SSD on the cheap

[newpersn]

Im after advice on a SSD

 

im looking to replace my ageing Hard drive in my computer. (500GB Sata-150 (i think))

 

I have got a 1tb Drive to use as a data disk

 

i was looking at a kingston V300 120GB SSD? Any Good (in a home computer playing games)

Edited January 2, 2015 by newpersn

[featured_spectre]

I'd say go for the Samsung EVO range. Cheap(ish) and reliable. We're making the switch at work...and its a good one to go for.

[newpersn]

I'd say go for the Samsung EVO range. Cheap(ish) and reliable. We're making the switch at work...and its a good one to go for.

 

I got a kingston V300 in my work computer and it runs alright in that.

[featured_spectre]

Amazon link for SSD Drive This is the samsung drive, performance wise and longevity wise, its better than the Kingston drive

[3s-gtech]

Avoid the current V300. The original model that was shipped (as I have in my own PC, thankfully) used better NAND - AnandTech | An Update to Kingston SSDNow V300: A Switch to Slower Micron NAND

[featured_spectre]

Didn't know that, thanks @3s-gtech

[computer_expert]

Have to agree with @3s-gtech on the kingstons.

 

I've got a v300 and a number of crucial m500s. The m500s seem noticeably quicker to me when compared to the V300. The crucial m500s have been replaced with the MX100 and M550 though.

[matt40k]

I've picked up a cheap Sandisk Ultra Plus ssd and that's not died yet dispite me thrashing the hell out of it for about a year now.

[abillybob]

It's a shame about the Kingston drives, I had one a while back and it ran like a dream for years, but since they have replaced the NAND I wouldn't bother now, you can get much better SSD's for the same price.

 

I now run a Samsung 840 Evo which thus far (6 Months) has been great.

[newpersn]

I think i may get a a hybrid drive?

[nicholab]

I got the crucial mx100 512gb in my mac it does take 10 secs to boot.

[flyinghaggis]

120Gb is a bit on the small side. Would be better to grab a 256Gb SSD which is about the price/capacity sweet spot at the moment by the looks of it. Maybe something like a crucial mx100 256gb as others have suggested for £80. I wouldn't bother with a hybrid drive when SSD's can be had so cheaply TBH. Their performance isn't on a par with SSD's.

 

Crucial MX100 256GB SATA III 6GB/s Solid State Drive SSD - CT256MX100SSD1 - Scan.co.uk

Edited January 3, 2015 by flyinghaggis

[Roberto]

I've got a crucial MX100 in my PC and I'm very happy with it. I picked up a 512Gb one during an Amazon sale. I had a hybrid drive in my system before but since replacing it with the SSD it is much improved; booting in a fraction of the time it did with a hybrid disk and it is very fast and responsive in day to day use. I would say that the Samsung 840 series are even better, having worked with those before, so those would be my two picks.

[jamin100]

I just got an OCZ arc 100 240Gb drive for £65 from PC world

 

They also have the 120GB version for £44

 

Performance is quite good with read /write at over 400mbs sec

 

The new Kingston v300 I had in he system for 1 day only managed 150mb read write

[Arthur]

I just got an OCZ Arc 100 240GB drive for £65 from PC World

For the price it is hard to beat the Arc 100. It's only a few £££s more than a 120GB Samsung 840 EVO (£61.69), but you get twice as much space.

 

www.currys.co.uk/gbuk/computing-accessories/components-upgrades/internal-hard-drives/solid-state-drives/ocz-arc-100-series-2-5-internal-ssd-240-gb-10100705-pdt.html

 

In July the MX100 was the king of the value market, but since then it has faced serious competition from SanDisk and OCZ. As I've said before, SSDs have matured to a point where any modern SSD is good enough for typical client workloads, which is why price is the dominating factor in the mainstream space. The MX100, Ultra II and ARC 100 all excel in cost efficiency and are currently available at less than 50 cents per gigabyte.

 

I should note that the ARC 100 doesn't support low-power states, which reduces its power efficiency and thus the Ultra II and MX100 are better picks for laptop users as they'll yield longer battery life. However, in terms of performance, the ARC 100 is the best out of the three thanks to the excellent performance consistency of the Barefoot 3 controller and it's also the best fit in case you're looking for performance on budget.

