Intel X25-M 80GB vs Crucial M225 64GB
- Thread starter PiKe
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Soldato
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I think the Intel excels the crucial but is obviously more expensive
Caporegime
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Real world, smeg all difference, though at Crucials original price it was a no brainer, at current prices(haven't checked INtel but Crucials have not far off doubled) I don't know if its even cheaper £/gb than the Intel, if not, get whatever you want.
THe Intel beats the crucial in SPECIFIC benchmarks, and no one can really tell you if that will massively effect your usage, in general, no it won't. I can't tell the difference between a singel 64gb crucial, and 2 in raid which almost perfectly scales and offers 4kb random writes at a very similar performance level to the Intel's, or far far closer, and yet I see no difference in real world use at all between raid and not.
Personally, mechanical hdd's are just slow, ssd's are SO much faster but once you reach a certain level of performance you simply cease to feel the difference.
Sure if you were unrar'ing stuff all day long the raid would should its sequential transfer difference easily, but I don't because downloading to an SSD isn't particularly smart, nor worthwhile. I keep mechanical hdd's for backup and a smaller one for downloading to, to prevent wear and tear on the SSD and to save space.
Most people seem to believe that trim, effects benchmarking performance a lot, but real world, makes fairly little difference if any. Which just goes to show that beyond a certain level of performance, everything else is just for benchmarking e-peen.
Get whatevers cheapest, or hold out for better ones or for prices to properly come down again. You can't really go wrong with a 64gb crucial for £95 as I got on launch, but at £150+, they are very expensive for the performance increase.
Keep in mind my crucials are faster than my old 64gb samsungs in raid(which were 100mb/s read, 80mb/s write and only 5/4mb's in the random 4kb read, as opposed to 15 on a crucial and maybe 30-40 on an Intel and 0.5mb/s on a mechanical). However, they aren't "that" much faster, noticeable but most of the best features, instant access and general quick feel to windows, was already there with the vastly slower Samsung drives.
Which leads me to believe, through experience, that mechanical hdd's suck, slower cheap ssd's in the 5-10mb's range for those random writes are very fast, but not uber, and anything from 15mb/s and up is uber and you'll rarely if every see any difference.
THe Intel beats the crucial in SPECIFIC benchmarks, and no one can really tell you if that will massively effect your usage, in general, no it won't. I can't tell the difference between a singel 64gb crucial, and 2 in raid which almost perfectly scales and offers 4kb random writes at a very similar performance level to the Intel's, or far far closer, and yet I see no difference in real world use at all between raid and not.
Personally, mechanical hdd's are just slow, ssd's are SO much faster but once you reach a certain level of performance you simply cease to feel the difference.
Sure if you were unrar'ing stuff all day long the raid would should its sequential transfer difference easily, but I don't because downloading to an SSD isn't particularly smart, nor worthwhile. I keep mechanical hdd's for backup and a smaller one for downloading to, to prevent wear and tear on the SSD and to save space.
Most people seem to believe that trim, effects benchmarking performance a lot, but real world, makes fairly little difference if any. Which just goes to show that beyond a certain level of performance, everything else is just for benchmarking e-peen.
Get whatevers cheapest, or hold out for better ones or for prices to properly come down again. You can't really go wrong with a 64gb crucial for £95 as I got on launch, but at £150+, they are very expensive for the performance increase.
Keep in mind my crucials are faster than my old 64gb samsungs in raid(which were 100mb/s read, 80mb/s write and only 5/4mb's in the random 4kb read, as opposed to 15 on a crucial and maybe 30-40 on an Intel and 0.5mb/s on a mechanical). However, they aren't "that" much faster, noticeable but most of the best features, instant access and general quick feel to windows, was already there with the vastly slower Samsung drives.
Which leads me to believe, through experience, that mechanical hdd's suck, slower cheap ssd's in the 5-10mb's range for those random writes are very fast, but not uber, and anything from 15mb/s and up is uber and you'll rarely if every see any difference.
