Trying to pick an SSD

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Minwaabi

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Apr 25, 2017
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Hello,

I've figured out everything else about my new work/gaming laptop, but I'm trying to figure out what kind of SSD to get. I'll be using this for work (which is usually just chrome/& lots of google docs) and for gaming and streaming netflix, etc. Right now I'm looking between:

250GB Samsung 850 EVO M.2 SSD -- $140
250GB Samsung 960 Evo NVMe M.2 SSD -- $180
512GB Western Digital Black NVMe M.2 SSD -- $210
500GB Samsung 850 EVO M.2 SSD -- $255

I currently also plan to get a 1TB 5400 RPM HDD, but I don't know if that's really necessary. That costs $45. (All those prices include installation.)

I know the WD drive has better stats than the 850 EVO, but no one I know has heard much about WD SDD's. Are they any good? Are they prone to problems? Are they reliable? Is the 960 EVO's performance actually noticeable over the other two? What are people's general suggestions between those drives?

If you want to know the other stats on the laptop:
CPU: 7th Generation Intel® Kabylake™ i7-7700HQ (2.8GHz - 3.8GHz, 6MB Intel® Smart Cache)
GPU: NVIDIA® GeForce® GTX 1050 Ti (4GB) GDDR5 (Pascal) DX12
RAM: 16GB (2x8GB) DDR4 2400MHz Dual Channel Memory
 
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In short, stick with Samsung for now.

WD SSDs are pretty new to the market. I believe this is the first ones they've made after the SanDisk acquisition. I believe it's using a Marvell controller and SanDisk NAND. So hardware wise, it's nothing special. Firmware wise, SSDs have a lot of different considerations when compared to HDDs so while WD's HDD experience would help some, I'd still give the nod to Samsung for firmware experience. For now, WD is mostly banking on their HDD brand name to carry the product so it's hard to make a judgement on long term reliability.

Now, as to NVMe vs SATA, I'd recommend SATA. For general use and for gaming, you're not going to see much benefit with an NVMe drive. The main place where you see the...
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rkzhao

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Mar 8, 2016
183
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In short, stick with Samsung for now.

WD SSDs are pretty new to the market. I believe this is the first ones they've made after the SanDisk acquisition. I believe it's using a Marvell controller and SanDisk NAND. So hardware wise, it's nothing special. Firmware wise, SSDs have a lot of different considerations when compared to HDDs so while WD's HDD experience would help some, I'd still give the nod to Samsung for firmware experience. For now, WD is mostly banking on their HDD brand name to carry the product so it's hard to make a judgement on long term reliability.

Now, as to NVMe vs SATA, I'd recommend SATA. For general use and for gaming, you're not going to see much benefit with an NVMe drive. The main place where you see the faster speed is in OS boost times, hence why people use SSDs as boot drives. Another consideration is that all that speed from an NVMe drive comes also with a lot more generated heat. Given that you are putting this in a laptop, that may be problematic.

As for capacity, it is of course all dependent on your use. A 250GB boot drive with a separate HDD for storage should work fine. Alternatively, you could probably get away with having only a 500GB SSD and no HDD. Using only a 250GB SSD without any additional HDD storage would be ok for a pure work laptop but is likely not going to be enough if you plan on having games and media on your laptop.

Some other things you could consider:
Why only a 5400RPM HDD? A 7200RPM would be faster but would be a bit noisier. Still, it might be better for your games.
If you decide on getting a 850 EVO, would the 2.5" form factor be cheaper than the M.2? You likely can't have an HDD in that case since I doubt the laptop can have two 2.5" drives but if the cost is lower, you might be able to get a higher capacity SSD.
 
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