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SSD Buying Guide

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i seen on amazon they have 256 ssd by crucial for 220 with the transfer data cable,is that a good deal and does anyone here have/recommend crucial??
 
Wicked1 said:
What is the risk of installing an SSD into a 2012 13" MBP and not using TRIM support of some sort of utility? Will the drive eventually fail or just fill up?
I have not heard of anyone in the Mac world not using it and having trouble later on?
Just curious in case I missed something, this is not to state your info is incorrect?....
Click to expand...
First, it is TRIM, not Trip. The lack of enabling TRIM itself will not be a direct cause of drive failure or "filing up." SSD drive can fail, but not directly due to using or not using TRIM, with, perhaps, the exception of a drive that is not compatible. User error is the main cause of a drive filing up, or a rampant process writing tons of log files, etc.
Trim just ensures that the performance of the SSD is maintained over time. In the same way, most drives have what is called Garbage Collection built into the firmware to address that issue, but the effectiveness of GC can vary according to the manufacturer. Some drives do not work well with Trim enabled, notably the OWC brand, which OWC says does not need Trim to maintain performance.
Do some searching on how TRIM functions if you are interested, but be warned, it is rather technical.
The whole SSD technology is just now catching on, or settling down. We are still in early days, with firmware and the technology improving every year.
There is a lot of info in this thread, with reports of drives working with TRIM enabled, etc. Choosing a drive, and deciding whether or not to enable TRIM can be confusing, but I think your worries (drive failure and filing up) can be ignored.
 
cubedweller said:
information overload. I'm trying to buy a new ssd for my '10 mbp (6,2). I'm leaning toward the samsung 840 pro 256gb. I know i'm limited to sata ii, but i'm having difficulty finding 830 drives, and the standard 840 doesn't seem compelling. Anyone have experience with this drive? My only concern is that it hasn't been on the market very long. My number one concern is reliability. It can't fail while i'm taking an exam.
Click to expand...

840 pro ftw!
 
amit715 said:
i seen on amazon they have 256 ssd by crucial for 220 with the transfer data cable,is that a good deal and does anyone here have/recommend crucial??
Click to expand...

You can get a 250GB Samsung 840 for $164 from B&H and for $18 OWC USB 3 enclosure also from B&H... A better deal, cheaper overall, and you have a useful USB3 external enclosure that I can put your HDD in rather than a transfer cable that you may never use again;)

Samsung 250GB 840 Series 2.5" Solid State Drive (SSD)

OWC / Other World Computing Express 2.5" USB 3.0 Hard Drive Enclosure (Silver)
 
For an early 2011 MBP 13, which one is the better, more reliabe, more stable, easier to use choice? Vertex 4, the Samsung 830 series or the Vertex 3 is an enough good choice too?
 
I am curious why the OWC Mercury 6Gs don't get more consideration. They seem very fast and are cheaper than the Samsung 840 Pros.
 
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Ronniegyaszi said:
For an early 2011 MBP 13, which one is the better, more reliabe, more stable, easier to use choice? Vertex 4, the Samsung 830 series or the Vertex 3 is an enough good choice too?
Click to expand...

I'd say the vertex 4. Best performance. Reliable as far as I've heard and there is an easy tool to update it on your mac
 
dnadrifter said:
I am curious why the OWC Mercury 6Gs don't get more consideration. They seem very fast and are cheaper than the Samsung 840 Pros.
Click to expand...

Because they're Sandforce-based and handle ~33% fewer IOPS. Not to mention the 512GB Samsung 840 Pro is only $20 more than the comparable OWC drive.
 
xxjudgmentxx said:
Because they're Sandforce-based and handle ~33% fewer IOPS. Not to mention the 512GB Samsung 840 Pro is only $20 more than the comparable OWC drive.
Click to expand...

So what is deal with sand force. I actually thought that was a good thing.

How important is iops compared to read and write speed?

Sorry for the remedial questions. I was considering an 830 but it seems they r out of stock a lot of places.
 
dnadrifter said:
So what is deal with sand force. I actually thought that was a good thing.

How important is iops compared to read and write speed?

Sorry for the remedial questions. I was considering an 830 but it seems they r out of stock a lot of places.
Click to expand...

Sandforce has been around for quite some time and has proven to my knowledge to simply be very unreliable. IOPS are the number of input and output per seconds so it has an effect on the speed of the SSD.
 
dnadrifter said:
So what is deal with sand force. I actually thought that was a good thing.

How important is iops compared to read and write speed?

Sorry for the remedial questions. I was considering an 830 but it seems they r out of stock a lot of places.
Click to expand...

830 stock is being phased out because the newer 840 series was just released recently. 830 series still benchmarks among the very best SSDs right now. Few can match it.
 
jvpython said:
Sandforce has been around for quite some time and has proven to my knowledge to simply be very unreliable. IOPS are the number of input and output per seconds so it has an effect on the speed of the SSD.
Click to expand...
Did you really mean that "unreliable"?
Irregardless of the corporation's record, I must admit Intel has some very competent engineers, and they use Sandforce controllers in their SSD products.
As far as I know their SSDs have a very good reputation for reliability, maybe the best on the market. How does that make the Sandforce "unreliable"?:confused:
The conclusion I have reached from info in this thread, etc., is that the Sandforce drives vary somewhat depending on the firmware, but in general, due to the way they compress data when writing, is that certain benchmarks that use compressed data show slow results for Sandforce drives. The idea is that for use with a large number of large compressed files, video files etc. a non-Sandforce drive will be faster, but for ordinary use the Sandforce drives are really fast enough. That has been my personal experience (admitted very little), in any case.
 
davidlv said:
Did you really mean that "unreliable"?
Irregardless of the corporation's record, I must admit Intel has some very competent engineers, and they use Sandforce controllers in their SSD products.
As far as I know their SSDs have a very good reputation for reliability, maybe the best on the market. How does that make the Sandforce "unreliable"?:confused:
Click to expand...

Anandtech's review of the Intel 520 series was sub-titled Cherryville Brings Reliability to SandForce. In the article's first few paragraphs the author goes on to say "Intel's strenuous validation will eventually make SandForce's drives better for everyone, but for now the Cherryville firmware remains exclusive," and "This is an important distinction because although Cherryville performs very similarly to other SF-2281 drives, it should be more reliable."

There's clearly the implication that prior to Cherryville, SandForce had reliability difficulties.
 
jvpython said:
Sandforce has been around for quite some time and has proven to my knowledge to simply be very unreliable. IOPS are the number of input and output per seconds so it has an effect on the speed of the SSD.
Click to expand...

IOPS is just another way to report transfer speeds (just like MB/s). You can translate IOPS to MB/s and vice versa as MB/s is just IO operations per second multiplied by the transfer size. E.g:

100K IOPS 4KB random write would translate to 409.6MB/s [(100,000*4096)/10^6]

vong said:
Can anyone help me out? I've tried googling for result but I only got results for 2008 MBP. I have a 2010 MBP model and planning on getting an SSD; Intel 520 Series Cherryville SSDSC2CW240A3K5 2.5" 240GB to be exact. Would this work on my 2010 MBP? Thanks
Click to expand...

I really don't see the point in buying Intel SSD 520. It's overpriced for what you get. Samsung SSD 840 is a good option if you want to save $ but Plextor M5P is great if you want something a bit faster and with better warranty.
 
I haven't even opened up my new 17" since just turning it on after getting it. Still working on the older MBP and deciding which SSD and RAM to order for the upgrade.

Because of the service and testing (reliability) I'm leaning towards OWC RAM. From their information I understand the 1600 works in the 2011 late model so will go with 16gb.

As for the SSD... thought I'd go with their Mercury Extreme 6G, but am thinking recently of the Samsung 830. The Samsung is a bit cheaper and has good user feedback (for some reason [price?] OWC SSDs are not that popular), not sure if its 'better'?

