Makes me feel old.
Pros: This drive is ridiculous. To just say "it's fast" would be so inadequate as to be offensive. Gone are the days of launching BF3 then going into the kitchen to grab a drink and a snack, maybe take out the trash along the way. Now I can't get up to turn off the lights before I'm already in-game. (Not exaggerating)
With the current setting I am running on the Magician software, I'm actually getting higher Read/Write speeds then the drive advertises, I'm getting "559/534MBps" on the average of 5 tests. Although my IOPS are much less "68,621/62,456 IOPS", again that's due to my current configuration.
So far, this drive has been the epitome of my new build. Yes I do enjoy all the eye candy these games have to offer, but honestly, the ability to play and load this fast makes things so seamless that I wouldn't trade it for anything. (other than a couple "Titan's" that is)
On a more serious note; If you are debating between drives, buy what fits your needs and your budget. Any SSD will be astronomically faster than an HDD, after that you start getting into how much space you need and the reliability of the drives.
When Buying this drive, know that this is 100% Samsung. The NAND is manufactured by Samsung, so is the controller, the cache, the firmware and the software. This makes it extremely reliable (especially since they did it right). Why else would you get a 5yr Warranty on it?
Be sure to have AHCI and TRIM enabled when using an SSD and to set your power mode on "High Performance", or at least set the SSD to "Never turn off" otherwise the TRIM and Garbage collection won't operate to its proper potential. You want to make sure the drive is as fast at 95% Used Capacity as it was out of the box.
Cons: This thing makes me feel old and slow. It won't let me use the restroom or grab a drink between matches...
The price is still a bit high, grabbing an 830 at a good price would be a better investment IMO, but if you want those higher speeds, this drive won't disappoint.
Other Thoughts: On a different but earnest note, please stop rating products poorly on the sole basis that you received a device that was DOA. Maybe if you had 2 or 3 in a row sure... there could definitely be a fault with the product revision then.
Also please stop giving poor evaluations due to a lack of accessories, if you want them, pay more for the versions that come with them, just test the product and give you assessment based on performance and reliability rather than pent up frustration due to life and its everyday quirks. It doesn't help the community nor does it provide any valuable information to help people making an investment.
Nice to see Manufacturers still giving case badges.
Also, for those debating on which storage capacity to go with for gaming, I have Window's 7, BF3, Bioshock 2, War of Thunder, World of Tanks, Planet Side 2, Arma II/Operation Arrowhead, DayZ, along with 6GB of music and other misc programs and I'm sitting at 136GB free of 238GB
(Remember that "Over Provisioning" will set 10% aside to accommodate for NAND failure later down the road so you won't lose any information on the drive. Also to prolong the life of your drive, never fill the SSD completely, leave a few GB's on top of the Over Provisioning for TRIM and Garbage Collection.Read full review
