OCZ ssd's

[Jader Pack]

Question for SSD gurus. Would it be a significant perf improvement to upgrade a machine that uses a HD SATA II or even HD SATA I with a SSD SATA III HD?

Hypothetical:
WinXP machine, SATA II, 4 GB RAM (Max 8 GB)
iMac G5 PowerPC 1.8 Leopard 10.5 machine, SATA, 1 GB RAM (Max 2 GB)

I think so. Even with a slow bus, older computers would benefit from the significantly reduced random access time of an SSD.

[Jesse]

Question for SSD gurus. Would it be a significant perf improvement to upgrade a machine that uses a HD SATA II or even HD SATA I with a SSD SATA III HD?

Hypothetical:
WinXP machine, SATA II, 4 GB RAM (Max 8 GB)
iMac G5 PowerPC 1.8 Leopard 10.5 machine, SATA, 1 GB RAM (Max 2 GB)

Definitely.. SSD = #1 upgrade for older rigs.

[O_G]

SATA II is fast enough to make it an upgrade, but stick with a slow SSD unless you're planning to upgrade the machine soon. That way, you won't be paying extra for speed your bus can't handle.

[The_Hamster]

Question for SSD gurus. Would it be a significant perf improvement to upgrade a machine that uses a HD SATA II or even HD SATA I with a SSD SATA III HD?

The interface (sata 3) does not determine the speed of the drive, just the speed of the interface. It's like driving on a highway with a 600mph speed limit (the interface). Your car (the drive itself) still max's out at 150mph. The fastest SSD drives are saturating the SATAII interface, so you are fine with whatever you choose really.

The access time of a SSD is something else you will benefit from. Instead of the arm of a physical disk having to flip around and find the data you get virtually instant data access times.

[Phuzun]

OCZ was really great when they got into making solid state drives. I have 3 60GB Agility 1 drives that I ran in raid 0 for 2.5 years, recently replaced them with 2 Crucial M4 128GB drives. The drive life on them is 94%, 98% and 99%. So they certainly are going to last a long long time, but I wouldn't buy one of their new drives over a Crucial, Samsung or Intel. Their quality and rep is just to low now.

2 M4s are nearly twice the speed of what the 3 Agility 1 drives were.

[NOTORIOUS VR]

I have to say after warrantying my agility 3 it's been flawless so far

[Fantomasz]

I have OCZ Vertex II and I love it.Not a single problem.

[O_G]

Question for SSD gurus. Would it be a significant perf improvement to upgrade a machine that uses a HD SATA II or even HD SATA I with a SSD SATA III HD?

Hypothetical:
WinXP machine, SATA II, 4 GB RAM (Max 8 GB)
iMac G5 PowerPC 1.8 Leopard 10.5 machine, SATA, 1 GB RAM (Max 2 GB)

An SSD is always a performance upgrade when compared with a mechanical hard drive, although the earliest SSDs could be pretty slow -- like the models that used JMicron controllers. That generation is long gone, though. The lack of TRIM support in an OS was also a concern, but now Windows 7 supports it and OS X supports it for Apple-sold SSDs (and through a hack for other models). If you're still using XP, you should buy a model that has robust garbage collection.

[PhReE]

SSD's are awesome. I have been running them since May 2009.

I first started with a G.Skill Falcon (Inidilinx Barefoot, same as Vertex 1)
Then moved to a Crucial C300, and then to am M4, all 128GB.

That's in my main system.

I have used many other drives for other things also. IMHO the sandforce drives are ones to avoid, they don't seem to be that reliable. Intel's 520 drive uses a sandforce controller with custom firmware, this drive should end up actually being reliable, but time will tell, it's still pretty new.

I think right now the best buys are: (In no particular order, 'best' means reliable and fast)
Samsung 830 Series
Crucial M4
Plextor M3
Any Intel Drive (500 series are faster than 300 series) (Jury is still out on 520 series but I would not be afraid to buy it.)


