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Why would you want the SLC flash only? The price is too much for a 32gb model. If you look at all the comparison charts the x25m (MLC) has a little bit faster read and it has a sustained 79 mb/s write.

Sure the SLC has a write of 100 mb/s but the intel x25-m still has a faster write time in most cases than even a velociraptor!

Anyways if your reason for an SLC SSD drive is of life span the intel x25-m can write more than 100GB per day for 5 years..

The intel x25-m can clearly last 15+ years for me so life span isnt an issue whatsoever, unless your running a huge server.

All I can say is wow this is the best upgrade I've ever made since 3d graphics!!

Also transfering 4.3gb to my 1tb external seagate hdd from the intel x25-m takes 45 seconds via fw800! Now this is what I call true speeds.

Also my current setup with the intel x25-m is faster in overall OS speed than I can remember with the 2.8ghz 8 core mac pro with 16gb of ram + 150gb raptor drive, it blows the mind!

You may call it luck, but every MLC drive I've bought has failed within months; the SLC drive I got for my tablet is still working very well.
 
You may call it luck, but every MLC drive I've bought has failed within months; the SLC drive I got for my tablet is still working very well.

Well it's maybe because you've bought the cheaper ssd which almost every other venders are no good with inferior controllers and it's clearly a stroke of bad luck on your side.

Btw what slc ssd do u currently have?
 
Whoever is thinking about buying Intel x25-m now, you should wait till the reviews of the new OCZ Vertex SSD drives is out (ETA End of Jan 09).

There is also G.SKill Titan SSD out now at Newegg.
You can see the review here, http://bjorn3d.com/read.php?cID=1465.

OCZ Vertex should perform a bit better than the Titan due to the fact that it has it's own cache and a brand new controller. Titan still uses the JMiron controllers that is plagued with issues however it has two controllers in RAID-like method to reduce the issue.

128GB Vertex should be same price for the 80GB Intel X25-m and it should be twice the performance in write speed with 85-95% of Intel's performance in read speed.
 
Whoever is thinking about buying Intel x25-m now, you should wait till the reviews of the new OCZ Vertex SSD drives is out (ETA End of Jan 09).

There is also G.SKill Titan SSD out now at Newegg.
You can see the review here, http://bjorn3d.com/read.php?cID=1465.

OCZ Vertex should perform a bit better than the Titan due to the fact that it has it's own cache and a brand new controller. Titan still uses the JMiron controllers that is plagued with issues however it has two controllers in RAID-like method to reduce the issue.

128GB Vertex should be same price for the 80GB Intel X25-m and it should be twice the performance in write speed with 85-95% of Intel's performance in read speed.

Originally I was waiting for the Vertex but just didnt have enough patience. Anyway I'll happily chug along on this intel ssd until 256gb or 512gb ssd with 2x-3x faster in read and write comes along in the next 2 years for $350. :cool:
 
I only use windows when Im at home (hooked up to my monitor/kb/mouse) to play COD and GTR... would it be possible to boot from a FW800 drive so I can keep the possibility of bootcamp open while still utilizing the X25-m SSD?
 
EDIT: It seems i was a little hasty and the drive is actually 256GB which should equate to 238GB. The review did know the difference between GiB and GB too. I missed it. Apologies to the writer and thanks to MikhailT for correcting me.


Whoever is thinking about buying Intel x25-m now, you should wait till the reviews of the new OCZ Vertex SSD drives is out (ETA End of Jan 09).

There is also G.SKill Titan SSD out now at Newegg.
You can see the review here, http://bjorn3d.com/read.php?cID=1465.

OCZ Vertex should perform a bit better than the Titan due to the fact that it has it's own cache and a brand new controller. Titan still uses the JMiron controllers that is plagued with issues however it has two controllers in RAID-like method to reduce the issue.

128GB Vertex should be same price for the 80GB Intel X25-m and it should be twice the performance in write speed with 85-95% of Intel's performance in read speed.

I don't trust a review where the reviewer doesn't know some hard drive basics.

