Is this SSD any good?

[Betty_Swallocks]

A friend of mine is planning to get an SSD to use as his boot and OS drive. He's seen this OCZ Agility 3 60Gb one and would like to know if it's the best for the money. I know very little about SSDs so I hope someone can confirm for me that this one isn't going to disappoint him.

He's also looking at a RAM upgrade and again I'd appreciate your opinions on this Corsair TwinX 4Gb set

Now I know these are pretty good. I have the same set myself but is there anything that would be better for the price.

Thanks

[CAT-THE-FIFTH]

I would get one of the Crucial or Intel ones. in the long term they seem to have less issues. However, the Intel 320 did have a firmware issue which affected some drives. OTH,Corsair Force 3 was recalled and the similar OCZ Vertex 3 also has had firmware problems. The Agility 3 uses the same SandForce controller. The SandForce drives also have something called DuraClass which reduces drive performance to increase lifespan artificially.

[Sputnik]

I'd also go for the Crucial M4 or if you want to save a bit of cash and get a larger capacity for a slight performance hit, Get the 96gb Kingston.

[Saracen]

Can't comment on the SSD as I've no experience with that one, but as for the RAM, I'd go for (and, indeed, did go for) standard XMS2 in preference.

As far as I'm concerned, the other one is no better but with poncy heatsink attached which, along with the pose factor, is what the price difference is about. If your friend is into extreme overclocking, then perhaps the DHX stuff is justified (and I stress "perhaps" it's justified), or maybe if it's in a case with poor cooling, but then I'd suggest improving case cooling over fancy heatsinks on your RAM. As far as I'm concerned, these things are about show and marketing. The stuff I linked to does, by the way, overclock pretty effectively too, if you're so inclined.

Or, alternatively, save another £1 or so with Value Select. I've no reason to suppose it's at all inferior, but for the £1 saving (or £1.20-ish at current prices) I'm not sure it actually matters. But £41 for XMS2 up to £55 for the DHX, well that's too much of a jump for the pose factor, in my book.

Of courser, others may disagree. This is just my view on it. Go for the XMS2 non-DHX, and save £14.

[smargh]

No love yet for Crucial memory? I only ever buy memory from them. Excellent customer service, lifetime warranty, guaranteed compatible, everything I've bought from them has been perfect. A lot of manufacturers use Crucial (Micron) memory.

[Saracen]

I've no problems with Crucial, but likewise, I've never had a failure with Corsair either.

For me, the determining factor was that the place I usually get other hardware from does Corsair and not Crucial. That was enough for me.

[Sputnik]

I'm toying with the idea of changing my motherboard and memory, So I might be selling an OCZ titanium 2x2gb kit soon.

[directhex]

Agility 3 is a good drive - but you might save cash with a 2-series instead, on a non-sata3 mobo.

[Betty_Swallocks]

Thanks guys, useful info. I'll point him at this thread.

[aymanal_i]

crucial is great, no problems

[TheodanUK]

I would also get a Crucial M4 instead of the Agility ..

[Gomezie]

Theres a few votes for the other option.. however I have found that OCZ returns and support is second to none, they get my vote every time