Ones to watch:
OCZ Octane (Second gen Indilinx controller)
Vertex 4 should be coming out soon with an even better indilinx controller

[Crass!]

just ordered another Vertex 3 240gb ssd. The one I bought last year is still screaming along, even on the sata II bus. The new one will be going into a new laptop - the current ssd is just too diminutive.

at 288 bucks with free shipping, this is nearly at the 1$/gb mark. Goddannngg!

http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B00...00_i00_details

[O_G]

just ordered another Vertex 3 240gb ssd. The one I bought last year is still screaming along, even on the sata II bus. The new one will be going into a new laptop - the current ssd is just too diminutive.

at 288 bucks with free shipping, this is nearly at the 1$/gb mark. Goddannngg!

http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B00...00_i00_details

The slower (not that it would matter on SATA II) Agility 3 is cheaper:

$210 after rebate.

http://slickdeals.net/f/4141268-OCZ-...BQAAAAAFOz8w1A

[Jader Pack]

Wow, are some of these SSDs ever getting cheap. This is making me reconsider an Air for my next laptop. I'd love a 512 GB SSD.

[valfaw]

not sure if the deal is still working but worth a look

http://slickdeals.net/permadeal/7164...BQAAAAAHOT8w1A

they seem to show up on slickdeals frequently...

[Saintor]

Oh and the Vertex Plus as well.

I had to re-install Windows 7 like 6-8 times and lost like 15-20 hours.

Firmware 3.55 solved my issues and it is running fine now.

Hard to recommend OCZ with all this mess.

A new crash today, after 6 months of normal operation. Tomorrow I will buy a regular 7200rpm Western Digital HD.

*OCZ = banned for life*.

[PhReE]

A new crash today, after 6 months of normal operation. Tomorrow I will buy a regular 7200rpm Western Digital HD.

*OCZ = banned for life*.

Why go back to slow mechanical drives that are not immune to failure either? If you MUST go back to mechanical drives at least get a good one, either a WD Raptor, or go with a Hitachi. WD's drives are all using several year old technology (except the latest gen raptors that just came out) and seagate drives have crap for reliability.

Just buy a GOOD ssd, Crucial M4, Plextor M3, Samsung 830, Intel 520, any of these are great and reliable drives.

[O_G]

Why go back to slow mechanical drives that are not immune to failure either? If you MUST go back to mechanical drives at least get a good one, either a WD Raptor, or go with a Hitachi. WD's drives are all using several year old technology (except the latest gen raptors that just came out) and seagate drives have crap for reliability.

Just buy a GOOD ssd, Crucial M4, Plextor M3, Samsung 830, Intel 520, any of these are great and reliable drives.

If you're going mechanical, get a hybrid drive with SLC NAND. SLC NAND is very resistant to failure.

The Momentus 750 was on sale for $135.

[Angry_Birds]

1. Samsung 830 SSD
2. Crucial M4
3. Intel 510/320

We've had a mixture of the above in close to 100 workstations, laptops, and test/development servers with zero issues. I wouldn't touch an OCZ drive with a 100 foot pole.

[Saintor]

Why go back to slow mechanical drives that are not immune to failure either?

I work on 4 computers. Only one had SSD (OCZ). It was performing well according to tests I did and it was optimized to work in AHCI mode. I would lie if I say that the overall computer experience felt significantly faster.

Despite being more silent, truth is that for typical web browsing, a SSD is not a significant advantage at all, IMO. Modern regular HD are at already <9ms level and they have quite an insane MTBF that compares favorably to SSD; 8-10 years lifetime in both technologies. My computers are in sleep mode 75% of the time.

[NOTORIOUS VR]

I would lie if I say that the overall computer experience felt significantly faster.

Then there is something wrong with your setup.

SSD's make everything faster/snappier... I went back to a 7200 RPM spindle HDD when I sent my OCZ in... the difference was astounding.

[Angry_Birds]

I work on 4 computers. Only one had SSD (OCZ). It was performing well according to tests I did and it was optimized to work in AHCI mode. I would lie if I say that the overall computer experience felt significantly faster.

Despite being more silent, truth is that for typical web browsing, a SSD is not a significant advantage at all, IMO. Modern regular HD are at already <9ms level and they have quite an insane MTBF that compares favorably to SSD; 8-10 years lifetime in both technologies. My computers are in sleep mode 75% of the time.

Yeah IDK what you're talking about. I can't speak to your personal anecdotes, but every single person I've known that's upgraded to an SSD has said they'd never willingly go back to spindle drives. The only reason they haven't completely replaced 10k/15k drives in enterprise applications is the price. They are better in literally every single other respect.

[Saintor]

Yeah IDK what you're talking about. I can't speak to your personal anecdotes, but every single person I've known that's upgraded to an SSD has said they'd never willingly go back to spindle drives.

