SSD performance difference between low and higher priced.

[Caminetto]

We have a Dell Vostro 3450 laptop and want to replace the hard drive with a SSD. I have been looking at the lower end of the SSD market thinking that is the way to go since the laptop is not used everyday.
However I am going to the trouble of replacing the HD in this bastard laptop that needs a complete disassembly to get to the HD. So, will there be much of a real world difference in ones priced at around $60 and those priced a little higher?

 

[dave_the_nerd]

The fastest SATA SSD is maybe twice as fast as the slowest one overall, depending on the benchmark.

But they're all fast enough that you probably won't notice the difference.

 

[Insert_Nickname]

But they're all fast enough that you probably won't notice the difference.

Since this is going in a laptop, I'd take a good look at the power consumption numbers on the particular drive at the particular capacity you're looking for. For mobile that's just as important as absolute performance.

 

[dave_the_nerd]

Since this is going in a laptop, I'd take a good look at the power consumption numbers on the particular drive at the particular capacity you're looking for. For mobile that's just as important as absolute performance.

Fair. I still assume (probably incorrectly) that most laptop owners are using their laptops as thin'n'light desktop systems, on AC like 95% of the time.

 

[hal2kilo]

Fair. I still assume (probably incorrectly) that most laptop owners are using their laptops as thin'n'light desktop systems, on AC like 95% of the time.

That's a roger.

 

[jimbob200521]

Benchmarks are in large synthetic. Get one that fits what you need as far as size, pick a reputable brand, and be happy. Real world says most of the time you won't notice much, if any, of a difference. If you are a regular desktop user (no video editing, high end gaming, etc) then just about any drive will do you. Samsung, Intel, Corsair, and a few others are solid drives.

 

[Caminetto]

Here are 4 (240 GBs) priced fairly low at Amazon right now. Any stand out in this group.

https://smile.amazon.com/dp/B00S9Q9...olid=2H2F2XHZ6FHQ0&coliid=IYDIMCC5RE0KN&psc=1

https://smile.amazon.com/dp/B019H3B...lid=2H2F2XHZ6FHQ0&coliid=I17HQWJIM3NSQB&psc=1

https://smile.amazon.com/dp/B016JRE...lid=2H2F2XHZ6FHQ0&coliid=I1I2Z129R013AO&psc=1

https://smile.amazon.com/dp/B013J7Q...lid=2H2F2XHZ6FHQ0&coliid=I2WYXF82H8PHNG&psc=1

 

[wpcoe]

Doing a quick Google of the Dell Vostro 3450, it appears to be a Sandy Bridge era laptop with an HM67 chipset, which might only support SATA-2 (3 Gbps), and if so, none of the higher speed SSDs would see their potential. You'd be capped a roughly 250 Mbps sequential read/write speed.

Oops. I was confusing PCIe 2 with SATA-2. nevermind....

 

[LTC8K6]

http://www.tomshardware.com/reviews/ssd-recommendation-benchmark,3269.html#p2
https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B01974UGNA/ref=s9_hps_bw_g147_i5

 

[Caminetto]

Thanks guys.
I’m going with the PNY CS1311. Great reviews at Amazon plus excellent power consumption numbers from the 4/15/16 Anandtech review.

 

[dave_the_nerd]

Doing a quick Google of the Dell Vostro 3450, it appears to be a Sandy Bridge era laptop with an HM67 chipset, which might only support SATA-2 (3 Gbps), and if so, none of the higher speed SSDs would see their potential. You'd be capped a roughly 250 Mbps sequential read/write speed.

Oops. I was confusing PCIe 2 with SATA-2. nevermind....

You're not always wrong though.

FWIW, while there are a lot of SATA-2 laptops out there (which, you're correct, does bottleneck sequential speeds on SATA-3 SSDs) a lot of the benefit the end user comes from the random I/O performance boost, where SSDs beat HDDs by a couple orders of magnitude, even with "slow" SATA-2.

If the only benefit to SSDs was sequential performance, we'd all still be rocking RAID arrays.

 

[Ranulf]

However I am going to the trouble of replacing the HD in this bastard laptop that needs a complete disassembly to get to the HD.

Heh. I hate those types of laptops. I wonder what the designers were thinking. One of the most often replaced items in laptop and they make it a 1-2 hour job minimum. I have a 2010 Dell Inspirion with the same issue. I decided two years ago it wasn't worth the effort unless the HD started going south or actually died.

Every laptop I look at now, I have to see the tech manual or a video showing access to the drive being easy for replacement.

 

[Caminetto]

Heh. I hate those types of laptops. I wonder what the designers were thinking. One of the most often replaced items in laptop and they make it a 1-2 hour job minimum. I have a 2010 Dell Inspirion with the same issue. I decided two years ago it wasn't worth the effort unless the HD started going south or actually died.

Every laptop I look at now, I have to see the tech manual or a video showing access to the drive being easy for replacement.

Yep. Although I pretty much have decided on the PNY CS1311, the extra $30 for a Samsung EVO still is on my mind as I don't ever want to go through complete breakdown again. (I replaced a failed HDD once already in this laptop and hated every minute).

 

[BonzaiDuck]

I know well this issue about an old laptop with SATA2. I put a 500GB Crucial MX100 on an eight-year-old lappie. The benchmarks show the limitation to 300MB/s. That was my impetus to add 4GB of RAM = 8, run the 90-day trial version of PrimoCache, and decide that it was all more wonderful than the 500GB WD Blue lappie disk.

And now I see wpcoe's correction. Certainly, newer laptops would have SATA3 controllers. But there are a lot of older laptops still in the hands of original owners or sold on the refurb market.