What SSD

[fdrotary]

I am looking into getting a SSD very shortly, I have read reviews, I have read posts, I have tried to do a lot of research before posting a repetitive thread. From what I have read Intel = Reliable and I was looking at their newer 320 SSD. When I read reviews though it seems like the OWC Mercury blew it out of the water in terms of speed. However it had some issues at one point in time. I like the logic behind Sandforce controllers (writing less information) that I read on Anandtech because I assume the power consumption being lower = better battery life. So my question is, have the OWC's become reliable with more firmware updates w/o much slowdown? I have a 2010 MBP so Sata 6 is kinda pointless because by the time I upgrade prices will have dropped so I will be able to just get a different hard drive for the new computer. However if the new hard drives give the best reliability and speed I will pay more for Sata 6 although I can't use it. I am looking for a hard drive in the 240 - 320gb range.

Also TRIM support would be nice I know Tiger will probably address this but I will be doing the "bypass" in snow leopard. Are only certain SSD's compatible with the back door way to get trim on Snow Leopard?

 

[Weaselboy]

I am looking into getting a SSD very shortly, I have read reviews, I have read posts, I have tried to do a lot of research before posting a repetitive thread. From what I have read Intel = Reliable and I was looking at their newer 320 SSD. When I read reviews though it seems like the OWC Mercury blew it out of the water in terms of speed. However it had some issues at one point in time. I like the logic behind Sandforce controllers (writing less information) that I read on Anandtech because I assume the power consumption being lower = better battery life. So my question is, have the OWC's become reliable with more firmware updates w/o much slowdown? I have a 2010 MBP so Sata 6 is kinda pointless because by the time I upgrade prices will have dropped so I will be able to just get a different hard drive for the new computer. However if the new hard drives give the best reliability and speed I will pay more for Sata 6 although I can't use it. I am looking for a hard drive in the 240 - 320gb range.

Also TRIM support would be nice I know Tiger will probably address this but I will be doing the "bypass" in snow leopard. Are only certain SSD's compatible with the back door way to get trim on Snow Leopard?

Don't drive yourself nuts obsessing over speed tests. Any newer drive it going to be far faster that the HDD you have and you will notice little to no difference among different SSD in day to day normal usage. But the drive you think will be reliable in your machine from a company that has good and reliable hardware and support.

There is a whole thread here on the OWC firmware issue. I think the jury is still out if this latest firmware solves all the problems.

For TRIM, just look in the drive specs and it will say something like "supports TRIM command."