Should Sandforce controllers be avoided?

[Cylphid]

nevermind - choice made

[Cylphid]

bah - double post

[Redeemed]

Gotta' be honest- I dunno. I recently bought this for a new rig I put together for my parents. Granted the system has extremely minimal use on it but let's just say the E6600 (@ stock), 8GB of DDR2 800, with the Intel "BadAxe" mobo boots to desktop faster than the rig in my sig does. Kinda' jeolous.

Not sure if that's Sandforce or not to be honest. All the manufacturers seem to have a comparable warranty, and Newegg's policy for returns is consistent on SSDs regardless of manufacturers. Going off of user reviews this one seemed to have the best and most consistent reviews of others in it's price and capacity range.

Not too mention I think it dropped $15 from when I bought it. I'd love to go Intel just for the reliability alone but they are so freakin' expensive!

Planning an upgrade for that laptop, huh?

[Muppet]

After my Sandforce SSD died, I checked out a few forums and it looks like they do have a fairly high failure rate.

Best advice is whichever drive you get, back it up regularly.

[Cylphid]

Originally Posted by Redeemed

Planning an upgrade for that laptop, huh?

Originally Posted by Muppet

After my Sandforce SSD died, I checked out a few forums and it looks like they do have a fairly high failure rate.

Best advice is whichever drive you get, back it up regularly.

Went Maplecrest. I figured $186usd isn't bad for intel reliability, about a dollar a Gig.

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Produc...82E16820167122

So yes, a nice upgrade, and Muppet - every day, every day My sister in law just had a horrible data loss, lots of photos and some paperwork that cannot be replaced. She didn't have a single thing backed up.

[Q]

Turns out the Intel 330 is using Sandforce now, as well, Cylphid.

http://www.storagereview.com/intel_ssd_330_review

[Cylphid]

Originally Posted by Q

Turns out the Intel 330 is using Sandforce now, as well, Cylphid.

http://www.storagereview.com/intel_ssd_330_review

Yeah, I saw that. It seems like SF is almost unavoidable, so I went with who seems to have the best reliability.

Intel is presumably selling many SSD 520's to enthusiasts and the like who want one of the fastest and most reliable SSDs around for use in client systems. It makes sense then that Intel would extend their brand further in the mainstream space, offering the SSD 330 for those who want Intel reliability but are willing to give up a little performance for a lower price tag.

When compared to the SSD 320 which the 330 will eventually supplant, it's night and day. The SSD 330 wins out across the board, making it pretty clear that the switch to SandForce for these recent SandForce-based SSDs was a good decision, Intel's client silicon just couldn't keep pace. When positioned against the SSD 520, the SSD 330 holds its own much of the time, coming in a half step behind on our gaming trace. In many areas the 520 just can't be contended with, which is exactly how Intel drew this up.

The bold is where my choice fits.

[Redeemed]

Originally Posted by Cylphid

Went Maplecrest. I figured $186usd isn't bad for intel reliability, about a dollar a Gig.

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Produc...82E16820167122

So yes, a nice upgrade, and Muppet - every day, every day My sister in law just had a horrible data loss, lots of photos and some paperwork that cannot be replaced. She didn't have a single thing backed up.

Excellent! You'll be pleased for certain.

I am curious though about your impressions of coming from a hybrid drive to an SSD. Really curious to see how much faster the SSD "feels" compared to the hybrid drive.

[Cylphid]

Originally Posted by Redeemed

Excellent! You'll be pleased for certain.

I am curious though about your impressions of coming from a hybrid drive to an SSD. Really curious to see how much faster the SSD "feels" compared to the hybrid drive.

I'll let you know, but I'm sure it will be like this.

7200rpm mech to hybrid = very nice improvement.

Hybrid to SSD will be in the awesome category

I'll be using the hybrid for storage though, too nice a drive to collect dust.

Oh, the 180Gb SSD is large enough to hold my current games too, and I'll swap from Steam folder to hybrid and back as I want to replay something. Looking forward to seeing for myself if there's any increase in gaming performance at all, or not.

[Redeemed]

Originally Posted by Cylphid

I'll let you know, but I'm sure it will be like this.

7200rpm mech to hybrid = very nice improvement.

Hybrid to SSD will be in the awesome category

I'll be using the hybrid for storage though, too nice a drive to collect dust.

Oh, the 180Gb SSD is large enough to hold my current games too, and I'll swap from Steam folder to hybrid and back as I want to replay something. Looking forward to seeing for myself if there's any increase in gaming performance at all, or not.

Honestly, since getting my SSD, I've noticed very little in-game performance increase, if any at all. It's everything else that is stupid fast.

That said, I still hope to pick up a 512 ~ 600GB SSD later this year as a dedicated steam drive. I can be an impatient man. I want to be in-game the millisecond I click "play" in Steam.

[Cylphid]

Originally Posted by Redeemed

Honestly, since getting my SSD, I've noticed very little in-game performance increase, if any at all. It's everything else that is stupid fast.

That said, I still hope to pick up a 512 ~ 600GB SSD later this year as a dedicated steam drive. I can be an impatient man. I want to be in-game the millisecond I click "play" in Steam.

I'm expecting more along the load times performance than actual in-game. I just got Batman AC for $15, and while it performs great, the initial game loading seems to take well over a minute. Frustrating. But if load times speed up nicely, I'll grab a 240Gb for a game drive. Prices are pretty good atm.

Originally Posted by slaWter

It's all about the firmware though.

Intel's latest 500 and 300 drives are using Sandforce controllers but Intel's firmware and testing methods are much better compared to other Sandforce drives.

Exactly - I've read enough to believe Intels firmware and testing are much higher quality than other manufacturers.

I updated my sig already, but the drive won't be loaded with OS and all until tomorrow. We'll see how snappy a win7 install off of an SD card can be.

[Cylphid]

Here's a good read on Intel and Sandforce, for anyone interested.

http://www.pcper.com/reviews/Storage...Force-Steroids

They didn't say so directly, but I can only imagine Intel's process was plagued by multiple 'back to the drawing board' moments. Trying to one-up competition like OCZ can't be easy as they've been tweaking SandForce firmware since the very beginning. There's also those nasty bugs that would cause random BSOD's or even permanently brick the drive. Such failures have no place in an Intel SSD. Intel's upper limit for each SSD line is a 0.75% annual failure rate, and we've seen SandForce SSD's failing at a higher rate than that this past year.

With each tweak made, Intel would have to once again pass their drives through another round of full validation testing. This is no small task for Intel. As an example: It took Intel just a couple of weeks to recreate and correct the long-term performance issue I discovered back in 2009, but despite mountingpressure, they could not release the updated firmware until it had successfully passed their validation a full three months later. Intel takes this testing very seriously, and that's what leads people to trust their reliability.