wd my book 2tb. 7200. i heard back from slate support, they had a couple of suggestions, including using the "streaming" feature. that seems to have helped a bit, as i actually got 30+ minutes before it crashed, not the best, but i was able to conclude my ssd4 work for the current project. thanks all.

update: ssd4 is now on my system drive (ssd lol). i had weeks of trouble-free use.

now, i seem to be in another cycle of crashing. nothing changed. i mean, obviously something did, but i have no clue.

back to the uninstall/reinstall, ccleaner...