Good choice for inexpensive SSD?

[Kneelbeforezod]

I found Dell Server 160Gb 2.5" SATA SSD DC III S3500 SSDSC2bb160G4T enterprise class MLC.

Is this a good choice for an inexpensive SSD rather than getting a cheapo Consumer SSD off Newegg? I need to do a low cost build for a dedicated video capture machine with 4570 cpu I've had for a while but not used yet. Just need a drive for W7 64 bitas the captured video goes to my NAS or workstation.

 

[BackupProphet]

Yeah its an excellent SSD drive, much better than the consumer alternatives. However you get 80GB more for just 7 bucks more.
Intel 240GB SSD DC S3500 Series 2.5" 6Gb/s SATA Enterprise Drive SSDSC2BB240G4

 

[christopher kuhn]

I dont have experience with the dell re branded drives but i have extensive working experience with the intel s3500s. Its always a leap with re branded drives but at the end of the day 60 bucks for a enterprise ssd.... I can tell you that i have set up many of these in raid 7 and 6 with no failures over the last 3 years (directly intel s3500 drives). not a single failure for 2 years and about 20 running with decent read write loads of a couple terabytes a week.

 

[christopher kuhn]

Yeah its an excellent SSD drive, much better than the consumer alternatives. However you get 80GB more for just 7 bucks more.
Intel 240GB SSD DC S3500 Series 2.5" 6Gb/s SATA Enterprise Drive SSDSC2BB240G4

this is an excellent deal

 

[Kneelbeforezod]

I dont have experience with the dell re branded drives but i have extensive working experience with the intel s3500s. Its always a leap with re branded drives but at the end of the day 60 bucks for a enterprise ssd.... I can tell you that i have set up many of these in raid 7 and 6 with no failures over the last 3 years (directly intel s3500 drives). not a single failure for 2 years and about 20 running with decent read write loads of a couple terabytes a week.

So you'd go with the S3500 over the Dell rebrand even though it doesn't have the 1 year warrant of the other?

 

[christopher kuhn]

You can always check the intel drives on there website. i have worked with intel RMA alot and they are really good. They honor there warranty's 100% and are solid when it comes to second owners. With that said i used the intel website to check these exact drives and there good through 2018

ISN (on drive): BTWL34250A56240NGN December 26, 2018
Intel® Warranty Center

That meens intel will accept RMAs on the drive until that posted date regardless if you are second owner or not but valid proof of purchase is required so they might want your ebay receipts. I wouldnt worry to much about SSDs. usualy if they work for 10 hours or more or you wrote 200TB to the drive you are more than likely good for the entire life of the drive wich for the s3500s is a REALLY REALLY long time. you will easily get 10 more years out of a lightly used ssd (<1tb a week).

EDIT: Basicaly this warranty will end jan 1 2019

 

[WeekendWarrior]

If you're willing to wait, you will probably be able to get the S3500 @240G for closer to $50 over even below $50 when purchased in quantities of 5-10 but this is a good deal for you if it's what you want/need at the time you want/need it. I've bought dozens of S3500 SSDs used in the last year and many other people use them readily - certainly over consumer SSDs.

 

[Kneelbeforezod]

If you're willing to wait, you will probably be able to get the S3500 @240G for closer to $50 over even below $50 when purchased in quantities of 5-10 but this is a good deal for you if it's what you want/need at the time you want/need it. I've bought dozens of S3500 SSDs used in the last year and many other people use them readily - certainly over consumer SSDs.

Right now just need one so not sure what I'd do with 5 or 10.

 

[WeekendWarrior]

Right now just need one so not sure what I'd do with 5 or 10.

Yeah, I've found that my storage needs grow in proportion to how much time I spent on this website. Give it time

 

[Patrick]

Of the ~160 used Intel SSDs we have in production with over 70,000 drive days, there have been zero failures. We did have a new ES drive fail during burn-in but that is a bit different. Check back on STH next week.

 

[christopher kuhn]

Of the ~160 used Intel SSDs we have in production with over 70,000 drive days, there have been zero failures. We did have a new ES drive fail during burn-in but that is a bit different. Check back on STH next week.

This mirriors my results in regards to my enviroment (except only up to +/- 7,000 drives). intel makes a good mlc ssd. What do you guys use for burn in? Just garbage dumping or a special program? I have some sandsik pros that i would love to test.

 

[Patrick]

This mirriors my results in regards to my enviroment (except only up to +/- 7,000 drives). intel makes a good mlc ssd. What do you guys use for burn in? Just garbage dumping or a special program? I have some sandsik pros that i would love to test.

Right now just doing power on/ off cycles plus IOmeter since just about everything gets benchmarked.

 

[fractal]

Yeah its an excellent SSD drive, much better than the consumer alternatives. However you get 80GB more for just 7 bucks more.
Intel 240GB SSD DC S3500 Series 2.5" 6Gb/s SATA Enterprise Drive SSDSC2BB240G4

Just got a couple of those 240's and dang are they nice.

Intel warranty through December 26, 2018

  9 Power_On_Hours  0x0032  100  100  000  Old_age  Always  -  13167
...
233 Media_Wearout_Indicator 0x0032  099  099  000  Old_age  Always  -  0
241 Total_LBAs_Written  0x0032  100  100  000  Old_age  Always  -  17821
242 Total_LBAs_Read  0x0032  100  100  000  Old_age  Always  -  1088421

what more can you ask for? Ok, ok, almost twice the capacity for a few dollars more on the NewEgg Toshibas. But still, for Intel SSD's? These are a decent buy.

 

[katit]

With all those deals it feels like some change coming in...

 

[christopher kuhn]

With all those deals it feels like some change coming in...

I bet its the wave of high capacity NVMe drives. now that nvme is 2tb+ range ssds are going to look old and slow. People are already starting to make the move. i am running a Samsung 950 m.2 and its really impressive, 2200 MB/s. People will still use ssds for gb/usd but there going to get even cheaper

 

[BackupProphet]

My guess is that it is very hard to sell enterprise SSD's to consumers and there probably are not enough enthusiasts like us to buy the wave of these SSD's. All consumer reviews focus mostly on sequential performance and iops performance for burst loads. Who wants to pay more for an Intel S3710 that looks much slower than Samsung 950 Pro?

I would love to buy more SSD's. But even while they are so cheap, I cannot justify spending that money. In most cases for me, more RAM helps a lot more.

 

[katit]

I'm done with SSDs too. I don't need much storage, mostly VMs. An I'm too looking at PCIe SSDs for next upgrade on my workstation