Boot disk for my Gaming PC

[prvnrk]

Hi,

I'm planning to buy a new system with Intel core i7 3630K with Intel 330 Series 120GB 2.5" SATA 6Gb/s Solid State Hard Drive as boot disk.
I know 520 series is even better but it costing too much (more than I could afford)

Do we have any better alternatives for the same budget? perhaps from Corsair / Sandisk??

thanks
prvnrk

[directhex]

Intel's drives are not fast. Even the 520.

They are, however, the most reliable.

Buy an Intel, and your failure rate is somewhere around 0.03%. Buy any non-OCZ brand and you're closer to 0.3%

Question is, do you feel lucky? Is your data business critical? Otherwise, a good 120G SSD with toggle-mode NAND which will dominate the Intel in benchmarks needn't cost more than ~£65

[prvnrk]

Intel's drives are not fast. Even the 520.

They are, however, the most reliable.

Buy an Intel, and your failure rate is somewhere around 0.03%. Buy any non-OCZ brand and you're closer to 0.3%

Question is, do you feel lucky? Is your data business critical? Otherwise, a good 120G SSD with toggle-mode NAND which will dominate the Intel in benchmarks needn't cost more than ~£65

Thank you directhex for your quick and accurate reply!

I'm OK with 0.3% failure rate (as I will have backups regularly). So please suggest me which SSD disk with best performance benchmarks I should go with.

thanks again,
prvnrk

[directhex]

Thank you directhex for your quick and accurate reply!

I'm OK with 0.3% failure rate (as I will have backups regularly). So please suggest me which SSD disk with best performance benchmarks I should go with.

thanks again,
prvnrk

At the 120G mark? Any Plextor M3, the Samsung 830, Corsair Performance Pro, or any Sandforce-based disk with Toggle-mode NAND. A lot of drives fall into the latter category, including things like the Sandisk Extreme, Mushkin Chronos Deluxe, Patriot Wildfire, OCZ Vertex 3 Max IOPS, OWC Mercury Extreme Pro 6G, Corsair Force GS

[prvnrk]

Thank you!

I will probably go with Sandisk Extreme.

-prvnrk

[CAT-THE-FIFTH]

Among the non-Intel drives the M4 and 830 seem to be among the most reliable. Samsung has also released the 840 series,although the 840 PRO is the one I would look at.

BTW,why are you looking at a Core i7 3930K for a gaming build?? Wouldn't a Core i5 3570K or Core i7 3770K be a better value choice??

[prvnrk]

BTW,why are you looking at a Core i7 3930K for a gaming build?? Wouldn't a Core i5 3570K or Core i7 3770K be a better value choice??

In addition to Gaming, We also need to run CPU intensive applications (whose benchmarks matched with i7 3930k) on it.

Thanks!
prvnrk

[Agent]

They are, however, the most reliable.

Sadly though, they have not escaped the dreaded Sandforce BSOD. A Google of "Intel 520 BSOD" will show plenty of people on Intels forum having issues. It's not a flawless SSD at all, even given the extra validation.

You can see some actual retailer figures here: http://www.behardware.com/articles/8...s-rates-6.html

Crucial has taken top spot from Intel thanks to a notable increase in Intel’s returns rate. We should say that this time, the Intel sample is only just above the minimum required and that some of the Intel returns are linked to the 8MB bug which has since been resolved. The OCZ rate has got a lot worse, going up to 7%, and only OCZ has models with rates of above 5%:

0.03% would be very low - I know Intel are quality, but I'd love to see some data to back that up given they've also had issues and firmware updates to solve them. It's not that I doubt you Jo, it's just SSD failure rate is so blinking hard to work out right now

[directhex]

Sadly though, they have not escaped the dreaded Sandforce BSOD. A Google of "Intel 520 BSOD" will show plenty of people on Intels forum having issues. It's not a flawless SSD at all, even given the extra validation.

You can see some actual retailer figures here: http://www.behardware.com/articles/8...s-rates-6.html



0.03% would be very low - I know Intel are quality, but I'd love to see some data to back that up given they've also had issues and firmware updates to solve them. It's not that I doubt you Jo, it's just SSD failure rate is so blinking hard to work out right now

Mainly I get my data from speaking to a friend/vendor with a hosting business, who gets through a lot of disks.

I've oversimplified things. The real key difference is what happens when a drive goes to hell. With, say, an OCZ Sandforce, when the drive's futzed you'll keep sending data to the drive and some portions of your data might get written - and some will get thrown away and some corrupted. With an Intel Sandforce (like the 520) a "dead" drive becomes fairly reliably read-only. For business-critical (think databases) you can imagine the importance of data you can rely on.

[jeckulz]

Just wanted to throw in a cheeky +1 for Vertex 4. Ive got a 128gb for boot and large, hungry software installs, and its wicked.
Ive done a fairly crude performance comparison on my youtube channel - search for user - jeckulz, so I cant be called out for shameless plugs

[directhex]

Just wanted to throw in a cheeky +1 for Vertex 4. Ive got a 128gb for boot and large, hungry software installs, and its wicked.
Ive done a fairly crude performance comparison on my youtube channel - search for user - jeckulz, so I cant be called out for shameless plugs

It's free from the typical Sandforce bugs (y'know, since it's got a Marvell controller instead), but benchmark performance is lower than the drives I mention.

[jeckulz]

It's free from the typical Sandforce bugs (y'know, since it's got a Marvell controller instead), but benchmark performance is lower than the drives I mention.

True.
But youre not going to notice the variances you talk about in real usage.
People get too hung up over benchmarks.

Real talk on SSDs - Theyre ****ing fast.
End of thread LOL

[cerebral744]

+1 for m4 and samsung 830

[Syd]

+1 for m4 and samsung 830

+1 for 830

Also have a vertex 2 which has proved reliable and a intel 80gb x25 which bricked after a week of use !

[tamzzy]

another +1 for the sammy 830

[drakioned]

+1 for m4 and samsung 830

+1 for M4 / Samsung 830. I have both and am very happy with both.

I really wouldn't recommend OCZ drives. Besides the Sandforce issues, on the Vertex 2 and the Vertex 4s, they'd changed the flash chips used on some of the drives after release without drawing too much attention to the fact (in the case of the Vertex 2Es, even keeping the same model number). So if you see really positive reviews of OCZ drives, you should double check that the one you're buying is the same as the one in the review.

EDIT: Occured to me that I should post some evidence.