Vertex or Intel

[BTRY B 529th FA BN]

So, what is the consensus between the Vertex or Intel SSD for a 24/7 machine? I need 60g minimum. My old SCSI Maxtor Atlas 15k 34G drive is almost full...

It will only be day to day usage. Encoding vids, forums, email, ripping DVD's CD's...

Thanks for your time,

529th

 

[daw123]

I've got a 60GB OCZ Vertex sitting on my desk ready to be installed, so I would be interested to hear what others say.

For me, the reason I bought the Vertex was because of the cost; an 80GB Intel X25-M is £100 more expensive than the Vertex (I got the Vertex for £180 and the cheapest I could get the X25-M for was £280). Hence on a £/GB basis its about 17% more expensive in the UK.

What's your budget BTRY - are you looking for the 250GB Vertex or the 64GB Intel X-25-E? (both are about £600 )

 

[BTRY B 529th FA BN]

Well, if I don't sell off some of this stuff I have, and I have alot actually. Just haven't put it up on the FS forums yet; then I would feel really guilty buying a 300$ drive (but that would wear off soon) I'd like to get another UD3R for the NIB Q9650 I still have sitting around. Whats really stupid is I have a 300G Vraptor that I just formatted and compared against my Fujitsu MBA 330NP SCSI. Either or I guess. I know one drive is better in areas the other isn't but technically I'm not sure at what... I think I just have an upgrade itch/thoughts i'm trying to scratch... What made you choose your Vertex over the Intel?

EDIT: i wouldn't want to spend much over 300$

 

[daw123]

If you only want to spend $300, then the 80GB X-25M is going to be very close to your budget.

NewEgg prices:
Intel X25-M SSDSA2MH080G1 80GB SATA II MLC Internal Solid state disk (SSD) - Retail $315 after $10 saving (expires 31/5). Free shipping.
OCZ Vertex Series OCZSSD2-1VTX60G 2.5" 60GB SATA II MLC Internal Solid state disk (SSD) - Retail $200 after $20MIR + shipping.

I'm sure you can do better than the above prices if you shop around.

 

[daw123]

Oh I forgot to add. If you haven't already read this article, then I suggest you do. It is long-winded but very informative.

http://www.anandtech.com/stora...owdoc.aspx?i=3531&p=31

 

[BTRY B 529th FA BN]

From what I've heard, the Vertex takes some tinkering with before its optimized. It has to be aligned, flashed, etc. Is that correct? using vista 64 btw

 

[BTRY B 529th FA BN]

Yup, I'm gonna wait, thanks for the link Daw. Whats the status of the i7950?

 

[taltamir]

the vertex needs constant firmware upgrades, intel needs an occasional one as well...
with the intel you just run a tool which does a live upgrade...

with the vertex you MUST plug it as a SECONDARY drive with another drive running windows, and then when it upgrades the firmware it destroys all the data. that is quite a pain and a big negative for the vertex i think.

if keeping a spare running system or a spare HDD and doing all this work to upgrade the vertex every time (both are expected to release a trim enabled firmware SOON) is worth the price difference, than go ahead...

Intel has much more IO speed and random write speed, but the vertex has faster sequential read and write speed... and both are blazing fast.

 

[ochadd]

I've got a 60GB vertex sitting in the laptop next to me with the 1275 firmware. I can say that it does slow down with use, noticably slower but still loads faster than the 7200 rpm laptop drive that came with it. Boot times have gone up about 3 seconds but applications load times like Acrobat reader, outlook, and excel are still near instant. I've only had the drive for a month but it's been flogged hard as a SQL server DB drive, PST repairs, and dozens of IOmeter tests.

The Intel drive is a little faster than the Vertex and from the dozens of reviews and shootouts I've read, performs significantly better than a Vertex in a used state.

If I had to do it over again I'd have gone with Intel even if there was a $150 premium. This is one of the areas where a massive R&D department really pays off. I still love the Vertex but the grass is always greener...

 

[daw123]

Originally posted by: BTRY B 529th FA BN
Yup, I'm gonna wait, thanks for the link Daw. Whats the status of the i7950?

Still waiting for it to be released; it could be this week, next week, next month, next year, next decade... you get the idea.

 

[BTRY B 529th FA BN]

sorry to hear that

 

[daw123]

Originally posted by: BTRY B 529th FA BN
sorry to hear that

Thanks.

I'm just fed up with shops changing the ETA on a daily basis (for the last 4 weeks). Latest was 3/6/09, although that will probably change tomorrow to 4/6/09.

 

[sgrinavi]

Originally posted by: taltamir
the vertex needs constant firmware upgrades, intel needs an occasional one as well...
with the intel you just run a tool which does a live upgrade...

.

It doesn't need constant firmware upgrades, depending on the what comes on the drive you may never have to do it. Even if you do it only takes about a minute.

 

[Syzygies]

By chance I have both an OCZ Vertex 60 GB, and an Intel X25-M 80 GB, with identical contents, side by side in an Addonics 4 x 2.5" disk array bay device (highly recommended) as internal SATA drives in my EFi-X homebuilt Intel box.

Each drive has the latest firmware. This is crucial.

I ran XBench on both drives, under OS X. The overall scores were virtually identical. However, the Intel X25-M has double the random performance, offset by better sequential performance for the Vertex.