Also not sure if I will go with a 500GB or 250GB SSD. If I get the 500GB I may just keep the DVD in place for those times I watch a DVD which I understand will not work in an external inclosure, but the 250GB would save some cash and I'd move the 750GB HD over to the optical bay and have enough storage.
 
elmarjazz said:
I haven't even opened up my new 17" since just turning it on after getting it. Still working on the older MBP and deciding which SSD and RAM to order for the upgrade.

Because of the service and testing (reliability) I'm leaning towards OWC RAM. From their information I understand the 1600 works in the 2011 late model so will go with 16gb.

As for the SSD... thought I'd go with their Mercury Extreme 6G, but am thinking recently of the Samsung 830. The Samsung is a bit cheaper and has good user feedback (for some reason [price?] OWC SSDs are not that popular), not sure if its 'better'?

Also not sure if I will go with a 500GB or 250GB SSD. If I get the 500GB I may just keep the DVD in place for those times I watch a DVD which I understand will not work in an external inclosure, but the 250GB would save some cash and I'd move the 750GB HD over to the optical bay and have enough storage.
Click to expand...

Why not jump on your 17" and enjoy that glorious screen in the meanwhile?

I choose 1333mhz 16 gb GSkill ram from Newegg in July when I bought my machine. Not a single problem with it. Ram either works right away or it doesn't.

I also got a then steal of a deal on a 512 gb Crucial M4 off of flea bay for $380. Knock on wood, no issues with that, either.

Sign up for the newegg daily deal email and keep an eye on it for specials. Find the best deal you can on the Sammy 830/840/840pro, Crucial M4, or Vertex 4, can't really go wrong with any of these drives.

Mind if I ask if you got the glossy or AG screen? LOVE the contrast on my glossy, thankfully reflections are not a problem where I use it.

Congrats on your (big) purchase!

BTW, good idea to jump on this thread to ask for advice; HH is our resident SSD demigod.
 
Thanks for the encouragement. Actually I have a 17" AG 2010 already, and got the last 'best' of the 17" while I could. Yes, its also a AG screen which I've had on my MacBooks since forever. Just too much going on the home front and with the old MBP still kicking getting the upgrades together has been difficult and not a priority.

At this time I'm leaning towards a Samsung 840 Pro, and I'll pick up the RAM and a data-doubler and a couple 34 express port adapters I've been thinking about.
 
Been researching putting a SSD into my early 2011 MBP 13". I read about some problems with the SATA connectors not being 6gb. I have included some info from my system. So am I reading this correct that the bay that holds my DVD is only a 3gb? Will that change what I need to buy in terms of my SSD?


Intel 6 Series Chipset:

Vendor: Intel
Product: 6 Series Chipset
Link Speed: 6 Gigabit
Negotiated Link Speed: 3 Gigabit
Description: AHCI Version 1.30 Supported

SAMSUNG HM100UI:

Capacity: 1 TB (1,000,204,886,016 bytes)
Model: SAMSUNG HM100UI
Revision: 2AM10001
Serial Number: S2GHJ9DB109214
Native Command Queuing: Yes
Queue Depth: 32
Removable Media: No
Detachable Drive: No
BSD Name: disk0
Rotational Rate: 5400
Medium Type: Rotational
Partition Map Type: GPT (GUID Partition Table)
S.M.A.R.T. status: Verified
Volumes:
disk0s1:
Capacity: 209.7 MB (209,715,200 bytes)
BSD Name: disk0s1
Content: EFI
Macintosh HD:
Capacity: 999.35 GB (999,345,127,424 bytes)
Available: 441.14 GB (441,135,554,560 bytes)
Writable: Yes
File System: Journaled HFS+
BSD Name: disk0s2
Mount Point: /
Content: Apple_HFS
Volume UUID: D1ECEE1A-0A8D-38AE-846E-3F543258E493
Recovery HD:
Capacity: 650 MB (650,002,432 bytes)
BSD Name: disk0s3
Content: Apple_Boot
Volume UUID: 8C632633-3D6C-3F2A-B7DE-4A34EB8C2513


