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Crucial M4 vs Mushkin Chronos Deluxe

H

HBP

Junior Member
So I searched for this before I posted, but a lot of the discussion revolves around price... recently these drives have been around the same price.

What would you take?

256GB Crucial M4 (Around $270ish)

Or a 240GB Mushkin Chronos Deluxe (Around $255ish)?

Basically comparing speed vs reliability. I think the Mushkin wins the speed department, while the Crucial is more reliable?
 
Mushkin will be faster (Sanforce SF-2281 + toggle nand). Even though most of the issues with sandforce are fixed I'd still choose the M4 for reliability if it was my main system.

I do have a SF-2281 based drive (async nand though). When I got it I was sorta expecting it to fail left, right and centre, but its been working great. Only issue i've had was a reboot coming out of sleep for the first time, I don't know if i'd blame the ssd cause every other time its been fine.
 
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I guess it's also an issue of 32mm NAND (Mushkin) vs 25mm NAND (Crucial)...

Hmm... this shouldn't have to be so hard!
 
I have a Crucial M4 64GB since Oct. Have had 0 issues, works like a champ. I also left it on the default firmware, there was some issues I saw on a crucial forum thread about the newest firmware so I just left it.
 
AlucardX said:
I have a Crucial M4 64GB since Oct. Have had 0 issues, works like a champ. I also left it on the default firmware, there was some issues I saw on a crucial forum thread about the newest firmware so I just left it.
Click to expand...

You might want to reconsider updating the firmware.

009 gave a considerable speed increase, while the latest 0309 fixed the 5000 hour issue.
 
HBP said:
I guess it's also an issue of 32mm NAND (Mushkin) vs 25mm NAND (Crucial)...

Hmm... this shouldn't have to be so hard!
Click to expand...

There is also the Corsair Performance Pro ssd which uses 32nm Toshiba toggle NAND with the same Crucial controller as the M4. Its faster than the M4 in writes ~400 MB/s vs ~260 MB/s but also more expencive.

Lotsa choices 😛
 
As far as speed, one thing to note might be how it reacts with data on the drive. A lot of SandForce drives seem to slow down quite a bit with data on the drive...the M4 doesn't. See this:

http://www.tomshardware.com/reviews/ssd-60gb-benchmark-review,3137-8.html

While that article mentions that the penalty is not nearly as big for a larger drive, I honestly don't know what the final outcome would be for the Mushkin. It might be faster across the board...but it's worth looking in to.
 
Blain said:
How did you arrive at that conclusion?
Click to expand...

http://www.tomshardware.com/reviews/ssd-review-benchmark,3139-6.html

Diogenes2 said:
Where do you see the M4 for $270ish ? I don't see it for less than $300 anywhere ..
Click to expand...

In Canada, TigerDirect had it at $309.99, Futureshop had it at $640. Futureshop pricematches and subtracts 10% of the difference. Would be around 270.

That said, I'm going to stick with the Mushkin. 32nm toggle NAND, faster longer lasting, new firmware fixes Sandforce issues (supposedly).
 
F1shF4t said:
There is also the Corsair Performance Pro ssd which uses 32nm Toshiba toggle NAND with the same Crucial controller as the M4. Its faster than the M4 in writes ~400 MB/s vs ~260 MB/s but also more expencive.

Lotsa choices 😛
Click to expand...

Yeah, it would be ideal but the only issue is the price. Was looking to stay around $1/GB.
 
Hmm...Tom's chart is interesting....It's got the m4 256 in Tier 3, but Anand's storage bench puts the M4 256 at the top of the heap, above several of the drives in Tier 1 in Tom's heirarchy chart.

http://www.anandtech.com/bench/SSD/65

Also, Tom's SSD chart for 2011 has the M4 256 scoring 706 on the AS SSD total score benchmark....my m4 128 scores a 762, and that's while operating as the OS drive and is over half full. Compared to his drive roundup charts, it would put my 128 M4 fifth overall...not exactly right in this comparison, so I'm wondering if he's got some issues with a few of his SSD setups.
http://www.tomshardware.com/charts/ssd-charts-2011/AS-SSD-Overall-Total-Score,2792.html

as_ssd1.jpg
 
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Sheesh Blain, he said he arrived at his conclusions based on Tom's charts . How could he be any more specific ?

This is where you could explain in your own words, if you disagree with the charts.
 
The charts don't measure reliability.

Like many people here, I'm always on the lookout for detailed information about hardware.
The better information I have, the better purchase decisions I can make.
My ears perked up when he mentioned that the Crucial was more reliable while the Mushkin had better performance.
I was curious as to how he arrived at those conclusions so I could investigate further.
 
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Blain said:
The charts don't measure reliability.

