yeah it's pretty easy to get msata ssd's in lyp these days.

let's just say we have one more option to choose from. retail shops are vital to us consumers, because there are still a lot of important values, other than pricing, in them; and they need sustainability. frankly i still prefer to go to retail shops to have a look and feel of what i am gonna purchase, instead of looking at pictures and imagine only.

msata and 2.5" ssd's these days are similar, except that 2.5" are relatively cheaper and we can have more choices in terms of brands. performance wise, unless you wanna invest on enthusiast 2.5" options, they are similar for common usage.

in much simpler terms, imo the choices depend on usage, the number of ports available in the laptop, and how you wanna have it set up.

1. if the laptop has limited sata ports (for instance a dell xps.15 has 1x 2.5" sata port, and 1x msata port; total of 2 ports), you might wanna have 1x msata ssd to run the OS and apps, and 1x 2.5" hdd for data storage (there is no msata form factor for hdd).
2. if the laptop has more sata ports (for instance alienware 17 has 3x 2.5" sata port, and 1x msata port; total of 4 ports), then you have more options.

yeah it's sad to see retail shops are getting smaller these days. they actually do sell stuff at very competitive pricing. (and surprisingly you can find plenty amount of stuff not found in their online price lists)

hehe sorry for using your message to highlight something else.

no, sandisk extreme ii uses marvell controller, same as crucial m500. the one in neutron gtx is lamd.

yeah the lamd controller is probably the best controller we can have in consumer ssd's to provide much better consistency (because it's developed by a company that mainly focus on enterprise market). however consistency alone is not the only factor that dictates everything imo.

also seagate's implementation is somewhat different from the one in neutron gtx. (seagate push for more performance than consistency, while corsair focus on the strength of lamd controller, consistency)

sorry but i am really not an expert in these controllers. to me i can only see the differences in features and outcomes, which vary because of different implementations by manufacturers, that might change in time due to firmware updates. to me the obvious differences between the two are adoption rate and focus:
1. marvell controller is a proven stable one due to much higher adoptions by manufacturers, while lamd is a bit dated with less adoption. (which doesn't mean it's not good)
2. due to its enterprise origin, lamd is more focused on data read/write consistency. this also means less features. (which might be meaningless to you depending on how you use the drive)

as for the speed, any decent ssd have great speed if you connect it to the right sata port. since your concerns are more about stability and endurance of a drive, you can narrow down to those with mlc chip, larger capacity, and longer warranty. the tbw (terabytes written) allowed for consumer ssd is kind of a standard these days, i.e. 72tb within the 3-year warranty period.

edit: here's one of the references that can give you an idea on endurance, http://techreport.com/review/26058/the-ssd...ion-after-600tb

This post has been edited by horns: May 10 2014, 09:55 AM

i know budget is always the constraint, but i really suggest you take up 240gb or more. since you intend to use it for 'very long time', it's better imo to invest a little bit more. there is nothing wrong about 120gb drives, except for the fact that you tend to get lower ends of everything with that capacity. if i referred to your reference, 240gb extreme ii is actually not bad.

furthermore, if it's just an OS-only drive, 120gb is fine. if you put apps/games in it too, that limited capacity will be a problem later on.

edit: i forgot to mention that the price difference between the drives are because sandisk extreme ii is for enthusiasts and it has 5-year warranty with 80tbw. samsung evo on the other hand is for mainstream and has a 3-year warranty.

This post has been edited by horns: May 10 2014, 12:28 PM

ok got it. hehe financial constraints is always the hardest part

i keep forgetting to post this. this is for those who are using samsung ssd's. after you have optimized the drives using samsung magician (you should run it and go through all the pages at least once), there is actually no need to run it anymore, unless you need it again. in my case due to uac in w8.1, samsung magician will cause a prompt on every windows start-up. DO NOT disable UAC. there are several ways to make the prompt disappear:

1. if you do not want it to run when windows starts up, just remove the magician shortcut from the startup folder, either at C:\Users\%userprofile%\AppData\Roaming\Microsoft\Windows\Start Menu\Programs\Startup or C:\ProgramData\Microsoft\Windows\Start Menu\Programs\Startup.

