[Kobrar44]

So I decided to get myself some SSD flash mass storage. Minimal requirement is ~250GB, but 500 shouldn't hurt too much if priced reasonably. I am not super cheap, to the point where I considered samsung 950, but I doubt the absurd transfer is really worth the extra money. What would be my options for a couple PB of lifespan SSD these days?

[The E]

Any Samsung Pro, Corsair, or Intel should suffice. This is an older test, but bottom line is that most quality drives will reach 1 or 2 petabytes of lifetime writes before catastrophic failure (and honestly, chances are that you'll hit other failures in your system before you get to that point).

[Mikes]

Intel business class drives for me and nothing else.

Never had a single hitch or issue with those drives for years. Rock solid. Even the drives that have been running 5-6 years worked flawless and showed perfect health as i sold them on ebay.

There s too many horror stories out there to trust the consumer drives (Intel consumer drives, with Sandforce or otherwise, as well) for my taste. Call me paranoid ... but my drives are working lol. ;-)

[Phantom Hoover]

Right but the post immediately before you links to empirical evidence that consumer drives are more than durable enough for anything you'd put them through in desktop use.

[OverDhill]

I have a couple Samsung and they have been dependable and fast. One for OS and one for my favorite games

[MP-Ryan]

My Samsung EVO 850 (250 GB) has been speedy and reliable thus far, and it was also quite inexpensive compared to the competition and I don't think the added expense for minimal performance gains in the higher-end drives is truly worth it (yet).

I don't, however, leave my data on the SSD.  I have a quasi-RAID array (Windows Storage Spaces in Win10 does a nice job of software RAID) with two conventional hard disks holding everything but the OS and installed software, so drive failure is not a particular concern of mine.

[666maslo666]

Seconding the Samsung 850 EVO. A very good SSD for a reasonable price. I would not worry about endurance for normal usage. Unless you regularly shuffle large amounts of data around, even TLC consumer SSDs of a reliable brand (Samsung, Intel) will last long enough. You will most likely swap it for a NVMe drive in a few years anyway, once their price falls.

[TechnoD11]

...And Thirding in the 850 Evo. Have 2, 500GB models myself (desktop + laptop). rock solid drives, don't forget to load Samsung magician once you install them.

[Mongoose]

Fourthed from me.  The 500GB version has been purring along just fine since I built this machine last summer.

[karajorma]

I've had an 840 Evo running in my machine for over two years. Haven't had a problem with it yet.

[Klaustrophobia]

I have a Samsung 850 EVO as well, 500 GB.  Bought it because it looked like the best value.  I'll give one tiny error report though, that's not even the drive, but my Magician software from time to time throws a pop up window asking if I'd like to exit, as if I'd closed it.  I can just hit no and move on, but it's kinda weird.   Also doesn't appear in the task bar when it does that so often it stays hidden behind things for a while.

[jr2]

I have an 850 Evo, that I installed my OS(es) to, and symlinked my user directories (which I store on my larger conventional drive) to.

In other words,

- I deleted my {fresh, empty} Desktop, Documents, Downloads, Music, Pictures, Saved Games, and Videos folder from my %UserProfile% directory, then:

open elevated command prompt (Win+ X + A in Win 10)

mklink /d {Link} {Target}, so,:

mklink /d C:\Users\{username}\Desktop D:\Users\{Username}\Desktop}

(You could store it wherever, like D:\Desktop or D:\blah\spaghetti)


The only caveat is:

1) If the drive letter changes, the links become invalid (but you can still just go to D: and find your files, and you can delete the old links and make new, valid ones, or just swap the drive letter back and all will be well).
2) If you re-install / upgrade Windows, Setup won't see the links as valid (during setup process the drives don't have the same letters, for whatever reason), and so it will make new, blank folders, but since the link file exists, it will call them Desktop (1), Documents (1), etc.   Once it restarts into normal Windows, your drive letters will be normal, the links will work again, and you can safely delete the blank (1) folders.

I also keep a Program Files and Program Files (x86) folder on the conventional drive, in case I want to install something large but don't want to use the SSD.  I can always just move it to the opposite folder (on the SSD if I need speed, or on the conventional if it's not that much faster or I need space) and mklink /d  to the original location

NOTE the {Link} must not exist (there must not be a file or folder with that name in the current directory, as the link is going to be a special file that for all intents and purposes acts like a folder).

[Det. Bullock]

Intel business class drives for me and nothing else.

Never had a single hitch or issue with those drives for years. Rock solid. Even the drives that have been running 5-6 years worked flawless and showed perfect health as i sold them on ebay.