They must be quicker. IMO, it is just that this added speed doesn't necessarely speed up the internet browsing experience, since this process is not very intensive on HD.

BTW, I am back with a Western Digital Black series. If I got it right, it can transfer data up to 126Mb (my low-spec OCZ+ can write at 160, which is not that better, and read at 250). I am ok with the speed. What I miss though is the absence of noise (my new WD is particularly noisy). But then there is the noise from the power supply, the CPU fan and the dual fans on my HD6850...

[Egilbe]

They must be quicker. IMO, it is just that this added speed doesn't necessarely speed up the internet browsing experience, since this process is not very intensive on HD.

BTW, I am back with a Western Digital Black series. If I got it right, it can transfer data up to 126Mb (my low-spec OCZ+ can write at 160, which is not that better, and read at 250). I am ok with the speed. What I miss though is the absence of noise (my new WD is particularly noisy). But then there is the noise from the power supply, the CPU fan and the dual fans on my HD6850...

You do realize that the internet is not stored on your hard drive, right?

[bmann]

Intel Solid-State Drive 330 Series 180GB for $135 after rebate.

http://www.amazon.com/Intel-Solid-St...=235TF29ELN81T

Now the only question is if I should do a clean XP install or just transfer my current setup. I have an assload of apps installed that I don't want to reinstall.

[SpiffyGTI]

wow, that's a smokin' deal.

go for the clean install whenever possible, imo.

[Jesse]

Good deal.. had to convince myself I don't need another SSD

Fresh install.. absolutely fresh install.. but do a lot of reading so you get your drive set up correctly under XP. Don't just set it and forget it. You'll also be missing some SSD performance improvements inherent in Win7 if you stick with XP.

[LordBass]

Intel Solid-State Drive 330 Series 180GB for $135 after rebate.

I stared at that price for a few days, decided the $70 gift card rebate was more hassle than I felt like dealing with.

Bit on my first SSD a few days ago, went for this OCZ for desktop use. It was $80-$10MIR the other day. Hope this goes well.

[PhReE]

They must be quicker. IMO, it is just that this added speed doesn't necessarely speed up the internet browsing experience, since this process is not very intensive on HD.

BTW, I am back with a Western Digital Black series. If I got it right, it can transfer data up to 126Mb (my low-spec OCZ+ can write at 160, which is not that better, and read at 250). I am ok with the speed. What I miss though is the absence of noise (my new WD is particularly noisy). But then there is the noise from the power supply, the CPU fan and the dual fans on my HD6850...

You guys are missing the point here. The advantage of a SSD is NOT it's sequential read/writes speed, its the RANDOM read/writes speed. A typical mechanical hard drive can do .5-1MB/sec in random 4k reads, while top end SSD's can do over 100MB/sec in the same test. Thats over 100x faster. Thats why they feel 'snappier'.

[Jader Pack]

Despite being more silent, truth is that for typical web browsing, a SSD is not a significant advantage at all, IMO.

Not true. Small or light operations like web browsing, chatting, emailing, etc., all perform a bunch of small reads and writes (caching and accessing caches, reading and writing logs, opening programs, among many other things). An SSD makes these operations, like all others, feel much faster.

Aside from that, a computer used for such activities is increasingly likely to be a portable. The increased durability and reduced power consumption are huge advantages even for such uses.

[bmann]

Good deal.. had to convince myself I don't need another SSD

Fresh install.. absolutely fresh install.. but do a lot of reading so you get your drive set up correctly under XP. Don't just set it and forget it. You'll also be missing some SSD performance improvements inherent in Win7 if you stick with XP.

I've been strongly considering just upgrading to Win7 64 at home. I have it at work and it's pretty decent.

[ATL_Av8r]

You do realize that the internet is not stored on your hard drive, right?

I don't know. I have significant portions of some websites Save As'ed

[CaptainQualude]

[QUOTE=The_Hamster;76398978 The fastest SSD drives are saturating the SATAII interface, so you are fine with whatever you choose really.[/QUOTE]

The next step:

http://www.ocztechnology.com/ocz-rev...press-ssd.html

[Daniel333]

I don't think I'd buy any brand other than Intel, my X-25M has been flawless.[img]http://www.**********/ht3.jpg[/img][img]http://www.**********/jh88.jpg[/img][img]http://www.**********/dh3.jpg[/img]