Best Inexpensive SSD for a Macbook Pro?

[z28dreams]

Hi all,

I'm mostly looking at these 3 budget SSD's in the 256gb range:

Samsung 840 (non-pro)
Plextor M5S
Corsair Neutron
Crucial m500

I was leaning towards the 840 since it seemed to have some of the better benchmarks, but I've read that flashing new firmware is a bit of a pain on OSX (you need to burn an image on a DVDRW).

Any strong preference between these 4 or another I might be forgetting?

 

[Cerb]

Are you using at least OS X Lion? If so, the 840 is the one, or the more expensive 840 Pro, if you want the best. It will give slightly worse write performance than the Plextor, but otherwise similar light usage performance, and will offer the least average power consumption of the bunch.

If you have at least Lion, you can enable TRIM, which will fix the one issue of the 840 series, that GC w/o TRIM leads to crap performance over time (with TRIM enabled, it will maintain like-new performance throughout its life). For Lion, there's a nifty GUI program called TRIM Enabler, or you can just copy and paste shell scripts (at least for Mountain Lion).

The Neutron and M500 will be a bit faster, but only if you push them. They will also consume much more average power, so if you run with your battery, it would even be worth spending a little more on the Samsung, even though it should actually be the cheapest.

 

[gpse]

Samsung 840, I have a Samsung 840 PRO in my Mac Pro Desktop, works great!

 

[MontyAC]

You can get a Samsung 840, 250 GB, for a sale price of $150.

 

[Mgz]

get a slightly used Samsung 830 , u can get it for about less than Samsung 840 250 GB, but it is faster, has more storage, and is a MLC so more durable. that is what I have done. Bought a Samsung 830 256 GB for 130$, with only 3.1 TB written.

 

[z28dreams]

get a slightly used Samsung 830 , u can get it for about less than Samsung 840 250 GB, but it is faster, has more storage, and is a MLC so more durable. that is what I have done. Bought a Samsung 830 256 GB for 130$, with only 3.1 TB written.

I'd love to pick up a cheap 830. How were you able to verify that only 3.1TB were written on it?

Actually, come to think of it, 3TB sounds like quite a bit on a 250gb drive. It basically had been written over completely 12 times.

 

[Germanic]

Get the normal Samsung 840. Seriously don't get a used 830...

If you want the best bang for buck speeds the 840 non-pro is the way to go. The 840 has almost the same read speeds as the 840 Pro but significantly lower write speeds.

However most non-professionals would only need to consider read speeds.

 

[dave_the_nerd]

I'd love to pick up a cheap 830. How were you able to verify that only 3.1TB were written on it?

Actually, come to think of it, 3TB sounds like quite a bit on a 250gb drive. It basically had been written over completely 12 times.

Yeah, but their write endurance is a bunch of thousands. That's, like, 99.5% new or something.

 

[aviator78]

You never know what the user did with the drive. I would get a 840.

 

[z28dreams]

It looks like Samsung just released an 840 evo, which is a faster version of the regular 840.

I'm going to keep my eye out for that and try to time buying it with the release of OSX Mavericks I think.

 

[royo]

The 840 Evo MSRP seems higher than the current price for a 840 non-pro.

 

[z28dreams]

The 840 Evo MSRP seems higher than the current price for a 840 non-pro.

That's suggested MSRP though - products almost always sell for lower. For example, PCMag says that the current 840 non-pro has an MSRP of $190, but regularly goes for $150 on sale.

 

[Cerb]

The 840 Evo MSRP seems higher than the current price for a 840 non-pro.

That's normal, and if the performance improvements actually pan out, could be worth it (actual price will be lower than MSRP, but if they keep selling the non-Evo models, probably slightly more).