The Intel is better at everything except sequential writes, which are largely inconsequential. The PCMark benchmarks, which are the closest you'll get to real world, show it adds up to the Intel being about 10% faster overall (remember the 60GB version is slower than the 120GB version)
Given current prices, go for the Intel. The extra space comes in handy too.
Given current prices, go for the Intel. The extra space comes in handy too.
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Caporegime
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After checking prices, I'd say the INtel is better value largely because you get around 20% more capacity for 10% higher price, meaning with Crucials at £173, its a poor buy, at £100, the Crucial is hugely hugely better in value and the incredibly easy choice to buy and I'd almost guarentee you'd see no real world difference.
I'd maybe consider looking around for a second hand older 64gb samsung though, as they went for £80-90 new all over and people ditching them might be giving great prices at £50 they'd give you a lot of the performance feel any top SSD gives for a tiny cost, and use one to tide you over till prices come back down.
I'd maybe consider looking around for a second hand older 64gb samsung though, as they went for £80-90 new all over and people ditching them might be giving great prices at £50 they'd give you a lot of the performance feel any top SSD gives for a tiny cost, and use one to tide you over till prices come back down.
I just wanted to say thanks for this thread.
I did a search before posting, and found it.
I've been iffing and umming about the Crucial 128gb for months.
I kept getting put off by the constant chat of a new firmware coming, and being destructive... so, I decided I'd wait until the firmware situation was sorted, and hopefully, the price dropped a bit too.
Of course, the price went in the opposite direction, and stayed there... so even though Trim is supported now, and I gather it all works well, the fact that it costs more now than it did months ago is frustrating, plus, it's rarely in stock.
So, I decided to look around and see if anything else would do. For whatever reason, I'd set my heart on getting the Crucial. So, a small amount of research led me to think the Intel X25 could do the job instead. I'm looking at the 80gb rather than the 128gb. Would be a bit of a squeeze, but so long as the SSDs don't lose performance when they get a bit full, that shouldn't matter. (I want to replace a 74gb raptor, and that's done the job fine, but with never more than 10gb free, so I'm not talking about filling one up to within a few hundred megs of capacity, but maybe with just say 4-5gb free)
Out of interest, anybody with an Intel X25 80gb that can tell me what the actual capacity is once formatted with NTFS?
So, the 80gb Intel is £100 cheaper here at OcUK, it's in stock, and from what I can gather, people are happy with them. Reliable, runs Trim in Windows 7. I have an old Asus P5B Mobo, but I gather the Sata ports on board will support Trim with the standard Windows 7 driver?
I do have two more questions if that's OK....
AHCI, I use it at the moment, I was planning on continuing to use it with the SSD. That's correct?
Also, backups. I currently use Acronis True Image Home v10.
I made the boot CD with it, and just load that once a week to make an image of my boot drive to another HDD.
If Acronis True Image Home v10 wouldn't work, what about v11 (or is it 2010)
Or anything else recommended that works with Windows 7 and an SSD?
I've got Windows 7 Pro here ready to install, would the built in backup software on that suffice? I don't want to buy a new SSD, install Windows 7, get it all up and running, to find I don't have a backup program that works. I like Acronis, I like that I can run it from a BootCD, and that it's quick, reliable, and provides impressive compression on a HDD image.
Many thanks for your advice,
Regards,
Vin.
I did a search before posting, and found it.
I've been iffing and umming about the Crucial 128gb for months.
I kept getting put off by the constant chat of a new firmware coming, and being destructive... so, I decided I'd wait until the firmware situation was sorted, and hopefully, the price dropped a bit too.
Of course, the price went in the opposite direction, and stayed there... so even though Trim is supported now, and I gather it all works well, the fact that it costs more now than it did months ago is frustrating, plus, it's rarely in stock.
