Would it really matter to buy a high performance SSD compared to a mediocre SSD?

[Battousai01]

Hi guys, I am choosing between a Samsung EVO SSD and Kingston V300, I have read reviews and there are reviews saying that Kingston SSDs are not performing as fast as Samsung's but the question is, since they are both SSDs running SATA III, will it matter if I bought a Samsung EVO over a Kingston? will I notice a "noticeable" difference in performance when playing casual games and doing everyday work?

If in the real world there's not much of a noticeable performance difference then should choosing the cheaper Kingston SSD be a better choice?

 

[Battousai01]

Hi guys, just an update, searched google and found an entry in Quora with the same question I have, what's your opinion guys?

https://www.quora.com/Solid-State-D...e-be-noticeable-difference-in-Samsung-850-EVO

Lastly, compared about lifespan what SSD last longer, Samsung or Kingston?

 

[Cerb]

Yes, it will matter. Bootup will be about as quick with either, but for the rest, the V300 with async NAND is noticeably slower than most other SSDs (source: experience). There are plenty of other good SSDs to choose from...choose one that won't have a risk of coming with async NAND.

Lastly, compared about lifespan what SSD last longer, Samsung or Kingston?

N/A. Unless you're doing something with them you shouldn't be, like running a 100Mb+ average traffic BT peer, running a heavy-hit OLTP database, etc., you're either going to never have a problem, have a firmware problem, or some retention/bad block problem. These are not the sorts of issues you are going to be able to predict, with any drive that has decent reputation.

If you were to end up with a failing chip, or get stuck with corruption/bricking from a firmware bug, etc., no matter how it may look in hindsight, it's not something you can do anything about right now, short of paying much more for an enterprise-platform-based SSD (such an Intel 730). SSD or HDD, back up any important data on a regular basis, and move on.

 

[Ketchup]

I have had an SSD for almost two years, and have installed three others within that time period, and I have to say that as far as the drive goes, I really can't notice a difference.

The drives were one Kingston (can't remember the model) and three Crucials (two MX100s and a BX200).

Did I time them? No. But remember when you were doing something heavy and waiting for the hard drive to respond? Yeah, that NEVER happened with either of those, which is good enough for me.

 

[tweakboy]

You wont tell a difference..... bit slower of course...

 

[nerp]

For casual use, no, you won't notice much of a difference. I would still spend the extra few bucks for the Samsung part, though. They are currently using superior flash chips and controllers. There are other factors worth considering beyond speed.

 

[Ranulf]

The Samsung is the better drive overall. So far the 850 seems fine but they had issues with the last gen, 840 EVO. The Kingston... well search for the V300 here on the forums and their nand swap debacle.

Having used/owned both (and the 840evo) I would look at the prices and how much you have/want to spend. If the V300 is $20 cheaper and you're on a tight budget I could go with that for a light use, budget machine. A daily driver with important data, I'd rather spend the extra for the samsung 850. Under no circumstances buy a cheap 840 evo if that is still out there.

 

[MustISO]

If you're on a tight budget $100 for 480GB isn't bad at all:
http://forums.anandtech.com/showthread.php?t=2468221

 

[poohbear]

The Samsung is the better drive overall. So far the 850 seems fine but they had issues with the last gen, 840 EVO. The Kingston... well search for the V300 here on the forums and their nand swap debacle.

Having used/owned both (and the 840evo) I would look at the prices and how much you have/want to spend. If the V300 is $20 cheaper and you're on a tight budget I could go with that for a light use, budget machine. A daily driver with important data, I'd rather spend the extra for the samsung 850. Under no circumstances buy a cheap 840 evo if that is still out there.

Well they fixed all the issues with firmware updates. I have no problem with my 840 Evos & I had them for about 2 years.

 

[JimmiG]

Evo 850 500GB:

V300 480 GB:

I really don't notice any difference at all launching games and applications from either drive. I've never tried the V300 as my boot/system drive, though. It's only being used for applications and games.

Usually, better drives like the 850 Evo are only slightly more expensive than the V300, BX200 and other low-end drives. In that case it might be worth it to spend the extra $10 - 15 for better performance, even if the gain is mostly theoretical.

 

[Cerb]

V300 480 GB:

Which NAND? Still, people normally are going for the smaller ones, and the 120GB and 240GB are pretty slow even for 120GB and 240GB drives.

 

[razel]

You will not notice a difference unless you benchmark all day. Between your two choices, I'd go with the Samsung 850 EVO, especially the newer 40+ layer NAND revision that Allyn from PCPER has tested not just because it's the best SSD out there latency wise for SATA, but because it comes with a 5 year warranty. Last that I checked you're lucky if you get 3 years from Kingston.