Bjorn 3D G.Skill Titan Review said:
This is a Multi Level Cell Nand Flash based Solid State drive so you can expect 10,000 operations per cell to be its expected lifetime and it's warranted for operation for a period of 2 years. Even though it's listed as a 256 GB SSD, SSD's reserve some space for use when cells start to fail. This helps to extend the lifetime of the SSD and the cells are designed to fail on a read operation when they do fail. So the drive simply transfers the information to one of its reserved cells and goes on in its every day operation. With the reserved cells taken into account you can depend on seeing about 232 GB space when you check the properties of your new drive.

The 232GB of space is due to the representation of bytes by the hard disk manufacturer (250GB = 250,000,000,000 Bytes which equates to 232GiB when you convert properly by dividing by 1024).

In a SSD drive they add more than the stated amount of space. So the drive has more than 250GB, but you can only see 250GB.
 
I've got an early '08 17" MBP and for some stupid reason opted for the large 5400rpm drive so I'm thinking of jumping to SSD too..

Now, I noticed on a certain mostly disk-bound task my iMac 2.8Ghz is about twice as fast as the 2.5Ghz MBP.

Not much CPU being used and the only real diff I could see in the hardware spec is that the MBP has 1.5Gbit SATA bridge but the iMac uses a 3Gbit one (SATA2?).

So does this mean you won't get the most out of putting an X25-M in this machine?
And does the unibody 17" have a 3Gbit bridge??

Justin
 
I use vmware fusion with windows vista to play party poker and run a few apps.

Suspending vmware fusion takes 3 seconds and resuming takes 3-4 seconds and once its up and running (even with only 512mb RAM attributed to it) it never lags and responsive as hell. I didnt even know that I only have 512mb of RAM attributed to vmware fusion and it feels like it has 4gb of RAM to it!

Yeah I can only imagine! Even with my regular 7.2K drive the performance in Fusion 2.1 is fantastic. I'd love one of those Intels. I wish they'd get it up to 256GB though. 160GB is really lean for me.
 
I'm thinking we should be able to soon expect a 256 GB SSD with very fast access for $500 or less within the next month or two.

If you figure that Dell is offering the Samsung drive for a premium of $400 over a 320 GB drive, that comes out to something like a $500 drive.

Fix the Bootcamp issue, and put on the $499 price tag at Newegg, and I'd buy one! Intel and their $950 160GB drive be darned.
 
This is a bummer for me... And to think I almost pulled the trigger on the new 160 GB Intel SSD at Newegg for $950...

I'm in the same position. I think I'm going to end up springing for the Intel 160 GB in a few weeks, I just really wish they would fix the Boot Camp issue. I don't use Boot Camp, which is why I'll probably still get it, I just hate not having the option!

I literally check that forum that you linked every day hoping for a software update or other fix. I'm also quietly hopeful that the 160 GB may work fine and that the 80 GB is the only one with the quirky setup (wishful thinking).
 
I'm thinking we should be able to soon expect a 256 GB SSD with very fast access for $500 or less within the next month or two.

If you figure that Dell is offering the Samsung drive for a premium of $400 over a 320 GB drive, that comes out to something like a $500 drive.

Fix the Bootcamp issue, and put on the $499 price tag at Newegg, and I'd buy one! Intel and their $950 160GB drive be darned.

If you're in the market for an SSD, I'd go for Samsung all the way...
 
I'm in the same position. I think I'm going to end up springing for the Intel 160 GB in a few weeks, I just really wish they would fix the Boot Camp issue. I don't use Boot Camp, which is why I'll probably still get it, I just hate not having the option!

I literally check that forum that you linked every day hoping for a software update or other fix. I'm also quietly hopeful that the 160 GB may work fine and that the 80 GB is the only one with the quirky setup (wishful thinking).

The Intel x25-m's firmware is fixed, there won't be any firmware updates coming from Intel.


The best you can hope for is Apple updating the EFI to make it work with intel's controllers.
 