So, I decided to look around and see if anything else would do. For whatever reason, I'd set my heart on getting the Crucial. So, a small amount of research led me to think the Intel X25 could do the job instead. I'm looking at the 80gb rather than the 128gb. Would be a bit of a squeeze, but so long as the SSDs don't lose performance when they get a bit full, that shouldn't matter. (I want to replace a 74gb raptor, and that's done the job fine, but with never more than 10gb free, so I'm not talking about filling one up to within a few hundred megs of capacity, but maybe with just say 4-5gb free)
Out of interest, anybody with an Intel X25 80gb that can tell me what the actual capacity is once formatted with NTFS?
So, the 80gb Intel is £100 cheaper here at OcUK, it's in stock, and from what I can gather, people are happy with them. Reliable, runs Trim in Windows 7. I have an old Asus P5B Mobo, but I gather the Sata ports on board will support Trim with the standard Windows 7 driver?
I do have two more questions if that's OK....
AHCI, I use it at the moment, I was planning on continuing to use it with the SSD. That's correct?
Also, backups. I currently use Acronis True Image Home v10.
I made the boot CD with it, and just load that once a week to make an image of my boot drive to another HDD.
If Acronis True Image Home v10 wouldn't work, what about v11 (or is it 2010)
Or anything else recommended that works with Windows 7 and an SSD?
I've got Windows 7 Pro here ready to install, would the built in backup software on that suffice? I don't want to buy a new SSD, install Windows 7, get it all up and running, to find I don't have a backup program that works. I like Acronis, I like that I can run it from a BootCD, and that it's quick, reliable, and provides impressive compression on a HDD image.
Many thanks for your advice,
Regards,
Vin.
Thanks for getting back to me.
Nice to know.
My current Raptor gives me 69.2gb, so basically the Intel drive would give me an extra 5gb.
I was really hoping for the extra capacity of the Crucial, but for the sake of £100 saving, and the fact it's in stock, I am seriously considering the Intel now... the slower write speed put me off at first, but I guess that's not so important at the end of the day, and it's still going to be way quicker than what I have now.
Cheers,
Vin.
Slightly OT, but it is to do with SSDs.....
Do any of you use Acronis True Image Home 2010 back-up and recovery?
I think I'm going to bite the bullet and go for the Intel 80gb drive today, but I just noticed that a competitor is selling the above software for £18, this week only.
As I said above, I have v10, but don't think this will work with Windows 7, and not sure about SSD.
So can anybody confirm that Acronis True Image Home 2010 definitely works with Windows 7 on a Solid State Drive?
I don't want to buy it if it isn't going to work, but wouldn't want to miss out if it does!
Thanks again for your replies,
Vin.
Do any of you use Acronis True Image Home 2010 back-up and recovery?
I think I'm going to bite the bullet and go for the Intel 80gb drive today, but I just noticed that a competitor is selling the above software for £18, this week only.
As I said above, I have v10, but don't think this will work with Windows 7, and not sure about SSD.
So can anybody confirm that Acronis True Image Home 2010 definitely works with Windows 7 on a Solid State Drive?
I don't want to buy it if it isn't going to work, but wouldn't want to miss out if it does!
Thanks again for your replies,
Vin.
Sure, I do that now.
I only use my Acronis True Image 10 from a boot disk, however, it's also handy to leave installed, in case I want to extract files from the backup.
Generally, once a week I boot Acronis 10 from the bootcd, simple, easy, quick, and works.
When I come to install Windows 7 on the SSD, what I hoped to do, to save time, is backup my Vista install, same as usual, install the SSD and Windows 7 onto it, and then use Acronis to extract those files that I want from the backup to the SSD.
So sure, I would generally only use the boot disk, but it's nice to have the option to load the main program sometimes... also if you delete something by mistake, can just restore the single file(s) without needing to do a full restore.
