IS this a reliable SSD?
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I have to agree with this based on my own personal experience. My original Vertext1 drive is running solid and never had any issues.
I had a Vertex 2 SSD die on me. I also had their Vertex 3 die due to their infamous S3-Sleep bug. It was months before they allegedly fixed that issue. It actually died twice one me, even after being flashed with their "fix" for the S3-Sleep issue.
Meanwhile I'm extremely happy with my Samsung 830 in my systems that S3-Sleep all the time.
Blazkowicz
Legend
a friend had a caviar green die on her, the warranty was only two years which I found a bit surprising. this is no fun, data loss + no new drive 
I'd rather have a 5 year HDD. btw even a 3 TB one is reasonable, price per GB is low. the drives are possibly cheaper than before flood, or same price.
I'd rather have a 5 year HDD. btw even a 3 TB one is reasonable, price per GB is low. the drives are possibly cheaper than before flood, or same price.
Paying more for a 5yr warranty is the same thing as buying an extended 3yr warranty on top of a 2yr warranty. It's just that the manufacturer is forcing you to buy the extended warranty and hiding it as a 5yr plan. Doesn't mean your Black will be more reliable than your Green...that's just what the manufacturer wants you to think...
Of course not everyone wants to buy extended warranties and this isn't specific to HDDs but to products in general. If you're more comfortable with a longer warranty then go ahead and spend more, doesn't mean you have a statistically more reliable HDD and definitely doesn't mean you're protected from data loss.
Of course not everyone wants to buy extended warranties and this isn't specific to HDDs but to products in general. If you're more comfortable with a longer warranty then go ahead and spend more, doesn't mean you have a statistically more reliable HDD and definitely doesn't mean you're protected from data loss.
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And again that's anecdotal. Pretty sure Blacks are more expensive because of perceived reliability due to the built-in extended warranty and slight performance advantage. Made on the same assembly lines using the same machines and materials, same quality controls.
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Blazkowicz
Legend
you might as well watch for smart errors and counts a few monthes before warranty ends. my server has started acting funny, I saw the smart error codes were awful, with mentions such as "about to fail" or "failing" or "bad". reading errors galore and it being used for the OS doesn't help. maybe smart said something like "you can RMA it", or it was implied
I have a limited backup including all of music and most text documents at least, but I'm losing some valuable content.
I have to get a new huge drive before the warranty on my 1TB ends (it's at least 3 years), then I can mount the 1TB read only and try to recover things I care about.
3 years is fine, 2 years not - it would give me an incentive in writing garbage all over the disk with totally random access for weeks, in hope that it semi-fails at least. mixed with hour-long sessions of forced, recurring spin down/spin up cycles
I have a limited backup including all of music and most text documents at least, but I'm losing some valuable content.
I have to get a new huge drive before the warranty on my 1TB ends (it's at least 3 years), then I can mount the 1TB read only and try to recover things I care about.
3 years is fine, 2 years not - it would give me an incentive in writing garbage all over the disk with totally random access for weeks, in hope that it semi-fails at least. mixed with hour-long sessions of forced, recurring spin down/spin up cycles
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Hyundai doesn't have the longest warranties nor are they anywhere near the bottom of build quality (quite the opposite in fact) in any recent surveys so you might want to choose a different example like land rover or something.
It's not free for WD to add 3 years of warranty so it might well be worth it for them to do extra QA on black drives.
Like their memory, perhaps their SSDs will eventually be just as well put together as the next guy's too.
For my anecdote I'll go with the boy wonder Anand:
The return rates article from behardware I linked earlier (which was original posted at hardware.fr) goes beyond anecdotal information, however. OCZ really is that shitty.
Anyway, to the OP I would say that any reliable SSD is better than no SSD. After having OCZs die, I have stuck with Intel (320s, now 520s) but I'd also recommend Crucial M4 or Samsung 830 without worries.
I believe there's no better upgrade for the general feel of a system. Even a relatively slow one will do wonders compared to a HDD.
Oh pardon me, let me rephrase that...ONE of the longest warranties....
And nobody said they had the worst quality...point is length of warranty does not magically equate to better reliability...it is only perceived as better with no quantitative proof.
Err...of course it's not free...that's why the Black drives cost more than Green drives for the same capacity despite having LESS cache.
You may WANT TO BELIEVE the extra cost is put to extra QA.....but that just sounds like wishful thinking which is exactly what their marketing department wants you to think.
