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Rent posted:Ah I see. Thanks for the advice. So something like this Mushkin you mentioned would be best bang for buck for someone who doesn't need much space? $100 is about my limit so that would be good Standard Amazon rules apply: Makes 100% sure you are ordering a new product fulfilled directly by Amazon or you will receive counterfeit crap.
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Aug 27, 2013 22:40
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Alereon posted:If you can swing an extra $7 I'd get SanDisk Extreme (over the identically priced Chronos Deluxe) because it has faster and slightly more reliable flash memory, but if not that drive is a perfectly reasonable option. Micro Center is selling the Extreme for $100. I'm not really familiar with them, and I'm not sure if they have free shipping.
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Aug 28, 2013 00:36
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Pretty Cool Name posted:Being the dumb early adopter I've always been I got a 250GB 840 Evo today. So far I'm very pleased with it, although write performance looks low? That seems exactly correct for the uncached writes. If you went straight from a Windows install to a benchmark, the SLC cache might not have had a chance to write out to TLC NAND, so your write speeds are the slower pace of the TLC NAND. Browse the web for an hour or so then try the sequential write benchmark again.
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Aug 28, 2013 06:55
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Factory Factory posted:That seems exactly correct for the uncached writes. If you went straight from a Windows install to a benchmark, the SLC cache might not have had a chance to write out to TLC NAND, so your write speeds are the slower pace of the TLC NAND. Yup, after some use it definitely looks better.
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Aug 28, 2013 19:59
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Should I install both Intel RST drivers & the Samsung Magician software? (Evo on an intel port)
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Aug 29, 2013 01:41
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dud root posted:Should I install both Intel RST drivers & the Samsung Magician software? (Evo on an intel port) I installed Magician just to easily check for firmware updates and that's it. I had issues with it minimizing or not going full screen in games so I only run it like once a month now. With RST, yeah.
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Aug 29, 2013 01:46
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Note that you do need the SSD Magician software running to use RAPID mode on the Samsung 840 Evo, which is the RAM buffering solution that boosts performance to PCIe-like levels. That said I don't think that version has released yet. Edit: So it has, I checked before I posted but only saw 4.0 for some reason. Maybe I clicked the wrong drive. Thanks! Alereon fucked around with this message at 02:14 on Aug 29, 2013 |
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Aug 29, 2013 02:02
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Pretty sure it has - http://www.samsung.com/us/support/owners/product/MZ-7TE500BW v4.2.1 adds support for RAPID with the Evo only.
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Aug 29, 2013 02:09
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Is $200 for an Intel 335 Series 240GB a good deal? Thinking it might be time to pull the trigger on it, but the 840 Evo 250gb is only $198 despite being relatively untested... VVV Cheers, that's exactly the advice I needed. Rime fucked around with this message at 19:56 on Aug 29, 2013 |
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Aug 29, 2013 19:31
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Rime posted:Is $200 for an Intel 335 Series 240GB a good deal? Thinking it might be time to pull the trigger on it. Alternately, Samsung 840 Series 120GB for $99?
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Aug 29, 2013 19:49
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A couple of times now my laptop with Sandisk Extreme 480Gb has just crawled to a halt. Its like the processor is running at 1/1000th speed- however task manager shows CPU activity at 1%. Eventually I have to do a hold the power button shutdown as it gets slower & slower. Opening a folder takes minutes. Just now after doing this an entire folder of documents is now empty, where there were files before. Chkdisk /f returns no errors. This only started when I upgraded from 240 to 480Gb. Its really frustrating because the 480Gb drive is only 3 months old and half empty.
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Aug 30, 2013 00:23
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Do you have the latest firmware for your drive? Post a Crystal Disk Info screenshot.
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Aug 30, 2013 00:45
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Using R201 and not R211. I could try updating, but I vaguely remember reading it was suggested not to use.
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Aug 30, 2013 05:55
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dud root posted:A couple of times now my laptop with Sandisk Extreme 480Gb has just crawled to a halt. Its like the processor is running at 1/1000th speed- however task manager shows CPU activity at 1%. Eventually I have to do a hold the power button shutdown as it gets slower & slower. Opening a folder takes minutes. I once saw a problem like this that had been caused by something in Windows getting corrupted during one of that machine's many random hard freezes (it had bad RAM). Doing a repair install on Windows fixed it.