 

[Leyawiin]

In run-of-the-mill daily usage (browsing, games) I don't notice a difference between SATA II and SATA III SSDs (and I have six of them total - all different brands and different specs). Any are better than a HDD (and that's the noticeable jump). If you're not doing massive file transfers on a regular basis its unlikely you'll notice either.

 

[Cerb]

In run-of-the-mill daily usage (browsing, games) I don't notice a difference between SATA II and SATA III SSDs (and I have six of them total - all different brands and different specs). Any are better than a HDD (and that's the noticeable jump). If you're not doing massive file transfers on a regular basis its unlikely you'll notice either.

A U110 was better, too, but I'd still have spent more for any PC that wasn't an appliance, not already having bought it. It can do things like slow down noticeably during virus scans and background updates, FI, when a nearly-as-cheap Sandisk SSD Plus won't. The price difference is one decent meal out, or less.

 

[redzo]

Read performance aside, the 840 evo is faster than most if not all the new budget drives released recently. I find this embarrassing since the 840 evo didn't brake any records at launch to begin with.
At this point in time I would expect all manufacturers of budget ssds to swap nand regularly except for the ones directly linked with nand manufacturing.

 

[dave_the_nerd]

Whether or not you'll notice the difference depends on whether or not your application/use-case is bottlenecked by storage.

Read performance aside, the 840 evo is faster than most if not all the new budget drives released recently. I find this embarrassing since the 840 evo didn't brake any records at launch to begin with.
At this point in time I would expect all manufacturers of budget ssds to swap nand regularly except for the ones directly linked with nand manufacturing.

Yup. Although I don't think it's really embarrassing. Manufacturers figured out where "fast enough" was and have focusing their efforts on driving prices down. For most consumers, that's a better scenario than a race for the fastest devices at any cost.

Every day we come closer to SSDs as standard in cheapo wal-mart laptops. That's a good thing.

 

[jhansman]

I'll throw in my $.02 this way: today I found the 500GB 850 EVO for $120 on Slickdeals (and you can too). This is $15 less than I paid for mine, and I thought I got a great deal. For that price, the performance you get (assuming your processor and RAM can keep up) is a no brainer.

 

[grimpr]

I buy only MLC ssd's with low latency like the ARC 100 and the Sandisk Extreme Pro and the Ultra II, they're snappier to everyday use.

 

[nerp]

I have experience with the Sandisk Ultra II and it is very snappy. Good drive. Tough to tell the difference with the Samsung EVO in day-to-day use.

 

[VirtualLarry]

Every day we come closer to SSDs as standard in cheapo wal-mart laptops. That's a good thing.

Not if they've been so cost-reduced, that they are barely better than an HDD, in terms of both performance and reliability. (Crucial BX200, I'm looking at you.)

 

[VirtualLarry]

I buy only MLC ssd's with low latency like the ARC 100 and the Sandisk Extreme Pro and the Ultra II, they're snappier to everyday use.

The Ultra II is TLC, with an SLC-mode write cache feature.

 

[MongGrel]

Sammy EVO's in general have been pretty much one of the go to SSD's awhile now, the first time I even bought SSD's bought a couple and put them in a RAID 0, they have been running fast awhile now. I had been watching SSD reviews for years before I even bought two.

Still have a hardware RAID card here with 4 WD RE3's for storage, with those.

Have bought a few Crucial's in the not too far past when I built the HTPC, and a friends computers OS drive went down, and rebuilt theirs.

They loved the upgrade.

 

[bononos]

Hi guys, I am choosing between a Samsung EVO SSD and Kingston V300, I have read reviews and there are reviews saying that Kingston SSDs are not performing as fast as Samsung's but the question is, since they are both SSDs running SATA III, will it matter if I bought a Samsung EVO over a Kingston? will I notice a "noticeable" difference in performance when playing casual games and doing everyday work?

If in the real world there's not much of a noticeable performance difference then should choosing the cheaper Kingston SSD be a better choice?

The V300 isn't just mediocre, its bad. That model got alot of flak for switching to a slower nand.
According to the AT follow up article the async V300 performance is noticeablely worse according to some real world testing. Since there are other cheap ssd including mlc ones that are faster for about the same price, it would be better to get something else.

 

[dave_the_nerd]

Not if they've been so cost-reduced, that they are barely better than an HDD, in terms of both performance and reliability. (Crucial BX200, I'm looking at you.)

The BX200 is a mediocre SSD, but it's still light years ahead of a spinner.

We've come a long way since the Crucial V4.

 

[hojnikb]

The BX200 is a mediocre SSD, but it's still light years ahead of a spinner.

We've come a long way since the Crucial V4.

Yep, V4 was pretty shitty (well, not as bad as JM601 drives). But still better than 5400rpm drives.