UniversalTruth
Veteran
Actually, that's exactly what the idea behind better reliability is, if engineers in the company have sufficient enough data that the MTBF is longer, they should extend the warranty.
That's why you have cheap chinese products with no warranty at all, others with very short warranties such as laptop power supplies, or batteries and something really durable like some hard drives with 5-year warranties.
I don't know what controller's in that Cruical drive, but the Samsung is great from all of what I've seen around the web. Pretty cool to have a drive where all of the major electronics is sourced from the same manufacturer. Controller, RAM, NAND...
On the whole I'd prefer either a Samsung or Marvell drive right now, because of the high standby power use on sandforce drives. That makes them highly unsuitable for laptops.
Aye! NOTHING beats a SSD. There's simply no contest. My SSD is old now (by SSD standards anyway), it's the original Intel SLC 60GB drive, but it's still lightning fast. Only bother is it's so small I have to keep my Steam game library on a HDD; it starts up pretty slow when you have upwards of 150 games installed...
Not really putting any endorsement behind this particular mass storage drive, but BestBuy has a 7200rpm 2TB Seagate for $99 -- (BestBuy Link)
I have an older 2TB 7200rpm seagate drive as the parity drive in my unRAID system and it's been stable without issues.
I have an older 2TB 7200rpm seagate drive as the parity drive in my unRAID system and it's been stable without issues.
Actually, that's exactly what the idea behind better reliability is, if engineers in the company have sufficient enough data that the MTBF is longer, they should extend the warranty.
That's why you have cheap chinese products with no warranty at all, others with very short warranties such as laptop power supplies, or batteries and something really durable like some hard drives with 5-year warranties.
I could sell products with no warranty at all..because I'm cheap and don't want to deal with the hassle of warranty claims, doesn't mean my product won't last 10 years...
Or I could sell a product that may only last 5yrs but offer it with a 5yr warranty and charge 50% more...
Go ahead and tell me which one is the "better" buy...
Oh and I never trust MTBF numbers given that there are so many factors outside of the manufacturers control after it leaves the factory...
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Blazkowicz
Legend
not really an SSD but I found this for a buddy who has a 9" eee PC :
http://cgi.ebay.fr/MR15-MR04-Metal-...C_Drives_Storage_Internal&hash=item27c71cd7b4
that's sweet, he has two mini-PCIe ssd, 4GB + 8GB, he can replace the 4GB one with this adapter for two microSD and use commodity memory cards. a small one he owns + possibly a 32GB class 10 samsung one.
it being dumb memory cards, there isn't the SSD specific failure modes, and you can just replace a dead memory card with another one. it's an order of magnitude slower than SSD but still low latency and good enough for crappy useful files and movies/music.
it will be funny to keep track of warranty. five years!
http://www.amazon.com/Samsung-microSDHC-Flash-Memory-Brushed/dp/B005TUQV0E
I assume either the card doesn't fail, or it does and 99% people don't know or bother to return it.
http://cgi.ebay.fr/MR15-MR04-Metal-...C_Drives_Storage_Internal&hash=item27c71cd7b4
that's sweet, he has two mini-PCIe ssd, 4GB + 8GB, he can replace the 4GB one with this adapter for two microSD and use commodity memory cards. a small one he owns + possibly a 32GB class 10 samsung one.
it being dumb memory cards, there isn't the SSD specific failure modes, and you can just replace a dead memory card with another one. it's an order of magnitude slower than SSD but still low latency and good enough for crappy useful files and movies/music.
it will be funny to keep track of warranty. five years!
http://www.amazon.com/Samsung-microSDHC-Flash-Memory-Brushed/dp/B005TUQV0E
I assume either the card doesn't fail, or it does and 99% people don't know or bother to return it.
RudeCurve, I've run and/or owned manufacturing companies since 1999. I can tell you that warranty periods and policies are related to manufacturing and design, often strongly so. There are cases where a manufacturer might charge more for the same product with a longer warranty, but this usually backfires as nobody likes to make use of a warranty.
Anyway, I have small stacks of WD greens in my junk pile at the company waiting to be mechanically destroyed. Most have failed PCBs (overheated). Will never buy them again.
Anyway, I have small stacks of WD greens in my junk pile at the company waiting to be mechanically destroyed. Most have failed PCBs (overheated). Will never buy them again.
