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SSD Buying Guide

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Hellhammer said:
Samsung 830 is a safe bet but Vertex 4 has a lot potential. It's really up to what you want - do you want to be one of the guinea pigs?
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I don't mind being a guinea pig. :) But I am interested if you have any insights from anandtech on the controller's performance without OS-level TRIM? The Vertex 4 review didn't include as much info as they normally do in this regard.
 
rev.b said:
Why nobody is talking about SanDisk 240Gb Extreme? It's having great reviews, and it's the cheapest 240-256 Gb SDD I could find.

£159.99 with free delivery at amazon.co.uk. It's back-ordered, but it's a great deal... Crucial m4 256 Gb is £177.78, and even so, cheaper than ordering from crucial.

I just ordered one SanDisk extreme.
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I ordered this too - just waiting on delivery which will be at some point this week so i'll install it this weekend and feedback. Just going to remove my boot camp partition before then - barely used it since I switched at the start of the year.
 
I'm looking to buy an SSD to replace my hard drive and was wondering if anyone could advise me. I'm a pretty simple user (internet browsing, word processing) so speed and such isn't too big a concern, but reliability, compatibility and ease of use is. It is for a mid 2010 MBP (SL) which I believe is a 3G (?). I'm Australian so I've been looking mainly at Australian online stores. I heard the intel is good but I am open to anything. I don't really know which would be compatible so any advice would be greatly appreciated.

I coud get the:
180GB Intel 330
120GB Intel 520

In my price range they also have:

128GB Samsung 830
128GB Crucial m4
120GB Kingston HyperX
120GB OCZ Agility 3 or Vertex 3/4

What do you recommend?
 
Weaselboy said:
Another great SSD review on Anandtech from MR member Hellhammer. This time the new Corsair Performace Series Pro. His section on TRIM will be of interest to Mac users.
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Heh, thanks :) Good to see that someone actually saw my effort on TRIM testing, it takes painfully long to test.

Andi90 said:
I'm looking to buy an SSD to replace my hard drive and was wondering if anyone could advise me. I'm a pretty simple user (internet browsing, word processing) so speed and such isn't too big a concern, but reliability, compatibility and ease of use is. It is for a mid 2010 MBP (SL) which I believe is a 3G (?). I'm Australian so I've been looking mainly at Australian online stores. I heard the intel is good but I am open to anything. I don't really know which would be compatible so any advice would be greatly appreciated.

I coud get the:
180GB Intel 330
120GB Intel 520

In my price range they also have:

128GB Samsung 830
128GB Crucial m4
120GB Kingston HyperX
120GB OCZ Agility 3 or Vertex 3/4

What do you recommend?
Click to expand...

Samsung 830, unless Intel or Crucial are significantly cheaper.
 
Thanks!

The Samsung 830 128GB is $199 and the Intel 330 180GB is $239, for that price difference considering the different sizes would you still go for the Samsung?
 
Andi90 said:
Thanks!

The Samsung 830 128GB is $199 and the Intel 330 180GB is $239, for that price difference considering the different sizes would you still go for the Samsung?
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Samsung 256. It's round $240 right now, I think. 128GB is not too big, unless you want to put your HD in the ODD.
 
SDAVE said:
Samsung 256. It's round $240 right now, I think. 128GB is not too big, unless you want to put your HD in the ODD.
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Unfortunately the prices around my area (Australia) aren't that low. It will be my main storage, but my current HD is not going well so I think its better than nothing, which was why I was considering the 180GB Intel 330. I don't want to spend a lot on a new SSD, around $250 is about my limit, as there may be other problems with my MBP, and if I buy a new one a few months down the line it will be kind of useless.
 
Hellhammer, what your thoughts on the OWC Mercury Extreme Pro 6G compared to the Crucial M4 or Samsung 830? I'm looking to upgrade to the Sata III 480GB version as soon as the new MBPs are released. I love that they are made specifically for Macs, but I'm wondering if that really matters. I've used their Sata II 240GB version for 2 years and it's been flawless since day one. Speed is definitely of concern to me, but reliability even more so, as well as long term performance -- I'd sacrifice a few mbps for drive longevity any day.
 
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dreamtenstudios said:
Hellhammer, what your thoughts on the OWC Mercury Extreme Pro 6G compared to the Crucial M4 or Samsung 830? I'm looking to upgrade to the Sata III 480GB version as soon as the new MBPs are released. I love that they are made specifically for Macs, but I'm wondering if that really matters.
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It does not matter. That is nothing but marketing hype from OWC. They use the exact same Sandforce controller, even with the same firmware, as other vendors, and there is nothing special about their SSDs. There is nothing necessarily wrong with them, but they are no different than other brands using the same Sandforce controllers.
 