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Aug 30, 2013 06:26
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dud root posted:Using R201 and not R211. I could try updating, but I vaguely remember reading it was suggested not to use. Alereon fucked around with this message at 06:49 on Aug 30, 2013 |
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Aug 30, 2013 06:44
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This was an great idiot's guide on how to enable TRIM in Ubuntu. I went with the cron job, do people think that's the right way? I had a bad corruption of my windows partition after moving it to a new enclosure. Anything to worry about? (Sandisk Extreme 240GB)
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Aug 30, 2013 11:11
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So TR did a full bench on Samsung RAPID and came away So for average users, I would say: 1) Don't buy a Samsung EVO or other SSD just for the supposedly miraculous RAPID software. That's not to say there aren't plenty of positive reasons to buy a Samsung SSD, but the fact that you can't have RAPID on a Sansisk or other brand should not be a deciding factor. 2) If you do have a Samsung drive, using RAPID should be a considered choice, not an automatic yes. Beyond the somewhat remote chance of data loss if something bad happens at just the right moment, it's also introducing a low-level system which you have to trust to be 100% stable and not introducing any bugs or quirks. I'd only use it if I knew my workload and could say that the real performance gains would outweigh the potential drawbacks. You should know whether you're going to get this or this. There are a bunch of other ram-caching storage utilities out there. Most of them will give the same awesome theoretical benchmarks that Anand got from RAPID. Very few people use them because in practice they're just not that spectacular. I'm not sure why there was an expectation that RAPID would be amazing just because it has Samsung's name on the front and comes with a great SSD. Klyith fucked around with this message at 20:09 on Aug 30, 2013 |
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Aug 30, 2013 17:42
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dud root posted:Using R201 and not R211. I could try updating, but I vaguely remember reading it was suggested not to use. Quite the opposite. It was strongly advised to upgrade to 211.
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Aug 30, 2013 17:46
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I'd just like to know if its safe to keep the Windows 8 Drive Optimization (defrag) scheduled to run automatically every week when the system identifies my main drive as an SSD. I heard that defragging in this case severely reduces the lifespan of the drive, but I'll venture a guess that's why the program now says "optimize" instead of "defrag" and won't mess things up. EDIT: Nevermind, answered in OP. Haeleus fucked around with this message at 18:41 on Aug 30, 2013 |
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Aug 30, 2013 18:35
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If you installed it to the SSD it won't defrag the SSD, that's probably code for "make sure TRIM/garbage collection is actually going on." If you moved an installation from an HDD and it doesn't know it's on an SSD, run the Windows Experience Index test and it will learn and modify its behavior appropriately. SSDs can't get fragmented like HDDs, and yeah, it's a pointless waste of write cycles to move data around on them to try to make it contiguous or whatever when that's not how flash works. They CAN get cluttered if TRIM commands aren't being acted upon or if background GC is otherwise compromised, and performance can really eat poo poo when that happens, though. I would guess without looking it up or actually knowing (in other words, don't quote me) that by optimize for SSDs it's doing something to the effect of some active garbage collection just to make sure the drive doesn't have a bunch of non-TRIM'd flash sitting around waiting to crap up your performance.
Agreed fucked around with this message at 18:43 on Aug 30, 2013 |
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Aug 30, 2013 18:40
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Klyith posted:So TR did a full bench on Samsung RAPID and came away distinctly unimpressed. I know Anand called it "PCIe from a SSD", but that hyperbole doesn't seem to bear out in many of the real-world applications. With Anand never having gotten back to doing a complete test of RAPID, I'd give the nod to TR in this case. In particular they had some results where RAPID was strongly detrimental to performance, not at all what you want to happen. (Though it's not all negative: performance in IOmeter was generally improved and most things were just zero change.) In short, on a performance scale from 1 to 10 a Samsung 840 Evo goes to 11, and some tests record this as wrapping back around to a 1. That doesn't mean that there won't be workloads where RAPID is really bad, but I don't think TechReport has found one in this case. I could be wrong though, learning more about how RAPID works and actually affects performance (as well as any problems with the SLC->TLC cache hierarchy) is one of the reasons why I'm suggesting people wait longer for the 840 Evo, in addition to straight-up reliability defects in the firmware. I could see this being he kind of thing that requires tweaking over time. Alereon fucked around with this message at 19:18 on Aug 30, 2013 |
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Aug 30, 2013 19:08
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Alereon posted:32bit overflow I'm still not sure I'd use RAPID myself if I had a Samsung Evo, as the non-performance drawbacks still exist, but I'm a completely average desktop user so I don't really need the goes to 11 nitrous injection. And the TR results of zero gain from windows loading / game loading still stand. As you say, the exact results of hand-timed game loads should have error bars, but all that means is that every SSD on the list is functionally tied, to the limits of human perception. What I'd really like to see now would be a good comparison between RAPID and other 3rd-party ram caching utilities. Is Samsung really doing anything special, with their ram cache -> SLC cache -> TLC storage three level setup on their own drives, or would any caching software plus a fast SSD have similar benchmark-breaking abilities? edit: Alereon posted:I could be wrong though, learning more about how RAPID works and actually affects performance (as well as any problems with the SLC->TLC cache hierarchy) is one of the reasons why I'm suggesting people wait longer for the 840 Evo, in addition to straight-up reliability defects in the firmware. Klyith fucked around with this message at 20:44 on Aug 30, 2013 |
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Aug 30, 2013 20:27
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So I got a Sandisk Extreme from the (no pun intended) extremely cool goon Synthetik, and I am strategizing how to implement this upgrade. I currently have a 1TB HDD which is un-partitioned and has Windows and all of my programs movies etc. How should I set up windows on the SSD? Should I make partitions or leave it whole like I have my HDD? Is there anything else I need to do in preparation to using an SSD besides setting AHCI etc. as listed in the OP. Also, can I remove windows from my HDD without formatting or will that cause issues? I'm basically looking for advice from anyone who has done this sort of upgrade which I'm guessing is pretty common.