There s too many horror stories out there to trust the consumer drives (Intel consumer drives, with Sandforce or otherwise, as well) for my taste. Call me paranoid ... but my drives are working lol. ;-)

Many horror stories seem to be about older consumer drives rather than recent models like the 850 EVO, at least that's my impression while doing my research on SSDs.

I'll probably buy the 500gb 850 EVO, as I mostly need a larger had drive (250gb HDD, I had to skimp in something while building my new PC), it being a SSD is a plus.

[jr2]

One thing to keep an eye on:

Your price point for a 500 GB 850 EVO SSD is about $154.62 USD, at which point you could just get the 250 GB EVO ($87.69 USD) AND a 2 TB Western Digital or Seagate hard drive for storage, and utilize some method similar to what I do, or just manually put things that don't need loading speed on the larger drive (read: most user files.  Only exception: downloaded installation files, but that will only affect your installation speed.)

Your OS and 90% of your program files will fit just fine in a 250GB SSD.  Just make it a habit, when you install things that you won't use often (or that you don't mind waiting 10-30 seconds instead of 2-5 seconds for), to put them on the slower, larger drive.


EDIT: Just to clarify, in case it wasn't clear: The price you will pay for a 250GB 850 EVO + 2TB conventional WD / Seagate is the same as just a 500GB 850 EVO, and the performance gain will be negligible for the 500GB, as you can easily fit anything that matters for loading speed-wise into the 250GB.  For the 500, you're basically paying through the nose to store files you don't need fast access to in a rocket-ship class storage device (your movies only need to stream at conventional speeds, your installation files only need to be used once, so download to SSD, install, move to conventional, your pictures / documents / music need so little speed-wise you could put them on an old PATA IDE drive and not notice, etc etc etc).

[Det. Bullock]

One thing to keep an eye on:

Your price point for a 500 GB 850 EVO SSD is about $154.62 USD, at which point you could just get the 250 GB EVO ($87.69 USD) AND a 2 TB Western Digital or Seagate hard drive for storage, and utilize some method similar to what I do, or just manually put things that don't need loading speed on the larger drive (read: most user files.  Only exception: downloaded installation files, but that will only affect your installation speed.)

Your OS and 90% of your program files will fit just fine in a 250GB SSD.  Just make it a habit, when you install things that you won't use often (or that you don't mind waiting 10-30 seconds instead of 2-5 seconds for), to put them on the slower, larger drive.


EDIT: Just to clarify, in case it wasn't clear: The price you will pay for a 250GB 850 EVO + 2TB conventional WD / Seagate is the same as just a 500GB 850 EVO, and the performance gain will be negligible for the 500GB, as you can easily fit anything that matters for loading speed-wise into the 250GB.  For the 500, you're basically paying through the nose to store files you don't need fast access to in a rocket-ship class storage device (your movies only need to stream at conventional speeds, your installation files only need to be used once, so download to SSD, install, move to conventional, your pictures / documents / music need so little speed-wise you could put them on an old PATA IDE drive and not notice, etc etc etc).

I already use an external drive for simple file storage and I still have space problems, I'd like to have more leeway for games and programs and a less noisy system, 1TB feels a lot like overkill to me.

Hell, I'd just like to be able to keep installed as many games as I could when I had windows XP on my old computer with a 120gb HDD, for some reason Windows 7 hogs a large part of the HDD and it did it from the start, clean install and all.

[MP-Ryan]

symlinked my user directories (which I store on my larger conventional drive) to.

You realize that, since Windows 7, Windows has supported the ability to permanently relocate user directories to other drives, right?

I can see where symlinks might be useful for Program Files / PF (x86), but anything stored in the User folder can be relocated with a right-click into Properties.  Bonus is that since Windows knows where the directories actually point to, there's never any need to remake them.

My entire user directory basically resides on my D: drive.

[jr2]

symlinked my user directories (which I store on my larger conventional drive) to.

You realize that, since Windows 7, Windows has supported the ability to permanently relocate user directories to other drives, right?

I can see where symlinks might be useful for Program Files / PF (x86), but anything stored in the User folder can be relocated with a right-click into Properties.  Bonus is that since Windows knows where the directories actually point to, there's never any need to remake them.

My entire user directory basically resides on my D: drive.

I knew you could add folders to Libraries, and set one of those folders as the default storage for that Library, and also that you could use the registry to assign a different user profile (in XP, but it required moving the files manually from old to new location)....

I guess I like this way because it's just my files, not all the other stuff?  The stuff that you might want reset in a re-install situation anyways?  Not really sure exactly what files and settings are stored there besides temporary and programs' user-specific settings.

