First SSD purchase: Intel 320 vs Crucial M4 vs Corsair Performance Pro?

[ccbadd]

Been running four of these drives since release. Have had NO problems what-so-ever. Three are in a RAID array and one in a laptop.
Now lets talk about the Vertex 3 they replaced.............

That the Intel 320 is in the same league as the Vertex 3 is all I am pointing out. The OP requested reliability. Out of the three he listed, the CLEAR winner is the Crucial M4.

If you take it a little further, the Intel 320 still has the issue and the Vertex 3 seems to be fixed with the latest FW, so maybe the the Vertex 3 is above the Intel 320. I am only comparing the Vertex 3 (not Vertex 2 or earlier) and the Intel 320 (not a G2 or 510, etc.) just to be clear.

 

[jiffylube1024]

That the Intel 320 is in the same league as the Vertex 3 is all I am pointing out. The OP requested reliability. Out of the three he listed, the CLEAR winner is the Crucial M4.

If you take it a little further, the Intel 320 still has the issue and the Vertex 3 seems to be fixed with the latest FW, so maybe the the Vertex 3 is above the Intel 320. I am only comparing the Vertex 3 (not Vertex 2 or earlier) and the Intel 320 (not a G2 or 510, etc.) just to be clear.

There is no way the Vertex 3 is above the Intel 320 in terms of reliability. While there are scattered reports of the 8MB bug still popping up around the net, they are few and far between. The Vertex 3, while improving its reliability, is not in the same league of reliability of any Intel drive, even the 320 series. Check Newegg or any site for reviews to get an anecdotal "feel" for failure rates, and then check online polls and other places to see what people are saying. The Vertex 3's are quick drives, but they're not even approaching Intel's drives in terms of reliability. At least their warranty is solid.

 

[ViviTheMage]

I picked up my second M4 128GB, happy

 

[kbp]

That the Intel 320 is in the same league as the Vertex 3 is all I am pointing out. The OP requested reliability. Out of the three he listed, the CLEAR winner is the Crucial M4.

If you take it a little further, the Intel 320 still has the issue and the Vertex 3 seems to be fixed with the latest FW, so maybe the the Vertex 3 is above the Intel 320. I am only comparing the Vertex 3 (not Vertex 2 or earlier) and the Intel 320 (not a G2 or 510, etc.) just to be clear.

In no way is the Vertex 3 even in the same "ocean" as the Intel 320.
Just go to the OCZ forums.
Now go back to this forum. ANYBODY here , after updating firmware on an Intel 320, seeing the "8mb bug ???

 

[ccbadd]

In no way is the Vertex 3 even in the same "ocean" as the Intel 320.
Just go to the OCZ forums.
Now go back to this forum. ANYBODY here , after updating firmware on an Intel 320, seeing the "8mb bug ???

What problems have users here had with the Vertex 3 after the newest firmware update? You and jiffylube are just proving my point. You have it set in your minds and facts are not going to change that.

 

[kbp]

I have two vertex 3 128. Still get BSOD in laptop. Both are now just sitting in motherboard box with other spare parts. Correction, one is in my desktop as a scratch drive.
Just picked up the Samsung 830 128gb the other day. $139 was to good to pass by. Wish I could get $139 for the vertex 3.
My Intel's are staying right where they are, in use every day.

 

[ccbadd]

I have two vertex 3 128. Still get BSOD in laptop. Both are now just sitting in motherboard box with other spare parts. Correction, one is in my desktop as a scratch drive.
Just picked up the Samsung 830 128gb the other day. $139 was to good to pass by. Wish I could get $139 for the vertex 3.
My Intel's are staying right where they are, in use every day.

The point I was trying to get across is simply that, out of the three drives the OP listed, the M4 is the most reliable and everyone who mentioned the Intel drive said it was rock solid, but that is just not the case.