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Aug 30, 2013 22:29
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I was very puzzled when my idle CPU temps went up 5-10c after installing my 840 EVO. It turns out that Samsung Magician "helpfully" creates a new power profile that, among other things, sets the minimum CPU speed to 100%, pegging it at max turboboost.
Sindai fucked around with this message at 23:31 on Aug 30, 2013 |
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Aug 30, 2013 23:22
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Sindai posted:I was very puzzled when my idle CPU temps went up 5-10c after installing my 840 EVO. It turns out that Samsung Magician "helpfully" creates a new power profile that, among other things, sets the minimum CPU speed to 100%, pegging it at max turboboost.  poo poo like that are the reasons I was primed to be very skeptical of RAPID, and take those TR bench results without further investigation. Samsung is fine with wasting your money for electricity and heat to make their product look maybe slightly better. Reminds me of motherboard makers who slip in a default overclocked FSB on their "performance" model, and gently caress you if some kit will react badly to that. Bleh Maestro posted:How should I set up windows on the SSD? Should I make partitions or leave it whole like I have my HDD? Is there anything else I need to do in preparation to using an SSD besides setting AHCI etc. as listed in the OP. The OP recommends Macrium Reflect* to image from the old HD to the SSD, and as long as the in-use space on the HD can fit of the SSD it will do the size change automatically. If you have more data on the HD than the SSD will hold, you'll have to do something else, either removing / backing up data or just installing windows fresh to the SSD. *And if you look back a few pages some people have good reports with other software.
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Aug 31, 2013 00:45
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Another unusual point in that Evo review is they measure Windows 7 boot time with RAPID enabled vs disabled. Isnt it a software solution that requires the Magician software to be running? It wouldn't be running during a windows boot
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Aug 31, 2013 02:32
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It could be copying the 1GB of cache from the HDD into RAM during startup if they were using special drivers or something, but I too thought it was solely a software solution.
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Aug 31, 2013 04:05
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I'm doing a fresh Win7 install on a 256gb (or 250? whichever it is) 840 pro tomorrow in a 3-4 year old laptop, how much space should I leave unpartitioned?
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Aug 31, 2013 05:09
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Brut posted:I'm doing a fresh Win7 install on a 256gb (or 250? whichever it is) 840 pro tomorrow in a 3-4 year old laptop, how much space should I leave unpartitioned? About 10% should be fine, or 20% if you'll be filling your partition to like 99% and want to do random I/O on the remaining 1%. You don't have to overprovision if you just leave space free, though; TRIM will do its thing and everyone will be happy.
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Aug 31, 2013 07:17
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Lehban posted:I'm looking for a cheap laptop for classes, and found a refurb dell latitude E6400 with a 120 gb SSD. I've always had good luck with second hand corporate Dell laptops, to be honest. Even the batteries tend to hold a decent amount of charge. You could do worse, depending on the cost.
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Aug 31, 2013 09:18
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Factory Factory posted:About 10% should be fine, or 20% if you'll be filling your partition to like 99% and want to do random I/O on the remaining 1%. You don't have to overprovision if you just leave space free, though; TRIM will do its thing and everyone will be happy. Right but this will be for my mom's computer and its simpler to do that then explain she has to keep space free and trust her to actually listen. Thanks for the numbers.
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Aug 31, 2013 11:19
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Just made my brother go pick me up a 256 Pro. Running a 120 Pro in my macbook now; Samsung drives are pretty neat. Gonna use the extra space for bootcamp and run some W7 poo poo. OP made my decision. Thanks goons!
