M225 or X25-M?

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As topic suggests im stuck between these two SSD's, Size isnt an issue as long as its at least 64GB, as it will be used for Windows 7 OS and some programs. So obviously performance is my main concern.

I know the M225 is rated well after reading around on the forums, but elsewhere the X25 seems to get the best performance reviews.

Could someone also tell me what the difference between the X25-E and the X25-M is? i was guessing the E meant enterprise but im only basing this on the fact that its more expensive.

I'm thinking of getting this for xmas, but as the supply is short i dont expect price to come down much in the next month and a half. So the budget is around £100-150. Are these the right drives to be looking at?

Any advice much appreciated, thanks guys!
 
The M225 & X25M are both great drives. The X25M has the upper hand in performance, but in real world use I really don't think anyone would be able to distinguish between them. The key benefit of a SSD over a HDD is the almost non-existent seek time, and this is the main reason that using a SSD provides such a massive performance leap over an HDD. For this reason, any of the newer drives are a worthwhile buy and will mostly give similar performance in day-to-day use.

The X25E is aimed at enterprises like you say. It uses a more expensive configuration of flash memory which can deal with continuous small reads and writes better. For the average user there's no reason to go for this drive except for bragging rights.
 
Thanks for the response toastor! yea i'm trying to think of the future as well, i know its only a matter of time before the performance is upgraded. Is it really that non noticeable? in terms of performance i mean.
 
To rephrase Toastor's reply, the difference you would notice between the two drives you list is minute compared to the difference you will notice going from a HDD to an SSD.
 
I think SSD's are totally worth the cost, and personally at the current prices I would choose the 80GB Intel drive over the 64GB Crucial drive. The point I made about bragging rights was aimed squarely at the Intel 'E' range and other similar enterprise class drives. :)
 
ahhh ok, was just curious cause my mate who's pretty clued up said there wouldnt be any point unless i was using demanding programs, but i think it could be worth the investment. Or for an xmas present :P lol. Is it because they are faster and more reliable, or are there other reasons too?
 
He's right, but his argument could also be applied to almost any component upgrade. Most users will notice their system boots faster and is a good deal more responsive in general windows use when using an SSD as the boot drive. Is it needed? No. Is it nice? Yes. Is it worth it? That comes down to your budget.

Yes, SSD's are much faster, no they're not any more reliable, other reasons? Silent operation is a big plus in my book.

If you're unsure, perhaps go for one of the sub £100 Kingston models. They're not as fast as the others in terms of data transfer, but they still benefit from the ~0.15ms seek times.
 
theoretically it should b more reliable. Unless something dies in the drive which all drives do. SSD's have less chance of dying because no moving parts, less power consumption, shock/vibration proof. Its like a disc walkman vs mp3 player.
 
Agreed, there's a lot less chance of damaging an SSD through shock and therefore they're a much more reliable option in a portable device.

Most SSD's have a stated MTBF of 1.5 million hours compared to around 1 million hours for an average HDD. This suggests that SSD's are on average 50% more reliable than HDD's. However, if you consider that 1 million hours is a long-long time, the chances of either type of drive failing within its useful lifespan is very slim. This is my reason for discounting reliability as a worthwhile reason for choosing an SSD over an HDD in a regular desktop system.
 
Since HDDs haven't been around for 100 years, manufacturers stating 1 million hours MTTF is compete cr@p. Most drives fail before 10 years continuous use in my experience.
Properly designed electronics should last decades and I would expect that of SSDs, apart from the obvious issue of the technology itself. But even that issue should just reduce the size of the drive over time.
The only likely way to damage these is by overvolt/spikes.
 
Ive no idea about reliability, but you were asking earlier if its a worth the upgrade. Definately! Got a couple of vertex drives and most people point to faster boot times, which yea, are nice. But then when youve booted and just generally using your PC its great! Things just open straight away when you click on them. Say opening Open Office, used to load for a little while but now it just opens pretty much straight away. Same sort of story with Media Player, Photoshop etc. May only save a few seconds here and there, but you really notice it and makes using the PC a lot nicer :)

As for M225 or X25-M.... Think I'd go with Intel if you have the money. Probably wouldnt notice much difference in general usage, but the extra space would be nice :p
 
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