 

[groberts101]

Most of this stuff is all based on speculation anyways. Go read from different sources?.. get a different perspective. Have one die on you?.. and that is reality for ALL SSD's made.. the perspective will change pretty quickly.

And after that happens?.. the "more buses on the other side of the street" rule usually kicks in as you start to notice more with similar issues as you hunt for them while trying to figure out what the hell happended to your "highly rated SSD".

I've had no less than 12 Sandforce based drives with never a "lost drive". I've only had 3 Intels with 1 killed in a matter of days. Am I silly or narrow minded enough to think that paints a very clear picture that Sandforce is more stable or "hardware friendly" than Intel?.. hell no. Salt added along with more careful research/post-search?.. and it falls into the law of averages for just about all things.

 

[bryanW1995]

M4 gets my vote.

Any of the 3 will work just fine though my preference would be Intel>Crucial>Corsair based on that list. Unless you're benching the difference in sequential read speed is negligible in day to day tasks but given the price drops on SSDs lately you may want to consider the Intel 520s as well if you can live with it being a new and mostly unproven drive.

A SATA3 SSD will futureproof you if you will be transfering the SSD over to a new motherboard, however.

I'd go with the Crosair Performance pro out of that list. now as a previous poster said day-to-day you won't notice a difference between most sata 3 drives. Personally I'd buy a Mushkin Chronos Deluxe 240gb 32nm Toshiba synchronous Toggle NAND and they are $1 per GB now and the best price to performance drive on the market and rock solid reliable! (if you can find it in stock anywhere)

Sorry guys, lots of fail in these posts.

The OP said that he had an sata II connection. The intel 320 series performs on a very competitive footing with the others when they use sata II, so lets keep performance out of the equation.

1. There's no point in buying a 520 for a an sata II connection. Terrible advice.
2. CPP is excellent, but it doesn't have the reliability record/longevity of the m4 and that was the OP's first priority.


We are now left with samsung 830, crucial m4, and intel 320. I'd lean towards the intel 320, but that snarky 8mb (if it's really still present) is problematic enough that we can eliminate it, leaving us with samsung 830 and crucial m4. Out of those 2, speed will be very close due to the slower connection, so I'd just buy whichever is cheaper.

 

[Brutus04]

Started w/Intel, it was awesome. Bought an M4 and RMA'd it for the 520. Intel is very reliable.

 

[LokutusofBorg]

Sorry guys, lots of fail in these posts.

The OP said that he had an sata II connection. The intel 320 series performs on a very competitive footing with the others when they use sata II, so lets keep performance out of the equation.

1. There's no point in buying a 520 for a an sata II connection. Terrible advice.
2. CPP is excellent, but it doesn't have the reliability record/longevity of the m4 and that was the OP's first priority.


We are now left with samsung 830, crucial m4, and intel 320. I'd lean towards the intel 320, but that snarky 8mb (if it's really still present) is problematic enough that we can eliminate it, leaving us with samsung 830 and crucial m4. Out of those 2, speed will be very close due to the slower connection, so I'd just buy whichever is cheaper.

You call people out but then say the 520 is a bad choice because he only has SATA2? The 520 is a good choice no matter what you're hooking it up to. You go on to recommend choosing between two SATA 6Gbps drives... It is far from terrible advice to recommend buying something that will likely last longer than the current build and be reused in a new rig that has SATA 6Gbps. It's called thinking ahead.

The mainstream choices at the current time boil down to the Intel 520, the Crucial M4, and the Samsung 830. I'm not familiar enough with the Corsair and Mushkin drives also being recommended in this thread, but if they're in the same $/GB ballpark as the three I just mentioned, then they're worth considering also.

 

[icanhascpu2]

Unless you're benching the difference in sequential read speed is negligible in day to day tasks...

Eh? Maybe I'm misunderstanding. Sequential read speed is negligible in day to day tasks? Between 1/3 and 1/2 of I/Os are sequential for common workload. Hardly negligible.

