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Samsung 840 120GB @ $79.99 promo 'EMCYTZT2640'
- Thread starter Ali Man
- Start date
Just bought one... been looking for an OS drive for my htpc build
I have an older Samsung 830 installed in the wife's laptop and it's been solid.
I was hoping amazon was going to match this price (they haven't yet) as they are giving a downloadable copy of AC3 but as of now they are still at $98
I have an older Samsung 830 installed in the wife's laptop and it's been solid.
I was hoping amazon was going to match this price (they haven't yet) as they are giving a downloadable copy of AC3 but as of now they are still at $98
Drown Babies
Gawd
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- May 29, 2005
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- 700
The AC3 deal is only for the 840 pro drives
http://www.amazon.com/gp/feature.html/ref=amb_link_366546642_3?ie=UTF8&docId=1000855781&pf_rd_m=ATVPDKIKX0DER&pf_rd_s=hero-quick-promo&pf_rd_r=1WZR642G9FR1XM6MVTKY&pf_rd_t=201&pf_rd_p=1419318982&pf_rd_i=B009NB8WRU
$80 for a 120GB 840 is still a good deal though.
http://www.amazon.com/gp/feature.html/ref=amb_link_366546642_3?ie=UTF8&docId=1000855781&pf_rd_m=ATVPDKIKX0DER&pf_rd_s=hero-quick-promo&pf_rd_r=1WZR642G9FR1XM6MVTKY&pf_rd_t=201&pf_rd_p=1419318982&pf_rd_i=B009NB8WRU
$80 for a 120GB 840 is still a good deal though.
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That's because in a lot of respects the drive isn't as good as the 830. It really should've been called the 820, or 835 or something. And the 840 Pro called just plain 840. But that's speaking from a consumer standpoint; marketing departments have other agendas.
D
Deleted member 232162
Guest
How much "worse" is the '840' from the '840 Pro'? I realize the price points are different for a reason, but what reason is that? Slightly better write/read speeds, or?
The reason is because the 840 uses cheaper TLC NAND, while the 840 Pro and even the 830 use MLC NAND.
I know it's a side grade from the 830 at best, and a slight down grade at worst, depending on what you're doing... But it's still a heck of a drive, easily as good or better than other drives that aren't normally that cheap either (Crucial M4, Plextor M5S, etc.).
If you wanna be really technical about it, the 840 Pro is actually the drive with the confusing name... Samsung's previous drive to the 830 was the 470, so the 840's smaller numerical jump in nomenclature makes some sense IMO. Now, adding a mere Pro tag to the higher performing drive when it's clearly a cut above everything released last year, that's just silly.
Performance-wise, if you have to ask, you probably wouldn't be able to tell the difference in commonplace real world use... Nobody would really unless you're benchmarking it or running a very demanding scenario that would expose the advantage.
MLC drives do have a long term durability advantage over a TLC drive like the 840, but again, you'd have to be moving dozens of gigabytes a day for that to matter... Otherwise most of these drives will outlast the rest of your rig or you'll upgrade it for a larger one long before durability's a concern.
D
Deleted member 232162
Guest
Ah. I figured, and I think I heard that response before, the "wouldn't be able to tell the difference anyway". I think I'll go ahead and grab an 840 then if I find it for a good price.
Drown Babies
Gawd
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Probably the only real difference you would notice is in capacities. The 840's have a little bit less space than the pro drives, probably because of more dedicated spare area. And the 840 pro is offered in 64GB, while the lowest 840 is 120GB.
Check anandtech if you really want more detail about both drives.
Check anandtech if you really want more detail about both drives.
D
Deleted member 232162
Guest
I mean, I just want to move away from HDDs and head towards SDDs. Have a solid 830 and a big storage drive, but I'd like another SDD with a minimum of 250(or 256)GB. I think I'll just honestly try to grab an 840 for as cheap as possible.
I've got too much crap to ditch HDD entirely any time soon (but not enough crap that I'd wanna bother setting up a NAS), I did pick up a second 128GB 830 for $70 when they were on sale tho. 256GB should be enough for my OS/apps/games for a few years.
Almost sprang for a 256GB instead but I realized two smaller drives was more than enough, I wasn't gonna end up selling my 128GB even if I got a larger one anyway... And I wouldn't be able to have every single game I own on flash regardless of whether I had 256GB or 384GB combined (not that I need to do that anyway). Everyone's needs are different tho...