 

The Ultra II in turn is slightly faster than the MX100 under very heavy workloads, but to be honest users with such workloads should be looking at the recommendations above (or right below) instead. Hence the Ultra II and MX100 are practically indistinguishable, although with the MX100 you do get hardware encryption (Opal/eDrive) in case that might come handy in the future. (Source)

 

Some people are reporting an issue with Crucial's MX100 whereby it randomly disappears from the BIOS so I would avoid that SSD if you can.

 

http://forum.crucial.com/t5/Crucial-SSDs/MX100-will-not-boot-sometimes/td-p/158815

[yugo]

The Crucial M550 256GB is down to £68.39 on their website at the moment.

[synaesthesia]

Would anyone knowingly put another OCZ in their machine though? No matter how much improvement they may have made, that'll always niggle at the back of the mind.

[LosOjos]

Would anyone knowingly put another OCZ in their machine though? No matter how much improvement they may have made, that'll always niggle at the back of the mind.

 

Was thinking that myself. I guess that's why they're so cheap compared to the competition though, they know they have to be cut throat to win back customers...

 

Personally, I'd decide my budget first then find the sweet spot between price/performance in that budget. I have a 120GB at home as it's all my budget would allow 2 years ago but I'd say you need 240GB realistically. I'm at a point now where I'm having to clean my drive every time a moderately sized Windows update rolls out so I can install it.

 

It still makes sense financially to have an SSD for software and a HDD for storage IMO. Hybrid drives I've got to say I'm not sold on. I put one in my MTPC and although it's fairly quick to boot up and load programs, I honestly don't think there's a noticeable enough performance boost to warrant the extra cost over a HDD; stick to a proper SSD and HDD combo

[DMcGuigan]

I got myself a 120GB M500 for my Christmas rebuild.. I filled it in three installs, Windows, BF4 and WoW. Thinking about either getting another and slapping them in RAID or just buying a bigger one outright to replace.

 

Performance-wise I can't fault it, full system reboot in 14 seconds, I'll be interested to see how it performs after a few months though.

[LosOjos]

I got myself a 120GB M500 for my Christmas rebuild.. I filled it in three installs, Windows, BF4 and WoW. Thinking about either getting another and slapping them in RAID or just buying a bigger one outright to replace.

 

Performance-wise I can't fault it, full system reboot in 14 seconds, I'll be interested to see how it performs after a few months though.

 

Are you using Windows 8 (or above)? If so, I'd give Storage Spaces a try; it's software RAID but really easy to manage and means if you have to get a new mobo, the drives will drop straight in an continue working

 

Also, I haven't noticed any decrease in performance in my 2 year old SSD - I don't do benchmarks, so can't give you hard figures, but in day to day use I've not noticed anything

[Arthur]

Thinking about either getting another and slapping them in RAID or just buying a bigger one outright to replace.

RAID 0'ing SSDs in home PCs seems a bit pointless for IMO. Most people don't need or benefit from the faster sequential read/write speeds and you also double your chances of failure (with two drives).

[mac_shinobi]

RAID 0'ing SSDs in home PCs seems a bit pointless for IMO. Most people don't need or benefit from the faster sequential read/write speeds and you also double your chances of failure (with two drives).

 

I know it isn't cheap but if you got two 256 850 pro samsung SSD's ( seeing as they have a 10 year warranty ) and RAID zeroed those together, claim under warranty when and if they failed ??

 

Possibly a bit cheaper else where but : http://www.ebuyer.com/657563-samsung-850-pro-256gb-sataiii-2-5inch-ssd-mz-7ke256bw

Edited January 5, 2015 by mac_shinobi

[sted]

I know it isn't cheap but if you got two 256 850 pro samsung SSD's ( seeing as they have a 10 year warranty ) and RAID zeroed those together, claim under warranty when and if they failed ??

 

its less the physical failure that's the problem than loosing data/having to restore from backup. So even if you get it rma'd in 1 day its still a major pita

[newpersn]

Wouldn't Raid 1 give you better performance anyway?

 

(out of touch with raid atm)

[mac_shinobi]

its less the physical failure that's the problem than loosing data/having to restore from backup. So even if you get it rma'd in 1 day its still a major pita

 

Have a raid 1 of WD Red's and use something like ghost / acronis or whatever and restore from a live backup copy to the SSD's again ?