to
Samsung's proprietary controller, no other software developer may
impinge upon without Samsung's blessings. Partitions, Samsung wants,
very much so, to be broadly within industry standards, in order to
sell the most Samsung SSDs as possible.

If you want overprovision, then you'll need to partition a non-RAW
compliant partition, i.e. Samsung's directive, and stop the OS from
using it, so that Samsung's controller has full access for any/all
over-partitioning benefits then, theoretically, to be derived.

I don't see that, or know otherwise -- why, in the case of Windows 8,
or 10, whatever you're running, should you over-partition with a *NIX
file system, inaccessible to Windows -- the controller need
necessarily be thwarted from the object;- no less so, extensively,
than simply not assigning a drive letter to a NTFS, or FAT32,
partition in Windows 8.1/10.

All you need really to do is get beyond Samsung's garbage collection
device drivers and interface, Windows 7 or a related update ID since
is given, for any benefit, if at all, e.g. the stated industry SSD
life projections over usages to degradation are, at present, largely
neither of concern nor a disappointment expected or generally
encountered.

Good luck if you decided to accept the mission and over-provision with
whatever else comes to hand apart from Samsung.

Both my Samsungs are over-provisioned, as well a Crucial, although
without critical firmware updates Samsung released as a result of an
advertising-to-performance debacle which occurred perhaps a year or
two ago. They're all also what I consider fringe managed, as my MBs
were released well before SSDs hit their stride, mainstream;- I've
hardly much practical interest in Windows 7, at present, near to none
projected for Windows 8.1, and I absolutely detest Windows 10 for
Microsoft's reptilian metamorphosis.

-
"I went from festivity to festivity. [...] it would seem to me—at the
breaking point of fatigue and for a second’s flash—that at last I
understood the secret;[...]. I ran on like that, always heaped with
favors, never satiated, without knowing where to stop, until the day
-- until the evening rather when the music stopped and the lights went
out.� -- The Fall, Albert Camus.