Almost sprang for a 256GB instead but I realized two smaller drives was more than enough, I wasn't gonna end up selling my 128GB even if I got a larger one anyway... And I wouldn't be able to have every single game I own on flash regardless of whether I had 256GB or 384GB combined (not that I need to do that anyway). Everyone's needs are different tho...
Drown Babies
Gawd
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I'll be demoting my HDD to a simple USB NAS. With this 120GB for OS and apps, and my old 160GB Intel 320 for mp3's, games, and misc. other stuff it should work out well, and allow me to leave a bunch of free space on both SSDs.
tehslippery
Gawd
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How good of a deal is this in the realm of SSD's around this size? I've needed to get one for a while, but it isn't something is a huge priority. Am I likely to get a better deal if I wait?
Edit: Hell with it, I bit
Edit: Hell with it, I bit
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If you're going to call the people who bought this drive suckers, give some evidence.
In my opinion, if you can find a SandForce drive with MLC for the same price as this drive, I would definitely get the SandForce. MLC gets about 3,000 P/E cycles while TLC only gets about 1,000. TBH I'm not likely to exhaust either an MLC or TLC drive but I like to get as much bang as I can for by buck.
Here's an Anandtech test where they found the 840 can take about 1,000 P/E cycles. http://www.anandtech.com/show/6459/samsung-ssd-840-testing-the-endurance-of-tlc-nand
Yes, even though TLC has even less lifetime than old MLC, it's very unlikely that you're going to wear out flash. It takes Terabyte's of writing to do it.
Though, since TLC is 3 bits per cell, it gives out more errors and sends more shit to the provision area, so slightly slower writes on small files are expected. I'd rather go with a SF-2281 MLC drive.
Though, since TLC is 3 bits per cell, it gives out more errors and sends more shit to the provision area, so slightly slower writes on small files are expected. I'd rather go with a SF-2281 MLC drive.
It's a good deal, I doubt you'll see it cheaper until later on next year. You probably won't find a comparable drive for much less either until other manufacturers release newer models (and their old ones go on clearance like the 830 recently did).
How's it a trap? That's a pretty awful characterization or assumption... If you write dozens upon dozens of gigs to your drive on a daily basis you should definitely opt for an MLC drive instead, but that kind of heavy user should do his research and know better.
For the vast majority of people TLC is fine and the drive will have a completely satisfactory life span, plus Samsung has proven to be very very reliable in general (over a few controller generations now). TLC will probably help make SSD truly mainstream by further lowering prices... Personally I'd still pick this drive over any Sandforce unless the SF is $20 cheaper, they've had a horrible compatibility and validation track record and performance with incompressible data is gonna be lower on SF drives.
The compatability issues were tied to the first gen SF-1200 controllers. They've long been fixed and gone with further revisions, even before reaching SF-2281.
As for "validation track record", all SF-2281 drives you see on the market are based on the SF-2281 reference PCB. They're all more or the less the same thing. Only with different firmware and flash.
FYI, as for SF's imcompressible data performance, you can turn off data compression in the SandForce firmware to boost it's imcompressible performance. Though, it'll slow down the drive in other areas since SandForce doesn't have cache and relies heavily on it's comprehension system.
What?? SF-2281 had widely published compatibility and BSOD issues thru a good chunk of this year (and last year), if anything the first gen controller seemed to suffer less over that... Even Intel's own SF-2281 spin wasn't entirely bug free and they actually offered refunds after one unfixable encryption bug was discovered.
What does the fact that all SF drives are the same even have to do with anything?? They have basic validation issues with the base firmware and their controller, regardless of the flash NAND used or the manufacturer (tho OCZ took the brunt of the bad PR hit).
Turning off compression would make any SF pointless, compression's their ace in the hole and part of what makes them competitive...
Except for Intel's founding of the controller's inability to encrypt AES 256-bit, the rest were mostly specific issues. SF-1200 has seen more shit than SF-2281 did. At this point, nearly all SF-2281's are shipping with the latest firmware and are completely problem-free.
Clearly not anymore as all of them have became a thing of past at this rate, now that all manufactorers have updated their firmware to the latest from SandForce.
Yes, I was just pointing out that it's possible to boost SandForce's writes.
Specific issues? Sure, specific issues that affected tons on people and it took them months to track down while people suffered reboots and other instability issues. They may have finally ironed it all out but I don't see why you would brush it under the carpet and make excuses for them... Every controller and manufacturer has had bugs but none were as pervasive as SF's (and few took as long to be addressed).