I just had a chat with an Acronis Customer Services Agent using their online chat system, and he told me that True Image 10 is not Windows 7 compatible, and that I'd need 2010... so I guess that answers that, may as well pick it up for £17 while I can I guess.
Thanks for your reply anyway though, always appreciated,
Vin.
Thanks, I was hoping my old version would suffice, but I guess I'll have to upgrade.
Funny thing is, I thought Windows 7 was meant to be compatible with Vista stuff, I've heard from other people that their Nero 9 doesn't work properly in Windows 7... but that's for another thread. I won't know myself, until I try it for myself...
So thanks again,
Cheers.
EDIT: Just ordered the Intel 80gb SSD, looking forward to trying these things out now, after reading so much about them
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So, the Intel drive has just arrived. (Gotta love OcUK prompt delivery, I even loved that the courier tracking page listed approx what time he'd be here... and was)
Anyway....
Just stuck it in temporarily, using bluetack!
Will just do that until I've sorted it, installed Windows, and moved important files from my Raptor over to the SSD, and then the SSD can take the place of the Raptor.
Despite the box saying it was packed on 26th December '09, it appears to have an older firmware installed.
I've not even got as far as partitioning it yet... just literally connected it up, and booted into my Windows install on my Raptor drive, downloaded and installed the toolbox, and it shows my firmware as being 2CV102HA, whereas I believe the latest one is 2CV201HD. From the info on the site, it looks as though the HA firmware IS the Trim firmware, but the HD firmware has some enhancements, that it doesn't actually list.*
Oh well, I guess I may as well flash the firmware first, and then go to work installing Windows 7 on it.
Looking forward to trying this out
Vin.
EDIT: *
This firmware revision has several continuous improvement optimizations intended to provide the best possible user experience with the Intel SSD.
Anyway....
Just stuck it in temporarily, using bluetack!
Will just do that until I've sorted it, installed Windows, and moved important files from my Raptor over to the SSD, and then the SSD can take the place of the Raptor.
Despite the box saying it was packed on 26th December '09, it appears to have an older firmware installed.
I've not even got as far as partitioning it yet... just literally connected it up, and booted into my Windows install on my Raptor drive, downloaded and installed the toolbox, and it shows my firmware as being 2CV102HA, whereas I believe the latest one is 2CV201HD. From the info on the site, it looks as though the HA firmware IS the Trim firmware, but the HD firmware has some enhancements, that it doesn't actually list.*
Oh well, I guess I may as well flash the firmware first, and then go to work installing Windows 7 on it.
Looking forward to trying this out
Vin.
EDIT: *
This firmware revision has several continuous improvement optimizations intended to provide the best possible user experience with the Intel SSD.
Last edited:
So, the Intel drive has just arrived. (Gotta love OcUK prompt delivery, I even loved that the courier tracking page listed approx what time he'd be here... and was)
Anyway....
Just stuck it in temporarily, using bluetack!
Will just do that until I've sorted it, installed Windows, and moved important files from my Raptor over to the SSD, and then the SSD can take the place of the Raptor.
Despite the box saying it was packed on 26th December '09, it appears to have an older firmware installed.
I've not even got as far as partitioning it yet... just literally connected it up, and booted into my Windows install on my Raptor drive, downloaded and installed the toolbox, and it shows my firmware as being 2CV102HA, whereas I believe the latest one is 2CV201HD. From the info on the site, it looks as though the HA firmware IS the Trim firmware, but the HD firmware has some enhancements, that it doesn't actually list.*
Oh well, I guess I may as well flash the firmware first, and then go to work installing Windows 7 on it.
Looking forward to trying this out
Vin.
EDIT: *
This firmware revision has several continuous improvement optimizations intended to provide the best possible user experience with the Intel SSD.
excellent, just got mine too, mine has a pic date of 17.11.09 it had firmware 2cv102hd on, i connected it to my work pc and updated the firmware from intel's site now showing 2cv102hd hopefully thats the most recent, will get it installed later this evening