SSD:Intel 330 or M4 for Linux OS

[dheer]

Hi,
I have Debian Gnu/Linux as My current Desktop Operating System for many years now. this will be My first SSD experience.

I am confused to choose between sf-2281(Sandforce) Intel 330 series 120GB SSD drive and Crucial M4(Marvell) drive. more inclined to purchase 330 series since I can claim international warranty in India(although will be purchased from USA).

I hope performance can be restored to pristine condition(~100%) by TRIM,Garbage collection in Sandforce based SSDs? I read a claim in a review and shown this(below pic) as how TRIM fails to improve performance.

http://www.anandtech.com/show/5508/...cherryville-brings-reliability-to-sandforce/7

queries:

• I use a Debian repository which have daily updates like 30-50MB or sometimes more. even if I delay the updates for a week, it will add to some amount. These packages are downloaded,extracted and installed. Will it wear the system more than Windows 7/8? Is it better, if I choose a Linux distro with lesser updates?

• I've read about SSD alignment is needed. How to achieve this? I plan to keep "/"(root),"/boot" partitions in SSD and "/home"(Home directory), "sw"(Swap) in Sata HDD. is this the correct strategy?

• I've read that wear levelling with TRIM enabling in Operating Systems. Since I may be using ext4 file system, will adding some parameters to /etc/fstab enough(like "discard" option). I read that a cron job running weekly for garbage collection is better recommended(elsewhere) with some utility like "fstrim".

• For Gnu/Linux- Which one is more recommended SSD's based on controller chipset: Sandforce or Marvell? How is SF-2281 support in Linux including TRIM support.

• I am using a primitive Zebronics 450W PSU for many years now. Will I need to replace it? Mind this is a C2D E4600 system with 2 GB ram.

• I am buying from USA to India, since Crucial or most of the SSD brands are damn expensive here. So, If I buy from USA, is there any brands like Intel which will honour warranty on SSDs Internationally(means in India)?

TIA+

 

[themillak]

I'm got an M4 for my netbook running sid. you mentioned 30-50 MB a day of downloads so I assume you're running testing or sid. depending on the size of the SSD I would choose between home on the SSD or on a HD but I would leave swap on the SSD and files like movies/pictures/music/downloads on a hard drive. Buying it will speed up your system and if you have to swap to a hard drive it'll really slow down. If you want to hibernate your system you could have a small swap partition on your ssd and then a larger one with a lower priority on the hard drive.

as for partitioning, I used Gparted and I was pretty happy with it. my boot partition took a few tries to actually align and then I aligned the rest from there.

root@debian-netbook:# fdisk -l

Disk /dev/sda: 128.0 GB, 128035676160 bytes
255 heads, 63 sectors/track, 15566 cylinders, total 250069680 sectors
Units = sectors of 1 * 512 = 512 bytes
Sector size (logical/physical): 512 bytes / 512 bytes
I/O size (minimum/optimal): 512 bytes / 512 bytes

   Device Boot      Start         End      Blocks   Id  System
/dev/sda1   *        2048      206847      102400   83  Linux
/dev/sda2          206848   250068991   124931072    5  Extended
/dev/sda5          208896    21180415    10485760   83  Linux
/dev/sda6        21182464   245694463   112256000   83  Linux
/dev/sda7       245696512   249890815     2097152   82  Linux swap / Solaris

 

[dheer]

Yes. I plan to run a Testing with some sid packages(apt-pinning). My queries are is sandforce chipset SSDs are fully supported in Linux especially TRIM command.

 

[themillak]

I would assume so. I don't remember reading anything saying that they weren't when I went shopping for my ssd

 

[Vegemeister]

Avoid Sandforce. Their controllers compress data to get the performance they claim, which is absolutely useless with encrypted data. Obviously, you should be be using luks on your root partition.

 

[Nothinman]

I went with Intel just to be on the safe sided, didn't do anything special and it all worked just fine. I did opt out of using the discard mount option after doing some reading and instead setup a cron job to run fstrim on the SSD filesystems periodically.