As far as SF is concerned I think the old saying applies perfectly... Fool me once, shame on you, fool me twice, shame on me. Regardless of whether all (known) issues were addressed or not, I still wouldn't touch a SF drive unless it was significantly cheaper (and even then I'd probably only use one as a secondary drive).
It's not even about the issues they had so much as how badly they handled it for months on end, I'm very forgiving of a problematic product if the company stands behind it and does right by customers, SF's fiasco was one of the worst examples of a company using customers and it's OEMs as glorified beta testers tho.
As far as SF is concerned I think the old saying applies perfectly... Fool me once, shame on you, fool me twice, shame on me. Regardless of whether all (known) issues were addressed or not, I still wouldn't touch a SF drive unless it was significantly cheaper (and even then I'd probably only use one as a secondary drive).
It's not even about the issues they had so much as how badly they handled it for months on end, I'm very forgiving of a problematic product if the company stands behind it and does right by customers, SF's fiasco was one of the worst examples of a company using customers and it's OEMs as glorified beta testers tho.
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Like I said, they've been a thing of past so I don't see why you were REFERRING to the things that don't anymore exist. In your first post, you were saying you wouldn't buy a SF-2281 drive over this because of the now non-existant, ironed out issues. So what was your point again?
I explained my point very clearly, I'm sorry if it seems to be flying over your head. I still wouldn't support or feel confident buying a product from a company that hasn't been around very long and has exhibited such poor practices, just my opinion.
If their drives were some kinda value marvel it'd be forgivable but when there's plenty of competition I'd rather spend my money elsewhere. This thread is about one such competing drive, what's your point again in coming to SF's defense within it? It's the Hot Deals board, not the Hot for SF boards...
If their drives were some kinda value marvel it'd be forgivable but when there's plenty of competition I'd rather spend my money elsewhere. This thread is about one such competing drive, what's your point again in coming to SF's defense within it? It's the Hot Deals board, not the Hot for SF boards...
SandForce has been in the market long enough to be considered. They didn't exhibit those "poor practices" on purpose. They're a small team so they don't have as much testing ways as, say, Micron. But that doesn't mean you should stay away from their products since all of their known problems have been fixed by far.
In my first reply to you, I merely pointed out that the SF issues you recalled don't exist anymore and SF-2281 drives ARE competition to the 840.
Drown Babies
Gawd
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To be fair pretty much every SSD manufacturer has had firmware issues (I even remember a firmware issue with seagate HDD's that bricked the drive 5 or 6 years ago). That Includes Intel and Samsung too. This series, the 840 and the 840-pro had pre-release firmware issues that bricked the drives.
http://www.anandtech.com/show/6503/second-update-on-samsung-ssd-840840-pro-failures
They are fixed now, but it takes a really long time to be sure they've cleared out all the issues.
http://www.anandtech.com/show/6503/second-update-on-samsung-ssd-840840-pro-failures
They are fixed now, but it takes a really long time to be sure they've cleared out all the issues.
Actually, it was 4 years ago, around 2008-2009. Happened to the Barracuda 7200.11's, and rendered the drive useless unless you updated it's firmware. Not only that, the 7200.11's were extremely unreliable and a massive portion of them died dramatically while giving out bad sectors and stuttering. When I went to a data center to shell out the big bucks, and have my data recovered from my 7200.11, the sheft was FULL of 7200.11's. That was the biggest drive fiasco that happened in the past years. It gave SeaGate a pretty bad name. Many now stay away from their drives because of the 7200.11 fiasco.
That particular 840 issue was easy to confirm was fully fixed, and I was actually reassured that Samsung caught it pre-release... But yeah, everyone's had some issues, even Intel (and not just with their SF drive); no one's had a debacle that lasted for months like SF tho (at least amongst the mayor players)... I just don't see the point in making excuses for them. It's totally irrelevant to the consumer whether they're a small team or not, etc.
Johnny here may not think past history is relevant, I happen to think it's very indicative of a lot of things. /shrug
Johnny here may not think past history is relevant, I happen to think it's very indicative of a lot of things. /shrug
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ccityinstaller
Supreme [H]ardness
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/Remove foot from mouth
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limitedaccess
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It isn't the same thing, the "T" does not stand for "toggle." TLC nand refers to "triple level cell" - http://www.anandtech.com/show/5067/understanding-tlc-nand
ccityinstaller
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