Ssd - What Should I Buy?

[Dork]

It's just to upgrade an old Core I5 notebook so doesn't need to be the newest/fastest on the market. Looking at the online prices in Thailand, OCZ seems to be the best value but I remember reading somewhere that they had some issues.

128GB would be ok but can be a larger one depending on the price. I just want to go and buy it in BKK. Can't be bothered importing from somewhere else.

Appreciate any suggestions.

[Chicog]

I've seen some reviews of OCZ but the bad stories don't match my experience. Anyway, Google SSD Reviews, there's plenty of info out there. And look on Amazon for User comments, that will tell you about return rates.

http://solid-state-drive-review.toptenreviews.com/

http://thessdreview.com/

http://www.tomshardware.com/reviews/ssd-recommendation-benchmark,3269.html

[Tywais]

I've seen some reviews of OCZ but the bad stories don't match my experience.

Same here. I've been running an OCZ 120GB Vertex III (Sata III) for 2+ years without a single issue and would not go back to hard drive for my OS and applications again. When I got mine, reviews were excellent and the fastest kid on the block at the time.

[Guest]

SSD gives great boost for an older laptop.

One limiting factor could be the height of you hard drive slot. Some laptop's use 7mm and some 9.5mm disks. For example OCZ disks don't fit to my new laptop.

You could also check your laptop specifications, what SATA connection do you have.

If you have for example SATA (1.5Gbps) or SATA II (3.0Gbps), then the maximum theoretical read/write speeds are 192MBps and 384MBps. Therefore your laptop could not use the full speed of OCZ Vertex 4 SSD and Vertext 3 would give more value for money for you.

[Guest]

Oh, I forgot to mention. I have OCZ Vertex 4 on an laptop which can only use SATA II speeds.. and I can not move this disk to my newer laptop which has 7mm disk slot.. I learned this the hard way

[Gary A]

I have a cheap netbook (HP Mini) that definitely needed a boost.

http://www.invadeit....nm-mlc-p009412/

I have nothing to compare it to except the original hard drive. It made a huge difference and I am satisfied. It didn't break the bank and is supposedly very reliable.

[RandomSand]

Consumer 2.5" SSDs:

> Intel drives have a reputation as most reliable.

> OCz are the fastest but the companies stock dived last month on fears the company was failing.

> Personally I'd buy Micron or Samsung right now.

I'm using an Intel X-25M 80GB for over 1 year. Drive being read/written nearly 24/7. No Problems.

Tip: Format any new drive at only 95% of its full capacity for a longer life-span.

[Naam]

Tip: Format any new drive at only 95% of its full capacity for a longer life-span.

interesting! is there a reason?

[Crossy]

Tip: Format any new drive at only 95% of its full capacity for a longer life-span.

interesting! is there a reason?

Many sites are suggesting that you don't FILL your drive beyond 80% but I've not seen anything about not formatting to full capacity. It's all to do with the drive allocating data slots on a remaining life basis (Flash has a finite number of write cycles) to even out wear across the drive.

[Gary A]

My research has revealed that you shouldn't format or defrag an SSD. If your computer is set for auto defrag, you should disable the program. Since I only use my netbook for travel, I would expect the netbook to die well before the SSD.

[monty]

My research has revealed that you shouldn't format or defrag an SSD. If your computer is set for auto defrag, you should disable the program. Since I only use my netbook for travel, I would expect the netbook to die well before the SSD.

Totaly true. An ssd has no moving parts so retrieving fragmented files is not slowing you down.

Defragmenting would just lessen the lifetime of your drive.

Sent from my GT-I9001 using Thaivisa Connect App

[Dork]

Thanks for the replies. Lot's of things I didn't know. So I don't need to worry about OCZ reliability. Great, I'll just go and buy whatever looks the best value. Will report back.

[rakman]

Tip: Format any new drive at only 95% of its full capacity for a longer life-span.

interesting! is there a reason?

Many sites are suggesting that you don't FILL your drive beyond 80% but I've not seen anything about not formatting to full capacity. It's all to do with the drive allocating data slots on a remaining life basis (Flash has a finite number of write cycles) to even out wear across the drive.

Most, if not all o/s's do not do well when any file system or drive goes beyond 90% full. The system starts to slow down as there isn't as much space for temporary use of empty space for file manipulation.