Like many people here, I'm always on the lookout for detailed information about hardware.
The better information I have, the better purchase decisions I can make.
My ears perked up when he mentioned that the Crucial was more reliable while the Mushkin had better performance.
I was curious as to how he arrived at those conclusions so I could investigate further.
Click to expand...

I think it's general SSD knowledge that the Marvell controller is more reliable than the Sandforce SF-2281 which has had numerous issues/failures (which were mostly before the more recent firmware upgrades).

It's also general SSD knowledge that a Sandforce Toggle NAND 32nm is faster than a Marvell Synchronous 25nm. This is backed up by numerous articles, reports, and tests on the web.

Hence, the m4 is more reliable, but the mushkin chronos deluxe is faster. Whether you agree with my conclusion or not, with any purchase of your own, your own research should be made! Hope that helps.
 
Jman13 said:
Hmm...Tom's chart is interesting....It's got the m4 256 in Tier 3, but Anand's storage bench puts the M4 256 at the top of the heap, above several of the drives in Tier 1 in Tom's heirarchy chart.

http://www.anandtech.com/bench/SSD/65

Also, Tom's SSD chart for 2011 has the M4 256 scoring 706 on the AS SSD total score benchmark....my m4 128 scores a 762, and that's while operating as the OS drive and is over half full. Compared to his drive roundup charts, it would put my 128 M4 fifth overall...not exactly right in this comparison, so I'm wondering if he's got some issues with a few of his SSD setups.
http://www.tomshardware.com/charts/ssd-charts-2011/AS-SSD-Overall-Total-Score,2792.html

as_ssd1.jpg
Click to expand...

I see your point. Lots of charts online put the Mushkin higher than the M4 in terms of performance though. I'm no expert behind all these benchmarks, I can simply process data from sources (that may or may not be biased). Also note that anandtech's chart is a bit dated, and compares against all these drives using the older SF-2200, and not the newer SF-2281 that they all now have. So perhaps that could make a difference. The tomshardware chart I showed you was updated a few days ago...


Check this one out:

http://thessdreview.com/our-reviews...ew-pcmark-vantage-comparison-and-the-verdict/
 
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Oh, I understand...I was just trying to say that I think something might be a little fishy with the SSD tests at Tom's Hardware, as my 128GB M4 shouldn't outperform the 256.

I think the hierarchy chart favors the Mushkin better because of the extra speed at sustained writes.
 
Jman13 said:
Oh, I understand...I was just trying to say that I think something might be a little fishy with the SSD tests at Tom's Hardware, as my 128GB M4 shouldn't outperform the 256.

I think the hierarchy chart favors the Mushkin better because of the extra speed at sustained writes.
Click to expand...

It's strange though, the 128 outperforms the 256 in the other review I showed in my last post as well...

Vantage-Overall-Highlighted.png
 
Jman13 said:
Oh, I understand...I was just trying to say that I think something might be a little fishy with the SSD tests at Tom's Hardware, as my 128GB M4 shouldn't outperform the 256.

I think the hierarchy chart favors the Mushkin better because of the extra speed at sustained writes.
Click to expand...

The 128GB flavor is actually faster in some read benchmarks due to the 256GB m4 using a 8KB nand page size, while the 128GB uses a 4KB nand page size.





felang said:
What about the Samsung SSD 830? Samsung drives are considered to be quite reliable.
Click to expand...

This, as well as Plextor's m3/m3 pro, which both use Toshiba 2xnm toggle nand.

Edit: in case you're curious about the M3. Shame it's not on sale anymore.

17621476.png


Sent from my HTC Eva 4G using Tapatalk
 
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Here is a my thought on the subject. Granted I don't have all the technical experience as many others here. This is a layman's view at your request.

Both drives are awesome. While benchmarks show the Mushkin is better in some areas the M4 is also better in other areas. Over all the Mushkin (since it is sandforce) benchmarks faster. As for reliability, the M4 is very reliable. Now where people say the Mushkin drive is not reliable or less reliable I believe is a pure lie. Where is the proof? What are they using to back up these statements? Because it is a Sandforce controller it is not reliable? I know the company Mushkin and they are top notch! They stand behind their products and have awesome support. Also I have not seen people complaining that the Chronos Deluxe is a bad drive or unreliable what so ever.

With all that said I think both drives are very very good and very much worth the $ you can get them for. THE MOST important thing of all and many people will say this...In real world use you would never tell which one is which. Pop either in your PC and use it and you have no idea which one it is unless you benchmark it. If it was my choice I'd save the $ and buy a Chronos Deluxe you won't be disappointed. If you go with the M4 you also won't be disappointed! Either way enjoy your new SSD!
 
i went with 2 mushkin's... I want instant loads in games. If I wanted reliability I'd still be using a commodore 64.
 
The big difference in the two drives, though isn't really in the read department, it's in the sustained write speed....I doubt there would be ANY perceptible difference in loading games or game levels with an M4 vs a Mushkin.
 
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