Looking for a speedy ssd

cdabc123

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Figured I would start this thread as there apears to be quite a few people who are very knowledgeable about ssds.

I'm looking to replace the 5 300gb sas ssds in raid 5 I'm running in my esxi box. (~800mbps reas, 800mbps write and a small cache)

I figured I would go with a nvme ssd as that appears to be the best route for a quick drive.

Looking for suggestions for the best cheap 1tb ssd that has decent endurance and speed

Also looking for recommendations for a ridiculously fast drive (1tb) somewhere under 200.

Are there any enterprise pcie ssds that still hold there own in regards to speed? (That can be found cheap on ebay)

Is a raid config with sas ssds still economically beneficial or is nvme the answer.

I'm looking to buy from either ebay or microcenter.
 
Why don't you go to Microcenter and see what they have, those guys can tell you which one is the fastest, and most likely they'll have whatever suggestion you get here.
Personally, I only go for Corsair now but had Western Digital, PNY, Sandisk, Mushkin, OCZ Toshiba, Crucial, Micron, but I will never buy Samsung.

Just know that the higher storage capacity, the higher the speed on NVMe drives, so a 1TB will be faster than a 500GB. I went for 1TB before but storage wise it was too much, so I revert back to using 500GB or less for my main drive, it certainly made no difference that I could see.


Just looking for some more details on drive differences as if I go to microcenter I'm buying the cheapest 1tb with decent numbers and I know it goes abit farther then that.

I'm also genuinely interested in seeing what the higher end 1tb drives can do speed wise
 
I wouldn't look at consumer sata ssd after working with enterprise sas models as the durability on the sas will generally be much better. Used sas ssds though have been harder to find cheap as of late though.
 
I wouldn't look at consumer sata ssd after working with enterprise sas models as the durability on the sas will generally be much better. Used sas ssds though have been harder to find cheap as of late though.
I will probably keep the sas raid array operating in this rig and can hit it with the backups/drive intensive stuff.

How do consumer nvme drive do running multiple vms simultaneously?
 
Just buy the Samsung SSD tier that you can afford and call it a day. They're the market leader for a reason.

I use 980 Pro x2 with my VMware ESXi setup and I've been really happy with it.
 
Im currently looking at a Inland Premium 1TB for $125, They seem to have a decent enderance?
 
Unless they pulled an Adata and changed the spec, the Inland Premium nvme should be a Phison E12 controller +DRAM and TLC NAND - arguably better endurance than QLC - but I'm not kidding when I say arguably. Personally I still prefer TLC but it's getting harder to find in the affordable range. It's a solid performer but I've read they run hot. Support if you need it will be minimal with Inland and it is unlikely you'll find any SSD toolkit from them for this drive. For 'Ludicrous Speed' nvme look at some of the full pcie 4 drives like the aformentioned 980 Pro.

My .02... Perhaps outdated now I'm a bit out of the loop these days.
 
I will probably keep the sas raid array operating in this rig and can hit it with the backups/drive intensive stuff.

How do consumer nvme drive do running multiple vms simultaneously?
Gotcha, makes sense.

From what I've read (no firsthand experience) is that they will work great for that since they are fast and that's really what you need for smooth vms.
 
I have 10 total 1TB Inland premium nvme’s with the e12 phison controller. They are all in various setups I own or have built over the years and still maintain. Never a single hiccup on any of them. And I bought them in person for $74 each when they went on sale the first year they came out. At the time of that sale, it was an amazing deal. I’d still pay over 100 for them anytime.
 
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Bad time to be looking for SSDs, with CHIA farmers buying most of the ssds that have decent endurance.
 
Bad time to be looking for SSDs, with CHIA farmers buying most of the ssds that have decent endurance.
It's okay. Once that currancy tanks, we'll have plenty of used half-worn on drives for deep discounts flooding the marking and swinging the prices the other way--just like for gpus. I actually am kicking myself for not picking up 1080Tis at a good price when they were cheap. Even if I couldn't use them, I could have turned around and sold them for such high profits the miners would be jealous. :LOL: In fact, if this cycle of pump and dump on the cyptos continues, I bet there will be a sub-market created of people who will buy the hardware when it's cheap and then unload it when it gets scarce again. And not the scalping stuff that's going on right now, but true, legit buying gtx980Tis for $99 and then selling them a year or two later for $250 and then picking them back up again for $79 and repeating the cycle.
 
alright I obtained the inland drive.

should I boot esxi off this drive or just use it for vms?

This rig already takes forever to boot thanks to a Dell perc 6i raid card
 
Add a small (64gb) SSD and use PrimeCache for the OS drive. You'll get insane boot up speeds. I spent money on an WD SN850 500gb M.2 drive because the Adata SX8200P wasn't running it's rated speeds. Found out Adata switched controllers in mid cycle and didn't tell consumers about the speed drop in performance. I get the SN850 and was also disappointed as it didn't reach it's rated 7k reads. Not even 6k. I could've kept using the Adata drive.

I have 2 raid-0 configs: (1 set for games drives, 1 set for media drives) off the mobo

So I installed PrimeCache and used an old 256gb SSD as the cache drive. I also have it configured as my games drive cache.
 

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alright I obtained the inland drive.

should I boot esxi off this drive or just use it for vms?

This rig already takes forever to boot thanks to a Dell perc 6i raid card
Forever to boot because of all the startup messages on the 6i? Otherwise I have a perc 5i, and even with an sas hdd, I definitely wouldn't call it slow and it feels quite peppy compared to sata.
 
I haven't used a raid card in ages. Last one was the RocketRaid. Yeah took a few to boot, but then I was using it as a boot up device.
 
Forever to boot because of all the startup messages on the 6i? Otherwise I have a perc 5i, and even with an sas hdd, I definitely wouldn't call it slow and it feels quite peppy compared to sata.
just startup messages. Come to think about it I have a battery for the thing I could plug in to get rid of some of the messages and use the cache again.

The raid 5 of sas ssd's really isnt terribly slow. This nvme is just really quick :p
 
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just startup messages. Come to think about it I have a battery for the thing I could plug in to get rid of some of the messages and use the cache again.

The raid 5 of sas ssd's really isnt terribly slow. This nvme is just really quick :p
Yeah makes sense. Oh yeah that backup battery and enabling write back definitely helps--just keep the whole thing on a ups. Yeah, I definitely hear you. But anything that transfers 1GB/sec is fast in my book now. :D
 
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