 

[icanhascpu2]

Sorry guys, lots of fail in these posts.

How is WaTaGuMp vote for the M4 fail? From Anands own review it seems to be a solid choice, and it has gone down in price since. They also seem to be supporting it well through firmware updates. An excellent value imo.

I went with the 64GB as my first SSD for 80$. It should be here in a week! I'll try to remember to come back with a report.

 

[bryanW1995]

You call people out but then say the 520 is a bad choice because he only has SATA2? The 520 is a good choice no matter what you're hooking it up to. You go on to recommend choosing between two SATA 6Gbps drives... It is far from terrible advice to recommend buying something that will likely last longer than the current build and be reused in a new rig that has SATA 6Gbps. It's called thinking ahead.

The mainstream choices at the current time boil down to the Intel 520, the Crucial M4, and the Samsung 830. I'm not familiar enough with the Corsair and Mushkin drives also being recommended in this thread, but if they're in the same $/GB ballpark as the three I just mentioned, then they're worth considering also.

It's a bad choice b/c it's so much more expensive and the OP won't realize as much of the benefit from using it on sata II. And the reasoning I used for recommending the crucial or samsung was sound, unlike that used by many others in this thread.

 

[groberts101]

Eh? Maybe I'm misunderstanding. Sequential read speed is negligible in day to day tasks? Between 1/3 and 1/2 of I/Os are sequential for common workload. Hardly negligible.

you are surely misunderstanding something here. The "common workloads" that you speak of here are very small files and if you think that doubling the R/W speeds of an SSD will improve the users perception for these tiny files?.. you are mistaken. The largest perceptible gain from moving to 6G SSD for an OS volume is in the random performance and improved latency for some models.

If you think that opening a few MB files repeatedly for an OS volume will be twice as fast?.. good luck with that. Or even a large staticlly stored video file for that matter. At 250MB/s is opens in about a second after clicking it. From an SSD with 500MB/s capability?.. yep.. nearly the same 1 second time frame.

The folks who don't have fast enough storage are really missing out on some of the extra cash they've spent to get that extra speed potential since R/W of statically stored data is already so damned fast to begin with. Getting the data TO the SSD is the biggest bottleneck and most overlook that weakness completely as they run data(R/W) between it and a lowly single HDD and anyone who uses an SSD based OS matched with SSD based storage volume is well aware of that fact. For those that don't have SSD storage?.. set up a simple ramdisk and the R/W to/from the 6G SSD to see what you're missing. Because it's a lot.

PS. I would never recommend buying a 3G SSD anymore these days. Not even for a 3G limited system. Just doesn't make sense when you consider that the SSD will not be living till its dying day in such a machine and will surely be handed up when the time for upgrade to 6G arrives. Plus, the price differential is just not wide enough to warrant buying older tech like that, not to mention that most would rather have an "old slow last gen 6G drive" to use for USB or scratch disk duty.. over an "old 3G SSD" when a few years have gone by and they have moved to faster SSD's by then. In reality, if you are that concerned with saving $27 bucks?.. you probably shouldn't be buying an SSD in the first place if funds are that limited.

 

[sequoia464]

The folks who don't have fast enough storage are really missing out on some of the extra cash they've spent to get that extra speed potential since R/W of statically stored data is already so damned fast to begin with. Getting the data TO the SSD is the biggest bottleneck and most overlook that weakness completely as they run data(R/W) between it and a lowly single HDD and anyone who uses an SSD based OS matched with SSD based storage volume is well aware of that fact. For those that don't have SSD storage?.. set up a simple ramdisk and the R/W to/from the 6G SSD to see what you're missing. Because it's a lot.

I'm a perfect example of this - sort of. My OS and all of my storage is taken care of with SSD's but I was doing my daily backups to a USB 3.0 drive. Had to break out the valium to help me relax through it - finally set up a raid0 with a couple of W.D. blacks, went from over an hour on the backups to under 15 minutes.