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Aug 31, 2013 17:24
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So I'm thinking about getting rid of my 2x 1TB drives and moving to a single 2TB drive and a SSD for things I care about loading quickly. If I've read the OP correctly, the Intel 330 Series SSD should be a good choice for somebody who wants to basically install a SSD and not think too much about it past it's installation? The OP specifically mentions the 240GB version, but is the 180GB version running the same controller / memory type? I want something reliable, and I'm not doing much besides general nonsense and gaming my PC. If I end up with something a little slower or a little more pricey then I don't really mind as long as it's reliable. If I'm not too concerned about OS boot times (as I only reboot a few times a month maybe) is there a real benefit to loading the OS on the SSD? I'll be running this on an i7 950 w/ 18GB memory and Windows 8.
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Aug 31, 2013 19:22
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Linux Nazi posted:If I've read the OP correctly, the Intel 330 Series SSD should be a good choice for somebody who wants to basically install a SSD and not think too much about it past it's installation? The OP specifically mentions the 240GB version, but is the 180GB version running the same controller / memory type? quote:If I'm not too concerned about OS boot times (as I only reboot a few times a month maybe) is there a real benefit to loading the OS on the SSD? You're seeing such good deals on the Intel SSD 330 because it's been discontinued for the SSD 335. That isn't a bad thing for the SSD 330, it's being replaced because the 335 uses cheaper 20nm flash memory versus 25nm in the 330, 20nm is a bit faster at reads but has lower write performance and write endurance (~1.5-2K cycles versus 3K for 25nm).
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Aug 31, 2013 19:44
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Alereon posted:Normally I'd recommend a 240GB version over the 180GB because the 180GB has 1/4 of its memory channels disabled, but the price difference is pretty drat compelling there so the 180GB drive would be a decent choice. Awesome, thanks for the info. Is there a good way to combat "Program Files" creep / bloat? I mean %programfiles% is a system variable that can be set to point anywhere, but not until post-install when it's already populated with some items. I keep all of my games in a separate folder, but I wasn't sure if there's a common trick that people with SSDs employ to address metering programs on their SSDs, or if you just have to be especially adamant about changing the install path for everything. Also should I allow the swap file exist on the SSD? Obviously it's better for performance, but how does doing so impact the life of the SSD?
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Aug 31, 2013 19:50
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Linux Nazi posted:Is there a good way to combat "Program Files" creep / bloat? I mean %programfiles% is a system variable that can be set to point anywhere, but not until post-install when it's already populated with some items. I keep all of my games in a separate folder, but I wasn't sure if there's a common trick that people with SSDs employ to address metering programs on their SSDs, or if you just have to be especially adamant about changing the install path for everything. quote:Also should I allow the swap file exist on the SSD? Obviously it's better for performance, but how does doing so impact the life of the SSD? Alereon fucked around with this message at 19:59 on Aug 31, 2013 |
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Aug 31, 2013 19:57
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I'm running a Corsair Force 3 120GB, which i haven't had any issues with since upgrading it to v.1.3.3 (the big sandforce bug was fixed then), so i havent touched that since. Yesterday i had an issue with programs crashing (i usually never reboot this machine, its always doing something and it had a couple months of uptime), and the programs that crashed refused to start back up without crashing again. I went for a reboot and even that crashed, stood at the shutting down screen for 30 minutes. After the reboot however, its been fine and nothing is broken or crashy, and crystaldiskinfo doesnt show anything bad. Should i worry, and/or buy a new ssd? Update the firmware?
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Aug 31, 2013 21:55
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I'd update the drive firmware and SATA controller drivers, if available. Do make sure you have good backups of any files you care about as well, but I don't think there's any need to plan a replacement yet.
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Aug 31, 2013 22:03
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So I wasn't sure where to post this, but here goes: I recently had a new computer put together and in it is a Samsung 840 Pro 128 gb SSD with Windows installed on it. I keep reading about people not even having the Windows logo animation complete because they boot up so fast, but for me it takes a solid 35-40 seconds from pressing the power button to getting to a loaded desktop. Is there something extra I need to do to cut down on boot time? In addition to Windows there are also some Adobe apps and the Office suite on the SSD. I don't know if it matters, but the motherboard is a MSI Z87 Mpower. I also ran the benchmark thing on the drive:
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Aug 31, 2013 22:24
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Confirm that you have the SSD (and your other drives) connected to the Intel SATA ports, not the second controller. Also install the latest Intel Chipset Drivers and Rapid Storage Technology software from the Intel website. Note that an SSD can only affect boot time from when the Windows logo appears, the time from the power button to the Windows logo is all due to the motherboard. You can trim some of that time by disabling unnecessary devices (such as that second SATA600 controller you shouldn't be using).
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Aug 31, 2013 22:39
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