I bought the 256Mb M4 from ebuyer last week and put it into my Late 2011 15" MBP. Did a clone from the existing Macintosh HD to the SSD with Super Duper (SSD in an external caddy). Did a test boot from the caddy to confirm it worked then swapped out the drive. The hardest part was removing some of the screws from the bottom to get into the MBP! - oh and dropped in 8GB of crucial ram at the same time.
The difference is simply amazing from scrolling through my itunes library with the album artwork appearing as fast as you can scroll, opening applications such as MS office has hardly any delay. Larger programs such as FCPX still open up quickly but editing (after transferring the clips to the SSCD) is so so much better, although I dont see a huge difference in boot times. Ive just done a speed test and am getting 250Mb/s write and 499Mb/s read (at the same time as playing an ALAC album in itunes).

The only problem I have is my Recovery HD had gone missing from the SSD clone. Ive put the original HD in the optibay so I still have it but I dont think I can access it for recovery where it is. If I have a failure I think I'll have to swap the drives back over - This is something I will look into at some point. I want to get the Recovery HD onto the SSD somehow.

I think the problems some have reported here are few and far between. The process is very simple and the benefits demonstrate how archaic traditional drives are in terms of read/write speeds. Be in no doubt about the speed boost and productivity increase an SSD will give you.

I've not bothered updating the firmware on the SSD, still not figured out how to, I've only had the MBP for a couple of weeks so still learning stuff.

I think the general user can get too hung up in slight differences of drive speeds and other factors that only make differences in extreme use cases. For the majority of users the Crucial M4 is a fantastic drive with a good warranty period at a very good price.
 
How do I reinstall Lion? Cmd + R to do the internet recovery? Or can I get to my old recovery HD somehow?
 
Hi,

I've tried my best to read through this big thread to get the information I need. It seems the Crucial M4 SSD seems to be the drive alot of people seem to be going for. I was about to pull the trigger myself on this http://www.amazon.co.uk/Crucial-CT128M4SSD2-128GB-M4-SSD/dp/B004W2JKZI/ref=cm_cr_pr_product_top. But reading the reviewer's comment's especially for MBP user's has me a little concerned, enough so that it's making me hesitate on ordering. Comment's here: http://www.amazon.co.uk/product-reviews/B004W2JKZI/ref=cm_cr_dp_synop?ie=UTF8&showViewpoints=0&sortBy=bySubmissionDateDescending#R17ENS79FB6R09
 
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Spikeuk76 said:
How do I reinstall Lion? Cmd + R to do the internet recovery? Or can I get to my old recovery HD somehow?
Click to expand...

I see you have a 2011 MBP, so you have Lion Recovery in the EFI (firmware), so yes, you can just cmd-r to get to it and install from there. Make sure you do not format with disk utility when doing this... just do the install only.
 
fingleburt said:
Hi,

I've tried my best to read through this big thread to get the information I need. It seems the Crucial M4 SSD seems to be the drive alot of people seem to be going for. I was about to pull the trigger myself on this http://www.amazon.co.uk/Crucial-CT128M4SSD2-128GB-M4-SSD/dp/B004W2JKZI/ref=cm_cr_pr_product_top. But reading the reviewer's comment's especially for MBP user's has me a little concerned, enough so that it's making me hesitate on ordering. Comment's here: http://www.amazon.co.uk/product-reviews/B004W2JKZI/ref=cm_cr_dp_synop?ie=UTF8&showViewpoints=0&sortBy=bySubmissionDateDescending#R17ENS79FB6R09
Click to expand...

You're referring to the person that says it doesn't work with Lion? It does. I installed the 256GB version last weekend. Cloned my old HDD using CCC and have had no problems at all. I'm not sure what problems the person that posted that comment was having, but it works fine with Lion.
 
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When trying to determine which SSD I want, I go to AnandTech. And when asking if something fits my laptop I like to give the laptop specs, model at least. ;)
 
I'm also looking to get a SSD for my mbp. I got a Mid 2010 Macbook Pro. I definitely want a 256 GB SSD, its more than enough.

Been reading the last few pages, its seem's that everyone is going with either Samsung or Crucial, correct me if I'm wrong. Which would you guys recommend that I should get?

Also since I'm replacing my HDD what would be the best option to transfer everything that includes OS and programs. I definitely don't want to a clean install yet, I will more than likely wait till OSX Mountain Lion comes out then I'll do a clean install. Should I do a Carbon Copy method or should I use a transfer cable?

Let me know what are my options and recommendations.

Thanks!
 
Looking into M4's, anyone know what the difference between these two ? :s
CT128M4SSD2 & CT128M4SSD1 both made by Crucial and both the same price it seems.
 
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