Searching for opinions on reliable SSD's

[tlgriffith3]

In the process of building a computer from scratch and i'm wondering what are some good DRAM SSD's out there. I'm not looking for capacity at all - anywhere from 40-80 gig. Looking for reliability/stability

 

[JohnnyLucky]

Intel ssd's are reportedly the most reliable according to a survey that was conducted in France.

Here is the link to the original article in French:

http://www.hardware.fr/articles/810-6/taux-pannes-composants.html

Here is a link to one of many English versions that are available:

http://www.macobserver.com/tmo/article/french_retailer_data_offers_ssd_failure_rates/

 

[Onus]

I have installed one each of SSDs from Corsair (64GB), Intel (80GB), G.Skill (120GB), and A-Data (128GB). None have offered any issues, and I don't regret any of them. I'm not sure I can really tell a performance difference between the SSDs while using any of those systems, but I haven't bothered to benchmark. While that's hardly a representative sample, I am convinced that any PC I build for myself will have a primary SSD in it. I don't just play games though, I surf a lot, correspond, and do some other writing. The speed just jumping in and out of programs is amazing.

 

[JohnnyLucky]

jtt283 - No OCZ?

I am not a gamer either. I'm semi-retired and still do some semi-professional work. I am actually interested in what an ssd could do for my mainstream professional photo and video applications. Had to go to the Adobe web site to find the answers I was looking for.

BTW - Plextor released their new ssd's. They became available at Newegg this morning.

http://www.newegg.com/Product/ProductList.aspx?Submit=ENE&N=100008120%2050001323%20600038519&IsNodeId=1&name=Plextor

 

[adampower]

For reliability the new offerings are supposed to include capacitors which will protect your writes during a power failure. Next Gen Intel and s2000 will likely be much more 'reliable' if data protection is a priority.

 

[Onus]

Of all the brands, OCZ is the only one that had a few too many really negative opinions related to customer service. I can accept that any company may produce a bad drive from time to time, but the ones that don't consistently look after their customers concern me; so, no OCZ yet.

 

[cadder]

It seems that the products could certainly be better. This is pretty unscientific- if you scan the ratings on newegg for 128GB drives, you see that Ridata has bad reviews, Kingston goes both ways, Intel Samsung and Crucial probably got the best reviews overall, Corsair is near the top, OCZ and G.Skill are below them.

The best Western Digital drives have a lot of reviews and their percentages of 1-egg and 2-egg ratings combined are at or below 10%. Samsung is almost that good, with Seagate and Hitachi pretty far below.

The best rated SSD's don't have nearly as many reviews as the mechanical hard drives, but their combined 1-egg and 2-egg percentages are below 5%. OTOH and this is important- there are plenty of the SSD models from mainstream players that have ratings significantly worse than the best of the mechanical hard drives, maybe worse than the worst of the mechanical hard drives. It seems that there are some turkeys out there on the market and the buyer should do their research, beyond looking for the 3 magic letters of S S and D.

Personally I don't feel the need for an SSD in my personal desktop, but I have 3 laptops at home that could probably benefit from an SSD upgrade. (2 of them would upgrade from Vista to Win7 at the same time).

 

[JohnnyLucky]

Although I do read the buyer comments at Newegg, I do not always rely on them. I've read enough comments over the years to know that some of the individuals do not do any reasearch prior to making a purhase and do not know what they are doing. This is particularly true when a new product installation requires changes to be made to BIOS, operating system, firmware, or a software application.

 

[JohnnyLucky]

I was just over at the OCZ web site and forums. OCZ changed from 34nm to 25nm NAND in their Vertex 2 series ssd's without any sort of press release or major announcements. In addition OCZ did not change the model name, product number, or description to reflect the switch. The Vertex 2 is still SATA II (3 Gb/s) too. Seems the 25nm NAND drives are not performing to customer expectations. I got the impression the new 25nm Vertex 2 performed worse than the original 34nm Vertex 2. OCZ may have been first to market with ssd's using 25nm NAND but that's all they can claim.

Intel on the other hand has simply delayed introducing ssd's with the new 25nm NAND. They are still working on manufacturing production quality 25nm NAND. The new Intel 510 series that will be introduced later this month will use the 34nm NAND. Looks like Intel is playing it safe and sticking with reliable components for the time being. I doubt they want a repeat of the Sandy Bridge recall.

 

[Onus]

Yeah, when you consider the trashing that OCZ RAM has been getting around here too, I'm not sure what they're up to these days. It's a matter of trust, and right now OCZ seems not to have that.

 

[JohnnyLucky]

jtt283 - Some of the veteran posters who were here about 5 years ago might remember what happened when OCZ acquired PC Power and Cooling. PCP&C had some of the best power supplies available until OCZ took over.

 

[Onus]

I think that's about the time I began posting; I think I had lurked for a little while too. PC Power & Cooling seemed to almost disappear from the PSU market for a while.

 

[tlgriffith3]

Some useful feedback. Basically from my general understanding of SSD's, if i were to build a new computer, there is no reason I should buy a hard drive over an SSD considering I'm not looking for storage capacity but speed. I practically will only have a few gaming programs and windows 7.

Another concern: I read somewhere that if I were to have an internal SSD, that cases these days don't have a place to mount or provide a space for the SSD like they would a hard drive? True/False? If true how do most people go about fixing this or would an external SSD prove easier and less complicated (one with a different connection type?)

 

[adampower]

I will not put another spinning disk in any computer that is not a server. (I hate saying stuff like that because I have a feeling I will have to eat it). But that's my intention.

You are rightish. SSDs are almost always 2.5" form factor (like a laptop drive). However, they also almost always come with a little adapter so they fit in a 3.5" drive bay. Also, some forward thinking case manufacturers have made 2.5" drive bays (but I can't think of any as I haven't looked for a case in some time).

 

[Onus]

Many 2.5" SSDs come with adapters, yes. Not all of those adapters have all the right mounting holes though. For example, the A-Data drive I just got has an adapter with holes to match the sides of a 3.5" drive, but not the bottom. I could not screw it to one of the trays in my wife's Antec Sonata case, so it just sits in the tray. That's ok though, because it contains no moving parts so it won't jerk around or make noise.
There are quite a few cases that have 2.5" mount points, typically using the bottom holes. Lian Li, Coolermaster, and Silverstone all come to mind as having at least a few models with such mounts.
I still plan to use spinning disks for documents, pictures, other media, and the Windows swap file (or I may test a small, e.g. 16GB, SSD just for the swap file).