I've had Windows installed about 3 days, and my user profile directory (not my personal files, those are symlinked) is currently clocking in at 8.44GB

[jr2]

One thing to keep an eye on:

Your price point for a 500 GB 850 EVO SSD is about $154.62 USD, at which point you could just get the 250 GB EVO ($87.69 USD) AND a 2 TB Western Digital or Seagate hard drive for storage, and utilize some method similar to what I do, or just manually put things that don't need loading speed on the larger drive (read: most user files.  Only exception: downloaded installation files, but that will only affect your installation speed.)

Your OS and 90% of your program files will fit just fine in a 250GB SSD.  Just make it a habit, when you install things that you won't use often (or that you don't mind waiting 10-30 seconds instead of 2-5 seconds for), to put them on the slower, larger drive.


EDIT: Just to clarify, in case it wasn't clear: The price you will pay for a 250GB 850 EVO + 2TB conventional WD / Seagate is the same as just a 500GB 850 EVO, and the performance gain will be negligible for the 500GB, as you can easily fit anything that matters for loading speed-wise into the 250GB.  For the 500, you're basically paying through the nose to store files you don't need fast access to in a rocket-ship class storage device (your movies only need to stream at conventional speeds, your installation files only need to be used once, so download to SSD, install, move to conventional, your pictures / documents / music need so little speed-wise you could put them on an old PATA IDE drive and not notice, etc etc etc).

I already use an external drive for simple file storage and I still have space problems, I'd like to have more leeway for games and programs and a less noisy system, 1TB feels a lot like overkill to me.

Hell, I'd just like to be able to keep installed as many games as I could when I had windows XP on my old computer with a 120gb HDD, for some reason Windows 7 hogs a large part of the HDD and it did it from the start, clean install and all.

Umm.  2 TB, not 1. 

Considering, say, Star Wars Battlefront is about 35-40GB, and FSO if you install everything is probably the same (I mean, including total conversions like Diaspora / BtRL / Star Wars / The Babylon Project / Blue Planet / etc etc etc) and you start running out of space really fast.

[Det. Bullock]

One thing to keep an eye on:

Your price point for a 500 GB 850 EVO SSD is about $154.62 USD, at which point you could just get the 250 GB EVO ($87.69 USD) AND a 2 TB Western Digital or Seagate hard drive for storage, and utilize some method similar to what I do, or just manually put things that don't need loading speed on the larger drive (read: most user files.  Only exception: downloaded installation files, but that will only affect your installation speed.)

Your OS and 90% of your program files will fit just fine in a 250GB SSD.  Just make it a habit, when you install things that you won't use often (or that you don't mind waiting 10-30 seconds instead of 2-5 seconds for), to put them on the slower, larger drive.


EDIT: Just to clarify, in case it wasn't clear: The price you will pay for a 250GB 850 EVO + 2TB conventional WD / Seagate is the same as just a 500GB 850 EVO, and the performance gain will be negligible for the 500GB, as you can easily fit anything that matters for loading speed-wise into the 250GB.  For the 500, you're basically paying through the nose to store files you don't need fast access to in a rocket-ship class storage device (your movies only need to stream at conventional speeds, your installation files only need to be used once, so download to SSD, install, move to conventional, your pictures / documents / music need so little speed-wise you could put them on an old PATA IDE drive and not notice, etc etc etc).

I already use an external drive for simple file storage and I still have space problems, I'd like to have more leeway for games and programs and a less noisy system, 1TB feels a lot like overkill to me.

Hell, I'd just like to be able to keep installed as many games as I could when I had windows XP on my old computer with a 120gb HDD, for some reason Windows 7 hogs a large part of the HDD and it did it from the start, clean install and all.

Umm.  2 TB, not 1. 

Considering, say, Star Wars Battlefront is about 35-40GB, and FSO if you install everything is probably the same (I mean, including total conversions like Diaspora / BtRL / Star Wars / The Babylon Project / Blue Planet / etc etc etc) and you start running out of space really fast.

At the moment it's a castle in the air anyway, meanwhile I found an amazon.it seller that sold anti-vibration pads for HDDs without charging 10 Euros of postage and packing on a 3 Euros article, I'll experiment with those to see if they work okay enough, if they do I might consider using a HDD.

Buying a SSD or new HDD will still have to wait anyway, probably my next big money splurge will be an Everdrive MD, so I can cut on Sega Mega Drive collecting as the prices have gone up way too much even on games that used to cost next to nothing lately and I'm also running out of space.

[jr2]

Price drop, $75 USD for 250GB Samsung 850 EVO:

[SSD] Samsung 850 Evo 250gb - $74.99 (In store and Online)

http://www.frys.com/product/8310177?site=cemail061816