SSD PCI-E or not?

ginjaninja · 23 May 2015 at 17:36

Id go cheapest per gb...as they are same class devices...the samsung 850 has the edge in performance..but the 840 firmware debacle may put some off samsung.

Loxa · 23 May 2015 at 18:27

ginjaninja said:
Id go cheapest per gb...as they are same class devices...the samsung 850 has the edge in performance..but the 840 firmware debacle may put some off samsung.

Yeah i have been doing some googling to see if the firmware problem carried over to the 850s but they have not been out long enough to determine if that is the case.

ginjaninja · 23 May 2015 at 19:27

ive seen no reports..but ive also read that root cause may be more fundamental than the firmware...ie changes to firmware masking a more fundamental engineering challenge with the nand...worth more investigation.

Loxa · 24 May 2015 at 10:18

The mind boggles, now i do not know wether to get two 500GB SSDs or a 1TB SSD. My reason for two is to replace my old 128GB 840 pro.

ginjaninja · 24 May 2015 at 12:28

a bit heartening...

http://www.extremetech.com/computing/199673-second-patch-for-ongoing-840-evo-ssd-performance-issues-being-prepped-by-samsung

That said, there’s reason to think that the 850 EVO wouldn’t have the same problems. One of the advantages of using an older NAND process is that the cell structures were more robust to start with. It’s entirely possible that TLC NAND built on 40nm would dodge problems that affected smaller process geometries. We’ll be keeping an eye on this problem over time — if Samsung can’t eliminate this issue once and for all with a second update, the 840 EVO is going to be permanently tarnished.

Loxa · 24 May 2015 at 13:09

ginjaninja said:
a bit heartening...

http://www.extremetech.com/computing/199673-second-patch-for-ongoing-840-evo-ssd-performance-issues-being-prepped-by-samsung

As long as it does not affect any of there newer ones it would be ok, but the question is do you go with x2 500GB or x1 1TB?

rodt99 · 24 May 2015 at 14:06

For peace of mind, at this point, I would get the MX200. The 850 might be a bit cheaper but we don't know if it will suffer from the same issues as the 840.

ginjaninja · 24 May 2015 at 14:26

i would go for 1x1tb

advantages of 1x1tb
higher performance-larger device tends to have best performance (1x1tb vs 1x500gb).
less sata sockets/case space used..more options later down road
cheaper - £/gb tends to go down as size goes up

advantages of 2x500gb
Backup of OS drive as drive rather than partition - dedicating an entire disk (rather than partition) to the os, makes OS backup/restore a little bit more fool proof for piece of mind..
Performance - in theory 2 drives utilised fully at same time faster than 1...but highly unlikely both drives would be fully utilised at same time...esp if 1 is os and 1 in games.

Loxa · 24 May 2015 at 15:05

ginjaninja said:
i would go for 1x1tb

advantages of 1x1tb
higher performance-larger device tends to have best performance (1x1tb vs 1x500gb).
less sata sockets/case space used..more options later down road
cheaper - £/gb tends to go down as size goes up

advantages of 2x500gb
Backup of OS drive as drive rather than partition - dedicating an entire disk (rather than partition) to the os, makes OS backup/restore a little bit more fool proof for piece of mind..
Performance - in theory 2 drives utilised fully at same time faster than 1...but highly unlikely both drives would be fully utilised at same time...esp if 1 is os and 1 in games.

A 1TB SSD does not have any speed performance improvement over a 500GB SSD, pretty even stevens.

http://www.anandtech.com/bench/product/1398?vs=1397

But i am starting to see sense after a lot more research, why buy two 500GB SSDs for raid 0 (to replace my 128GB SSD) when i can buy a 1TB SSD and have everything on the one drive.

crinkleshoes · 24 May 2015 at 16:17

If you are going to raid-0 the 500gb drives... and you're using them to replace your primary boot device... I would recommend getting the single 1TB drive... lower chance of failure.

2x500GB = twice the chance of data loss due to drive failure + possibility of raid failure.

Loxa · 25 May 2015 at 11:24

For general PC use and gaming is raid 0 really relevant? Is raid 0 even relevant with SSD's? Or is it just pointless (would there be a performance boost)

OracIe · 25 May 2015 at 12:45

Loxa said:
For general PC use and gaming is raid 0 really relevant? Is raid 0 even relevant with SSD's? Or is it just pointless (would there be a performance boost)

Yes RAID 0 is relevant with SSD's and would give a performance boost, whether or not its useful to you for general PC use and gaming, only you can answer.

crinkleshoes · 25 May 2015 at 12:49

Yeah... it near enough doubles the read/write speed for sequential read/writes

But smaller random read/writes won't see much boost at all, it's possible that might even slow down slightly thanks to the raid controller... few factors to consider/test.

Loxa · 25 May 2015 at 12:50

OracIe said:
Yes RAID 0 is relevant with SSD's and would give a performance boost, whether or not its useful to you for general PC use and gaming, only you can answer.

Yeah true, i think i leaning towards buying two 500GB SSDs as i can get them cheaper than buying one 1TB SSD. And if at some point i want to change from Raid 0 i can have one for my OS/games and another for storage.

Minstadave · 25 May 2015 at 13:02

I wouldn't touch RAID 0 SSDs with a bargepole, you're doubling your chance of failure for a performance increase you're unlikely to notice.

Loxa · 25 May 2015 at 13:31

Minstadave said:
I wouldn't touch RAID 0 SSDs with a bargepole, you're doubling your chance of failure for a performance increase you're unlikely to notice.

When people say double your chance of failure though it is only really an extra 1% chance, i have not had an SSD fail so far (touch wood).

Seems more taboo than anything.

Quartz · 25 May 2015 at 13:44

I wouldn't bother with PCIe SSD in a gaming rig as having one can remove PCIe channels from your GPUs.

Loxa · 25 May 2015 at 14:18

Quartz said:
I wouldn't bother with PCIe SSD in a gaming rig as having one can remove PCIe channels from your GPUs.

Yeah i agree.

ginjaninja · 25 May 2015 at 14:31

Quartz said:
I wouldn't bother with PCIe SSD in a gaming rig as having one can remove PCIe channels from your GPUs.

but as long as you have 8x PCie 3 for single gpu then thats enough..
bigger reason to not have as a rule of thumb might be that size is more useful than performance..coupled perhaps with the very small impact of PCIe3x8

Minstadave · 25 May 2015 at 15:19

Loxa said:
When people say double your chance of failure though it is only really an extra 1% chance, i have not had an SSD fail so far (touch wood).

Seems more taboo than anything.

An extra 1% chance? How do you work that out?