The Intel drive is going back to Intel, as explained in this thread, but the replacement is going back into my MacBook, momentarily. I'd buy either again, with the edge to the X25-M.

 

[GarfieldtheCat]

Originally posted by: sgrinavi

Originally posted by: taltamir
the vertex needs constant firmware upgrades, intel needs an occasional one as well...
with the intel you just run a tool which does a live upgrade...

.

It doesn't need constant firmware upgrades, depending on the what comes on the drive you may never have to do it. Even if you do it only takes about a minute.

I agree...I have both drives to play with, and haven't had to flash either drive.

I have tried both as my boot/OS/app drive, each for about one week. I don't really notice a difference between the two, but I don't do benchmarks on them. They are fast and quiet though!

 

[SolMiester]

Originally posted by: ochadd
I've got a 60GB vertex sitting in the laptop next to me with the 1275 firmware. I can say that it does slow down with use, noticably slower but still loads faster than the 7200 rpm laptop drive that came with it. Boot times have gone up about 3 seconds but applications load times like Acrobat reader, outlook, and excel are still near instant. I've only had the drive for a month but it's been flogged hard as a SQL server DB drive, PST repairs, and dozens of IOmeter tests.

The Intel drive is a little faster than the Vertex and from the dozens of reviews and shootouts I've read, performs significantly better than a Vertex in a used state.

If I had to do it over again I'd have gone with Intel even if there was a $150 premium. This is one of the areas where a massive R&D department really pays off. I still love the Vertex but the grass is always greener...

I am so waiting for better prices of the Intel E SSD, I want to use this in our ESX servers for SQL BB's as well!

Not sure how they will mount in 2.5"drive bays though!

 

[taltamir]

Originally posted by: sgrinavi

Originally posted by: taltamir
the vertex needs constant firmware upgrades, intel needs an occasional one as well...
with the intel you just run a tool which does a live upgrade...

.

It doesn't need constant firmware upgrades, depending on the what comes on the drive you may never have to do it. Even if you do it only takes about a minute.

i meant they keep releasing major new versions... either fixing major bugs or giving serious speed improvements... you don't HAVE to update the firmware on either drive in either case, but it is highly recommended... and its not "constant" in that you have to reflash with the same firmware every X months... I figured that was obvious though.

 

[ochadd]

Originally posted by: SolMiester

Originally posted by: ochadd
I've got a 60GB vertex sitting in the laptop next to me with the 1275 firmware. I can say that it does slow down with use, noticably slower but still loads faster than the 7200 rpm laptop drive that came with it. Boot times have gone up about 3 seconds but applications load times like Acrobat reader, outlook, and excel are still near instant. I've only had the drive for a month but it's been flogged hard as a SQL server DB drive, PST repairs, and dozens of IOmeter tests.

The Intel drive is a little faster than the Vertex and from the dozens of reviews and shootouts I've read, performs significantly better than a Vertex in a used state.

If I had to do it over again I'd have gone with Intel even if there was a $150 premium. This is one of the areas where a massive R&D department really pays off. I still love the Vertex but the grass is always greener...

I am so waiting for better prices of the Intel E SSD, I want to use this in our ESX servers for SQL BB's as well!

Not sure how they will mount in 2.5"drive bays though!

The difference in response time is unbelievable. Our main production database is about 80% small writes and 20% reads but those reads are simply massive. Tens of thousands of records being accessed for reporting purposes. What was easily a 10 second wait came up instantly. I've never had as much actual fun with a peice of hardware.

I don't trust it in a full on production environment but when SLC drives become more reasonable and a little larger our databases will all be running on them.

 

[BTRY B 529th FA BN]

@ ochadd - so what would you recommend for a 24/7 desktop machine?

 

[ochadd]

Originally posted by: BTRY B 529th FA BN
@ ochadd - so what would you recommend for a 24/7 desktop machine?

I'd go with Intel if I was buying right now. My equipment usually lasts two years though and I'd put my money on Intel over anyone else in the business for reliability. If you are the person that upgrades every 6 months I'd go with a 30-64gb Indilinx based drive and just sell/ditch it around Christmas time or the beginning of 2010 when things will be much bigger and faster.

 

[BTRY B 529th FA BN]

Thanks for the suggestion

 

[taltamir]

so which did you get?

 

[BTRY B 529th FA BN]

I have one hangup. I have a new just formatted only, VRaptor 300 that I bought to do some benches against my Fujitsu MBA 300NP SCSI 15k drive which generally they both are about the same except for the VRaptors burst rates, which are around 180mb/s compared to 115mb/s... anyways, my dilemma involves a few things. First to change drives would probably require a re-install (no fun) I am also thinking of plopping in my Q9650 to this P5Q Premium board which is fine but would be funner on a UD3R. So, that will require a reinstall if I decide to get one later; as you may know by now, i'm not a big fan of re-installing a 24/7 machine. The initial install isn't bad with the updates but its customizing it to how I have things now is APITA - I do like having extra peripherals laying around for that 'in case i need it' one day... So, before I have to do a re-install, i guess now the question is teh Vraptor or the Intel?

 

[taltamir]

so.. neither?

 

[BTRY B 529th FA BN]

Either the Vraptor I have or teh Intel.