Intel 6 Series Chipset:

Vendor: Intel
Product: 6 Series Chipset
Link Speed: 3 Gigabit
Negotiated Link Speed: 1.5 Gigabit
Description: AHCI Version 1.30 Supported

MAT****ADVD-R UJ-898:

Model: MAT****ADVD-R UJ-898
Revision: HE13
Serial Number: UL21 020AWD
Native Command Queuing: No
Detachable Drive: No
Power Off: Yes
Async Notification: No
 
maw4bc said:
Been researching putting a SSD into my early 2011 MBP 13". I read about some problems with the SATA connectors not being 6gb. I have included some info from my system. So am I reading this correct that the bay that holds my DVD is only a 3gb? Will that change what I need to buy in terms of my SSD?


Intel 6 Series Chipset:

Vendor: Intel
Product: 6 Series Chipset
Link Speed: 6 Gigabit
Negotiated Link Speed: 3 Gigabit
Description: AHCI Version 1.30 Supported

SAMSUNG HM100UI:

Capacity: 1 TB (1,000,204,886,016 bytes)
Model: SAMSUNG HM100UI
Revision: 2AM10001
Serial Number: S2GHJ9DB109214
Native Command Queuing: Yes
Queue Depth: 32
Removable Media: No
Detachable Drive: No
BSD Name: disk0
Rotational Rate: 5400
Medium Type: Rotational
Partition Map Type: GPT (GUID Partition Table)
S.M.A.R.T. status: Verified
Volumes:
disk0s1:
Capacity: 209.7 MB (209,715,200 bytes)
BSD Name: disk0s1
Content: EFI
Macintosh HD:
Capacity: 999.35 GB (999,345,127,424 bytes)
Available: 441.14 GB (441,135,554,560 bytes)
Writable: Yes
File System: Journaled HFS+
BSD Name: disk0s2
Mount Point: /
Content: Apple_HFS
Volume UUID: D1ECEE1A-0A8D-38AE-846E-3F543258E493
Recovery HD:
Capacity: 650 MB (650,002,432 bytes)
BSD Name: disk0s3
Content: Apple_Boot
Volume UUID: 8C632633-3D6C-3F2A-B7DE-4A34EB8C2513


Intel 6 Series Chipset:

Vendor: Intel
Product: 6 Series Chipset
Link Speed: 3 Gigabit
Negotiated Link Speed: 1.5 Gigabit
Description: AHCI Version 1.30 Supported

MAT****ADVD-R UJ-898:

Model: MAT****ADVD-R UJ-898
Revision: HE13
Serial Number: UL21 020AWD
Native Command Queuing: No
Detachable Drive: No
Power Off: Yes
Async Notification: No
Click to expand...
When you install an SSD, put it in the HD bay, and put your HD in the optical bay with a DataDoubler or the like. No HD can saturate a 3Gigabit interface anyway, so despite the interface, the HD should function well in the optibay.
The SSD will respond better in the HD bay too.
 
davidlv said:
When you install an SSD, put it in the HD bay, and put your HD in the optical bay with a DataDoubler or the like. No HD can saturate a 3Gigabit interface anyway, so despite the interface, the HD should function well in the optibay.
The SSD will respond better in the HD bay too.
Click to expand...

My understanding is that the SSD in the main drive position is the way to go. The question is about a HD drive in the optical bay. I know many have put their HD in the optical bay, but the main drive bay has anti-shock (how Apple has this working I don't know) and the optical bay does not. How does this effect the HD in the optical bay? Is it something to be cautious about in use? Does the provided Apple 750gb HD (late 2011) have anti-shock (as some drive do) built in so I don't need to worry?

Thanks
 
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