Low cost SSD Suggestions?

[Vendetta]

You're probably right it just seems like there are some great holiday deals right now on SSD drives, why does everyone who owns a Mac specifically recommend these drives? Is it just because of the Sandforce controller?

Here's the Microcenter one I was talking about but it looks like they sold out

http://www.microcenter.com/single_produ ... id=0351760

People recommend those drives because they are good drives. OWC is a company that has been making/selling Mac compatible accessories for years. I've heard/read good things about their SSDs, and if I had to choose, I'd put a drive from a Mac specific vendor into my Mac (or in this case hack). Also, I'm familiar with their customer service, and it's excellent.

 

[thgill]

They have one at Microcenter for $99, its a Microcenter brand (actually an Adata rebrand) 64 gb with sandforce and a jmicron controller, I don't know if anyone here has personal experience but from other sites it looks like a good deal.

I picked up one of these from my local Microcenter today at lunch.

Will let you guys know how it works later tonight. Since its Sandforce based, I expect some blazing performance.


Any specific benchmarks anyone wants me to run?

 

[Vendetta]

They have one at Microcenter for $99, its a Microcenter brand (actually an Adata rebrand) 64 gb with sandforce and a jmicron controller, I don't know if anyone here has personal experience but from other sites it looks like a good deal.

I picked up one of these from my local Microcenter today at lunch.

Will let you guys know how it works later tonight. Since its Sandforce based, I expect some blazing performance.


Any specific benchmarks anyone wants me to run?

Just to be clear, the Sandforce controller doesn't really provide any faster performance than those with other controllers. OOB, most SSDs (Even those without Sandforce) should perform approximately the same. What the Sandforce controller is good for is its hardware based garbage collection. You see, OS X doesn't support TRIM, so after a bit of use on your non-Sandforce SSD, things will begin to slow down, and you will need to wipe the drive and restore from a backup in order to speed it up again. I've already had to do this on my 2-month old SSD (non-Sandforce).

The above is my understanding, feel free to correct me if I'm wrong.

 

[thgill]

Apparently its a rebadged Adata S599 drive.

Guru3d reviewed the 100GB Adata version earlier this year and had this to say:

With the release of the SandForce 1200 based S599 ADATA is placing a superb piece of hardware onto the market. The results show potential and here and there even are flabbergasting. As such we can only conclude that SandForce 1200 based SSDs will show massive muscle throughout the board of tests. We did have one issue with with HDTune which does not seem to like the SSD at all, but perhaps that's solved with either a software update, or new firmware. Other then that it broke any and all records really.

First we need to point you to ATTO, we reached 280 MB/sec read performance and I have never ever seen that before. When we look at PCMark Vantage's HDD test then that's another scenario where the S599 shows incredible strength, not a little, much higher then anything we have ever seen. And we feel that PCMark Vantage's HDD test is probably the most realistic series of tests you can compare real world stressing a storage unit with..

http://www.guru3d.com/article/adata-s59 ... d-review/1

So while the Sandforce controller does benefit with the garbage collection, it also translates into some real world performance benefits. Pretty much the fastest SSD's that you can plug into a SATA port (not those PCIe OCZ ones) are Sandforce controller based. At least for now anyways...

 

[Shelby]

Vendetta thanks for clearing that up for me, I just kept hearing about OWC but never the reasoning behind it.

Thgill - Great news, I just picked one up as well hopefully it will perform well, also thanks for posting the AData drive info.

 

[Vendetta]

Apparently its a rebadged Adata S599 drive.

Guru3d reviewed the 100GB Adata version earlier this year and had this to say:

With the release of the SandForce 1200 based S599 ADATA is placing a superb piece of hardware onto the market. The results show potential and here and there even are flabbergasting. As such we can only conclude that SandForce 1200 based SSDs will show massive muscle throughout the board of tests. We did have one issue with with HDTune which does not seem to like the SSD at all, but perhaps that's solved with either a software update, or new firmware. Other then that it broke any and all records really.

First we need to point you to ATTO, we reached 280 MB/sec read performance and I have never ever seen that before. When we look at PCMark Vantage's HDD test then that's another scenario where the S599 shows incredible strength, not a little, much higher then anything we have ever seen. And we feel that PCMark Vantage's HDD test is probably the most realistic series of tests you can compare real world stressing a storage unit with..

http://www.guru3d.com/article/adata-s59 ... d-review/1

So while the Sandforce controller does benefit with the garbage collection, it also translates into some real world performance benefits. Pretty much the fastest SSD's that you can plug into a SATA port (not those PCIe OCZ ones) are Sandforce controller based. At least for now anyways...

Thanks for posting that.

I have to say though, that I'm still not sure it's the Sandforce controller. They mention that this particular drive is "a superb piece of hardware", but there doesn't seem to be a direct correllation between the controller and the drive's initial speeds. Even my SSD, for example, which is a pretty low end SSD, has read speeds of 250 MB/s. SSDs can vary in speeds depending on the quality, but from what I've understood, the real benefit is in the garbage collection. Don't get me wrong, I agree that these drives are definitely faster, but I think the greatest advantage with the Sandforce controller is the hardware based garbage collection. Either, it sounds like a win-win. Congrats!

Man, I wish I lived near a micro-center.

 

[Shelby]

It is G2 Sandforce driven, so it should be fine.

You can see it right on the picture:

http://www.microcenter.com/single_produ ... id=0351760

Vendetta PM Sent

P.S. Nice build!

 

[vizx86]

If performance is important, definitely check the max read/write speed of the SSD on the specs. I would check the specs to make sure it's got about 280mb/s or more. With higher speed, comes higher price.

 

[thgill]

It is G2 Sandforce driven, so it should be fine.

You can see it right on the picture:

http://www.microcenter.com/single_produ ... id=0351760

Yep.
Just installed and confirmed via the bios screen that its a G2.

Installing SL now.

 

[thgill]

Snapped a couple pics before I installed it: