Intel 335, Samsung 840-pro, or Samsung 830 ?

[visitor]

Hello there,
After a long wait, my long longed for W520 is finally home, and I'm very glad I was able to still get one of these machines which suit my needs in a much better way than the newer W530. Mine has the 2860QM chip with the 1000 quadra graphics card in a 1920 screen.
My main use is editing video (standard DV only still) and converting to DVD mpeg2, which implies in regularly moving large amounts of data from one drive to another. In such workflow I find it sufficient to work with two SSDs of 240~256 GBs (when I'm off the computer, I can clear space by transferring the files already used out to a couple of external eSATA/usb3 HDs.

I had been using an external OCZ Enyo SSD which worked fine... for three months. So having read dozens of threads I have come to the decision of choosing the best performing SSDs from one of the top reliability-reputed brands which are Intel and Samsung.

I still have a chance of grabbing a Samsung 830 of very little failure rates following its couple-of-year user history, but now there is the new model 840-Pro (the non-pro model shows much lower writing times), and there is Intel's newest 335 model. I haven't totally discarded Intel's 520 but I've bumped against several threads mentioning some kind of failure or pausing issues, needing firmware fizes, etc.

With you guys's experience and wisdom, which of the three SSDs that I've narrowed to would likely offer me the best balance of reliability and performance, money not being a consideration ? And how perceivable would the difference be among them for the kind of work I do ?

Also I would welcome any comments on maxing out RAM with the 1600mhz Corsair Vengeance, if anyone has used it. It's my following plan after I recover from the SSDs investment. Meanwhile I'll get by with original 8 GBs.

Thanks for reading, and more thanks for any advice.

Visitor
W520, X201s, X60s (before: X31, T42, T23)

[visitor]

One thing about the Samsung 830 is its 7mm form factor which would produce a 2.5mm gap when replacing a regular 9.5mm HD in the W520's main bay.
I wonder how important this would be and if an adapter should really be necessary or else it could live with some tape fill-in or other material.

Visitor
W520, X201s, X60s (Before: X31, T42, T23)

[ansible212]

Both Samsungs are 7mm. They come with a spacer for use in laptops that take 9.5mm drives.

(I would go for the 840 Pro as it supports hardware encryption.)

[visitor]

ansible212, thanks for the tip. As far as performance alone, do you find the 840-pro much more appealing than the 830 so to justify the risk of spending for a Samsung equipment that is still not-proven in terms of reliability ? I would consider taking such risk if it means less time in finishing video tasks. I just don't quite understand benchmarks as to what they actually translate to in daily computing. OTOH if it all means gaining some 5 minutes in a 4 gb rendering I would then rather stick to a 830.

As to encryption, it is not a concern to me since I use the W520 solely as a desktop replacement, never take it away from home, while my x201s remains as the one with important data to protect.

Thanks again for advising.

Visitor
W520, X201s, X60s (Before: X31, T42, T23)

[ajkula66]

If I were buying a SSD "for keeps" I'd go with the 830.

Reliability trumps everything else when it comes to SSDs and myself.

My $0.02 only...

[visitor]

ajkula66, yes I did read the endurance history of the 830 and decided to pull the trigger for that since I could still find one. If I find another one I might get it for the ultrabaym unless I feel confident about the mSATA models and then might as well keep the optical drive.
Wish Samsung comes out with an mSATA model.
Cheers,

Visitor
W520, X201s, X60s ( Before: X31, T42, T23)

[jcvjcvjcvjcv]

Out of the three mentioned I would take the Intel. Afaik Samsung cuts corners everywhere. If it doesn't fail in a week or month or year, it will fail the day after the warranty lapsed, complete with your data.

[ajkula66]

Out of the three mentioned I would take the Intel. Afaik Samsung cuts corners everywhere. If it doesn't fail in a week or month or year, it will fail the day after the warranty lapsed, complete with your data.

I don't know...Samsung SSDs used to be of questionable value and performance some years ago, and Intel was king.

Nowadays it's a different story. I'm far less keen on Intels since they've stopped using their own controllers, and I'd trust Samsung 830 over any current Intel, key word here being "current"...my T43p sports the original X25-E SLC SSD and I wouldn't trade that for the world...

My $0.02 only...

[ThinkRob]

Nowadays it's a different story. I'm far less keen on Intels since they've stopped using their own controllers, and I'd trust Samsung 830 over any current Intel, key word here being "current"...my T43p sports the original X25-E SLC SSD and I wouldn't trade that for the world...

I'm partial to SLC drives too (you kinda really, really want them for your ZIL if you use ZFS), but I don't think you can discount Intel entirely. IIRC they do still use their own controllers for some of the drives; wasn't it mainly the "mainstream" (i.e. consumer) drives of theirs that they started using Sandforce controllers for?

And the firmware is supposed to be entirely theirs. SSD controllers are pretty sophisticated chips and it's not like everything's baked into the silicon itself, so I'd imagine the firmware can really make a difference. (Not that it necessarily *does* make a difference in this case...)

[Cigarguy]

I love SLC SSD but they are expensive and therefore cater to the enterprise market.

In the case of the Sandforce 22xx controllers, firmware was everything. It wasn't until about a year ago did Sandforce came out with a good stable firmware. Being an early adopter (because I was an idiot), I got an early model Sandforce 2281 controlled SSD which was prone to random and frequent BSOD. OCZ's reputation, being the first to come out with SSDs containing this controller, really suffered because of this and rightfully so. Before that OCZ's reputation was one of the best with the 12xx controllers. Intel waited until things stabilized then release their series of SSDs based on Sandforce controllers.

Intel and Samsung have the advantage as they are OEM for NAND chips and controllers. Samsung especially have really come on in this area. It is assumed that being the OEM, they should know what they are doing when it come to building the complete package (NAND+Controller+Firmware).

Again, when it comes to SSD, the maximum speed is not everything. Most people will never benefit from max benchmark speeds. Where SSD have the greatest speed advantage over HDD is the nearly instant seek and access time. If you must compare speed, the 4K r/w speed is what I'll typically look at as most OS and programs r/w a lot of 4Kish files. Of course a RAM drive, which operate at the speed of memory, is the holy grail.

[jcvjcvjcvjcv]

Well, Samsung often offers the cheapest products. Now that's either because they have cut costs in an efficient way or because they have cut quality. And from what I've seen so far from Samsung it's the latter. Their HDD's where nowhere to be seen when it came time for real-world use benchmarks, their S-PVA monitors had a gargantuam amount of input lag, the paint on their phones comes off in no time.

At this moment the only Samsung product I have is in a box. All the others failed: corrosion under the paint on a HDD frame, a videocard with Samsung RAM failed (Yes, it was the RAM), the Samsung monitor I still have in a box has massive inputlag, a half-working rotation sensor and one day out of the blue the DVI port didn't work anymore. When buying hardware, I avoid Samsung just like I avoid VIA.