2. if you want it to run automatically on every windows start up without seeing the prompt, just press ctrl+shift+esc key combo to call out task manager, navigate to startup tab, scroll down and find samsung magician. select and right click on it to choose properties. from the properties window, click on the compatibility tab, and check the option, 'run this program as an administrator', followed by clicking on the ok button.

it should be 3x the m.2 10gbps, in theory. however, there is none of m.2 ssd's in the market today can run at that speed. yet.

this is kind of futuristic, but they are good news

http://www.techspot.com/news/56868-ssd-mid...peed-boost.html

http://www.neowin.net/news/ssd-breakthroug...n-on-old-drives

http://techon.nikkeibp.co.jp/english/NEWS_...0140522/353388/

this is the 4-lane samsung xp941 128gb, a pci-e m.2 ssd that has the lowest scores of everything compared to its bigger brothers (256gb, 512gb), on asrock z97 extreme6.



tbh, it has no effect on common usage.

nah i don't think ssd manufacturers will deliver this so soon. if they are willing to do so, then it's a great news.

however, with tlc flash to become mainstream ssd's (e.g. marvell's recent announcement about a new controller for tlc flash), replacing mlc flash gradually, this technology might be a good option to help prolong flash lifespan further.

yeah the 4k read is not that good looking. if you looked at benchmarks of 256gb and 512gb, even raid0 of 2x 512gb, their 4k are almost the same.

the lifespan of ssd's depends on how you set your system up, and how you use and maintain it. if set up and use it properly it can last for more than that. the only problem is that not many practice it right.

i had a friend told me ssd sucked. after almost a year of usage it's left with 9% health. i asked him what he did usually. he told me, 'as usual. normal web browsing; watching youtube; document editing, etc.' the last one of the etc. is 'defrag it once a month'.

raid0 runs faster. cstkl1 posted a video about this (the second post of the previous page).

This post has been edited by horns: Jun 2 2014, 03:28 PM

exactly :/ all he needs to do is just leave the machine alone for an hour or two during weekends. (with his usage he doesn't even need to leave the machine that long)

if you're w8/8.x it's ok to do that, since these versions of windows already can differentiate which is ssd and which is hdd, and do the right job to each of them (for ssd's it's the issuance of trim command; for hdd it's defrag)

however for w7, it's best to turn the scheduler off.

you can check the total host writes and/or total nand writes (depending on ssd brand) using crystal diskinfo and compare it to the advertised tbw of that ssd, (terabytes written; usually 72tb). this is just to get some rough ideas of your ssd usage.

hehe right

for common usage, with minor adjustments of use (e.g. ramdisk for user temp folders, web caches; hdd for downloads and storage), even consumer ssd's will likely last you for a few years. (assuming other parts of the ssd still work fine, that is)

electronics never work well with brute force

hehe.. well this thread is quiet these days. hopefully some jokes can lighten it up abit

there are good stuff revealed at computex 2014. for ssd's, the most interesting to me are:
1. plextor m6pro reaches 5.9GB/s with plexturbo;
2. sandisk extreme pro offers 10 year warranty;
3. samsung is putting tlc drives into enterprise market

unless you have/wanna use these intel technologies (rapid start and smart connect), they're kind of not relevant to your system based on the way you use ssd now.

the one that is more relevant is the intel rapid storage drivers.

i use plextor (m5pro, m5m). yes their current models are not top of the line in terms of performance, but they're actually not bad. things will change when m6pro is available.

like marfccy said, plextor is well established. liteon is the oem version of plextor. you can find liteon ssd's in many pre-built systems/laptops.

crucial produces decent ssd's. mx100 is mainstream/consumer centric offering from them, while m550 is for enthusiasts. (much like plextor m5s vs. m5pro; or 840 evo vs. 840 pro)

again, cheap is a good thing. (it just means the market has achieved high adoption for ssd now, and manufacturers have the volume big enough to bring the costs down) we hope for this to happen for a long time already (price drop), and it's happening now

it shouldn't be a problem, because you can just set the boot order in the bios and make your system boots windows on ssd only.

yeah i have them from different sources, and installed on different machines. never had an issue so far. (i didn't do the drop test hehe)