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Which SSD .. intel or owc?

jetjaguar

jetjaguar

macrumors 68040
Original poster
well im pretty sure i will be getting a SSD in my mbp .. the question is which one? The choices are either an OWC 120gb or an Intel 160gb?
Price difference is about 100 dollars .. owc is like 310 or something and the intel is around 414 .. trying to decide if 40gb is worth 100 dollars ? which one would u guys choose?
 
I bought the OWC. They have great customer service nearly 24/7. Not for the bloke, but they are made at OWC obviously from imported parts so their techs KNOW about them in good detail. Therefore, IMHO the 3 year warranty means something from them. Also salesmen are NOT on commission.

Did you see their RAM analysis under-tech support>benchmarks>memory test results>select Mac Model? Great read for me anyway.
 
I know before it's "2" lineup intel was spanking owc when it came to random read/writes. I think they're suppose to be par now if not a little skewed towards owc, and owc is cheaper per gb.

But the comparison isn't really fair, the intels are almost a year old and on the verge of a update in a couple months while the owc ssds got an update few months ago.
 
I'm a deviant. Intel gets my vote.

I considered the OWC very strongly. I really did. And in truth I am probably going to get some other things from them in the future - that FireWire portable drive that's clear, for example. But I passed on their SSD for a couple of reasons.

One, yes it's cheaper, but I have to pay for shipping and their rates were WAY outta whack. The Intel I got from Amazon, overnight shipped for $4, no tax. So while the OWC's base price is cheaper, in truth there really wasn't much price difference.

Second, I'm a big fan of "did it first". It's the reason I keep loyalty to companies like RIM and Palm when there are other upstarts who in some ways did things better. When I think "processor" I don't think AMD, I think Intel. When I think graphics card, I don't think Intel, I think nVidia. Because of Intel effectively pioneering the technology, I have a blind loyalty to wards them for it. They weren't the VERY first...but they were the first to produce a consumer grade product that performs like a business grade product.

Make your own decision though. I'm just adding the vote.
 
revelated said:
I'm a deviant. Intel gets my vote.

One, yes it's cheaper, but I have to pay for shipping and their rates were WAY outta whack. The Intel I got from Amazon, overnight shipped for $4, no tax. So while the OWC's base price is cheaper, in truth there really wasn't much price difference.

Make your own decision though. I'm just adding the vote.
Click to expand...

Just so everyone is clear on OWC shipping policy.

I called OWC and asked about shipping. They said over $200 is free. They shipped mine free on a 3 day basis with Fedex.
 
yea im leaning towards the OWC because i dont really feel like spending 414 dollars .. but the only thing is the size .. 120 vs 160 .. only 40gb but it gives more room even though i dont think i use more that 20gb
 
I have a OCZ Vertex 2 that I have been satisfied with. It has the same Sandforce controller that the OWC one uses. It also seems to perform a tad better than the OWC in benchmarks. This may be because the Vertex 2 is able to utilize special drivers which allow for faster writes than Sandforce lets OWC use.

Anyway, if you are leaning towards the OWC product, you could check out the Vertex 2 (or even the Agility 2 or Vertex LE models).
 
I've had both the OWC and the Intel, and as per my sig, I have decided to stay with the Intel.

The OWC didn't perform the way I wanted and the way I expected, especially in the random speeds. And for some reason it got slower over a period of 2 weeks. Maybe I just got a dud, but I ended up returning it and buying the Intel, which has been awesome since day one, so slow downs at all.
 
revelated said:
I'm a deviant. Intel gets my vote.

I considered the OWC very strongly. I really did. And in truth I am probably going to get some other things from them in the future - that FireWire portable drive that's clear, for example. But I passed on their SSD for a couple of reasons.

One, yes it's cheaper, but I have to pay for shipping and their rates were WAY outta whack. The Intel I got from Amazon, overnight shipped for $4, no tax. So while the OWC's base price is cheaper, in truth there really wasn't much price difference.

Second, I'm a big fan of "did it first". It's the reason I keep loyalty to companies like RIM and Palm when there are other upstarts who in some ways did things better. When I think "processor" I don't think AMD, I think Intel. When I think graphics card, I don't think Intel, I think nVidia. Because of Intel effectively pioneering the technology, I have a blind loyalty to wards them for it. They weren't the VERY first...but they were the first to produce a consumer grade product that performs like a business grade product.

Make your own decision though. I'm just adding the vote.
Click to expand...
If brand names are what you're after, you can get a Corsair Force SSD. Intel doesn't normally involve itself in memory technology, but Corsair has been producing RAM forever.

When shopping for an SSD, brand names should not be a big part of your consideration. The memory controller is the determining factor for an SSDs performance.

The OWC SSD has a Sandforce controller, just like the OCZ Vertex 2 and the Corsair Force. All three drives exhibit similar performance across the board. The only major differences are the regularity of firmware updates and the warranties.
 
I would recommend the OCZ with the Sandforce controller. I would recommend purchasing it through a trusted website like Amazon. In case there's an issue, it's easy dealing with it through them.
 
As an Amazon Associate, MacRumors earns a commission from qualifying purchases made through links in this post.
Tmacfan4321 said:
When shopping for an SSD, brand names should not be a big part of your consideration. The memory controller is the determining factor for an SSDs performance.
Click to expand...

Here's what you missed. Is a laymen user going to notice a 2 second difference in boot time? Likely not. Looking at the numbers side by side it's clear that Intel is right there with the higher rated models, but the one consistent thing I read is that Intel holds true as the most reliable of them all. Now whether that's true or not, I don't know. I also don't care. The SSD in my MacBook does not hold anything critical; all of it is on an external drive. I have one VM running which I use for work, and it comes from a master copy that can be recreated at will. So data loss is a moot point in any event. The speed with the Intel is improved tremendously over a platter, and I would submit that my experience would hold similarly true for the majority of users.

I stick by my vote; but others can choose what they will.
 
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