SSD's should not be defragged since the controller knows where the data is and electronic access is quick for all parts of the drive, unlike platter based drives where the heads have to move from area to area to get the data.

[Guest]

SSD failure rates.. I don't know how reliable and valid this is.

http://forums.storagereview.com/index.php/topic/31477-ssd-failure-return-rates/

or original French article translated to English http://tinyurl.com/ssd-failure-rates

- Crucial 0.82% (against 0.8%)

- Intel 1.73% (against 0.1%)

- Corsair 2.93% (against 2.9%)

- OCZ 7.03% (against 4.2%)

Another thing to consider is the power consumption if you wish to maximize your laptop battery performance. I think the newer Intel and Samsung disks use quite little power while on idle and in usage.

[Dork]

SSD gives great boost for an older laptop.

One limiting factor could be the height of you hard drive slot. Some laptop's use 7mm and some 9.5mm disks. For example OCZ disks don't fit to my new laptop.

You could also check your laptop specifications, what SATA connection do you have.

If you have for example SATA (1.5Gbps) or SATA II (3.0Gbps), then the maximum theoretical read/write speeds are 192MBps and 384MBps. Therefore your laptop could not use the full speed of OCZ Vertex 4 SSD and Vertext 3 would give more value for money for you.

Didn't know there was 2 sizes. So does that mean a 7mm will fit ok in a 9.5mm slot? Is 7mm a newer spec?

Looking at what's for sale online they all seem to be SATA III anyway.

[Guest]

SSD gives great boost for an older laptop.

One limiting factor could be the height of you hard drive slot. Some laptop's use 7mm and some 9.5mm disks. For example OCZ disks don't fit to my new laptop.

You could also check your laptop specifications, what SATA connection do you have.

If you have for example SATA (1.5Gbps) or SATA II (3.0Gbps), then the maximum theoretical read/write speeds are 192MBps and 384MBps. Therefore your laptop could not use the full speed of OCZ Vertex 4 SSD and Vertext 3 would give more value for money for you.

Didn't know there was 2 sizes. So does that mean a 7mm will fit ok in a 9.5mm slot? Is 7mm a newer spec?

Looking at what's for sale online they all seem to be SATA III anyway.

I think the best way check is totake the laptop to the shop and insert the drive.

Naturally the ssd should not move while inserted as otherwise the contacts could get damaged while moving the laptop. Maybe there is some solutions how to make the 7mm disk thicker when inserted to a wider slot.

On my case older laptop (lenovo X61s) uses 9.5mm disk while newer (lenovo E320, which sucks btw) is using 7mm disk. 7mm disks are probably getting more common as the laptop's are shrinking.

Story here http://www.thaivisa.com/forum/topic/591556-moving-disk-to-another-computer/

....

And another thing which comes to mind while getting SSD. Remember your backups. Use NAS, Dropbox or similar for regular backups. All drives fail at some point. The difference between spinning disk hard drive and SSD failures is that old HDDs quite often started to make sounds, when the HDD was failing. SSD is naturally always quiet and therefore does not give the indication of possible failure in the future.

[IamNotaNumber]

I have two OCZ Agility 4 drives. One in my laptop and one as the C drive in my desktop PC. I bought them in Pattaya where choice is quite limited, and they were the cheapest available. Had I bought in the UK I would have bought Samsung (I couldnt find these in Pattaya for a decent price), but there is nothing wrong with the OCZ drives.

On the desktop machine I have a SATA hard drive as my D drive, which contains all my user data and app data. The C drive only contains Windows and Program Files.

If you fit an SSD C drive on a Windows machine, ideally you should reinstall Windows rather than clone. Regardless of whether you reinstall or clone, you should ALWAYS run the Windows Experience Index as this will set various Windows defaults for using an SSD.

Yes, drives that get written to regularly should not be filled more than about 80% but I regularly fill storage drives to within 1% of their capacity. There is no reason not to.

[Dork]

Got a 128GB Vertex 4 for THB4100 this afternoon and 8GB of RAM for another 1300. Installed Win8 and the old clunker is going like a rocket. I can't tell any difference in speed compared to my fairly new (& quite expensive) Ultrabook.

Thanks for all the recommendations.

[muratremix]

I bought intel 330 series 120Gb for 3400 thb from computeandmore.com (Shop located in Pantip 4th floor).

It is cheap, delivers more or less same performance with other sandforce 2281 ssds.