I don't trust a review where the reviewer doesn't know some hard drive basics.



The 232GB of space is due to the representation of bytes by the hard disk manufacturer (250GB = 250,000,000,000 Bytes which equates to 232GiB when you convert properly by dividing by 1024).

In a SSD drive they add more than the stated amount of space. So the drive has more than 250GB, but you can only see 250GB.

The hard drive is being sold as 256GB, not 250GB. Therefore, it should show up as 238GiB but it won't because SSD reserve some space for wear leveling purposes which as far as I understand does not include the extra cells.

He already explained the GiB/GB issue in the later paragraph.


We checked several times and it really does hold that much storage (less extra cells and translation from marketing numbers to storage numbers, marketing sees 1,000,000 as 1 million bytes, and computers see 1,024,000 as 1 Mb.). That translation means when buying you see bigger numbers and when installing you wonder why it's not showing the full 256 GB inside the OS.
 
Intel X25-M 160 GB Price Drop

It went from 999 to 889 on NewEgg over a couple of days. That's more than 10%! They must not be selling.

Is everyone waiting for a $500 Samsung 256 GB drive with similar perf to the Intel?

Are prices of hi-perf drives about to drop?
 
It went from 999 to 889 on NewEgg over a couple of days. That's more than 10%! They must not be selling.

Is everyone waiting for a $500 Samsung 256 GB drive with similar perf to the Intel?

Are prices of hi-perf drives about to drop?

I don't know that the price drop is due to poor sales, though it could be. High technology like this tends to drop rapidly as it becomes more mainstream, which appears to be happening a lot with SSD's at the moment.

Also, I watch that item everyday just to see the price, and I think it only dropped from $949 to $889.

http://http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16820167015
 
The hard drive is being sold as 256GB, not 250GB. Therefore, it should show up as 238GiB but it won't because SSD reserve some space for wear leveling purposes which as far as I understand does not include the extra cells.

He already explained the GiB/GB issue in the later paragraph.

I stand corrected! Thanks MikhailT, I updated my original post to reflect this.
 
799 or the X25-M 160 at NewEgg! Either nobody is buying these things, or Samsung is about to saturate the market with 256GB drives at a cheaper price. I'd really like a 250 GB driver or greater so I could easily migrate over my MBP OSX and Win partitions without having to reset anything up.

256 for $500 (OK $600) and I'd buy one...

Let's see - if it continues to drop $150 per week - they'll be giving them away in six weeks...
 
799 or the X25-M 160 at NewEgg! Either nobody is buying these things, or Samsung is about to saturate the market with 256GB drives at a cheaper price. I'd really like a 250 GB driver or greater so I could easily migrate over my MBP OSX and Win partitions without having to reset anything up.

256 for $500 (OK $600) and I'd buy one...

Let's see - if it continues to drop $150 per week - they'll be giving them away in six weeks...

It's a price drop. It's been rumored for the past month that Intel will cut prices on their SSDs.

Intel X25-M 80GB is down to 399$
Intel X25-M 160GB is down to 799$
Intel X25-E 32GB is down to 549$
 
I think i'm going to purchase one now that they've dropped in price. I had been looking at it...glad I didn't!
 
I think i'm going to purchase one now that they've dropped in price. I had been looking at it...glad I didn't!

But they're dropping so fast! And I really don't need one - I think it would be prudent to see how Samsung answers this, and then get the Intel if the value isn't there...
 
Check out PhotoFast G-Monster series. They are FAST.. G-Monster V2 runs at 230MB/s read and 160MB/s write!! G-Monster V1 with Macbook review here.

Abric Technologies distributes PhotoFast in south east Asia.
 
Benchmarks?

Also my current setup with the intel x25-m is faster in overall OS speed than I can remember with the 2.8ghz 8 core mac pro with 16gb of ram + 150gb raptor drive, it blows the mind!

Thanks for the information. I want to upgrade my Mac Pro 3.2GHz to SSD. It sounds like it will be worth the investment. Have you run any benchmarks? What is your boot time?
 
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