

32GB OCZ Core SATA II SSD $99 after Rebate
SSDs dip below $100




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RE: meh
By therealnickdanger on 9/9/2008 11:11:57 AM , Rating: 2
I've read and re-read the reviews repeatedly. Despite the "unacceptable" performance, the Core drives still manage to beat the Velociraptor in many benchmarks. I'm sorry, Anand is over-reacting a bit. I've seen these systems in operation - they behave very well in standard desktop operation. It's almost laughable that Anand is simulating 100% random writes as reasoning against these drives. Afterall, look at the AT review of the Core line several weeks ago:

Editors choice. It's not just AT either, there is a consensus among hardware review sites: the Core line offers noticeably improved system-wide performance. Clearly, the new Intel drive is a HUGE step beyond Core, but I don't think it's fair to count them out completely - especially at the right price.

RE: meh
By Zshazz on 9/9/2008 11:25:06 AM , Rating: 4
It's not just "simulations" being run that show this... The reason they were alerted to this problem was due to random pauses of nearly a second on certain easy tasks... such as sending an IM. The culprit was found to be things like updating a small log file.

I'm really sad at the news as well, but if you want to suffer through inconsistent performance, you're certainly allowed to. Just remember, peak performance makes nice-looking benchmarks, but people actually care about general performance and/or worst-case performance... these MLC drives simply aren't up to the task after you look at the fact that they fail at relatively simple real-world tasks. :(

RE: meh
By feraltoad on 9/9/2008 8:51:41 PM , Rating: 2

Well said! Who would choose a video card that was much faster when it came to maximum fps but with a minimum of 1 fps at times while gaming? In that scenario most people would choose a lower but steady frame rate. Imagine that freeze in COD4 right before u try 2 snipe someone running!

Although they are just unloading the things, I hope this signals a price drop for SSDs. If a company sold a 64gb SSD for under $200 they wouldn't be able to keep them on the shelves. Which is why they would charge more. :( Economics <sigh>...

RE: meh
By bhieb on 9/9/2008 11:28:47 AM , Rating: 2
I think your missing the reason for the concern. In benchmarks the drives look fine, but in actual real world usage you can tell a difference anytime there are more random writes than the buffer can handle. Sorry but most users heavily use their Web browser and IM client. And even if it is happening once or twice and hour it simply is not acceptable for the price premium/other small benefits.

It boils down to what you want most.

Battery Life/Ruggedness
- stick with a desktop drive the premium is not there.

Quick application starts
- SSD obviously has an edge here even the older MLC's beat a normal drive.

Overall better experience
- You won't get that from the older MLC. What difference does it make if your browser starts fast if it is pausing for up to a second randomly throughout the day. Sorry that is a complete failure compared to a normal drive.

This is a subjective category and for whatever reason a random pause is noticed by the user more than a steady slowness. You get quite used to your apps taking x number of seconds to load, but and unexplain random slowness will always impact your overall experience more.

RE: meh
By xsilver on 9/9/2008 12:05:49 PM , Rating: 2
well some poor sods have to buy them at least in order to reduce the prices further on the next generation drives! ;)

and they still are useful if you want durability/battery performance.
tough break though - the price point is very tempting although the size is still just a tad small for os install. 64gb is just about right. When that hits the $100 price point without this issue - I think the floodgates will open on sales.

RE: meh
By therealnickdanger on 9/9/2008 12:43:09 PM , Rating: 2

"Subjective" being the key word. Objectively, the reviews show these as lightning-fast drives. Subjectively, I didn't notice anything like what Anand mentioned on a system (Vista-32, 2GB RAM) running the 64GB Core and I did plenty of surfing. I did not use IM though (I rarely do anyway). What I did notice was a snappy responsiveness that I had never experienced prior.

Friday is payday and I'll likely purchase this drive. I'll keep investigating up to the very second I click the "purchase" button. I'm trying to encourage people not to just dismiss this drive - as powerful as Anand's comments can be. There is MUCH to benefit the common user with one of these. If your workload produces constant small, random writes, then this isn't the drive for you. It's inappropriate to call it "crap" however.

RE: meh
By TheLiberalTruth on 9/9/2008 1:56:16 PM , Rating: 1
Friday is payday and I'll likely purchase this drive.

By all means, buy it! We need suckers *ahem* I mean someone to buy up all these drives so the retailers can make room for new models that work right.

RE: meh
By Brandon Hill (blog) on 9/9/2008 1:33:10 PM , Rating: 5
You're quoting the wrong SSD drive. The drive in the review you point out is OCZ's SLC drive. SLC drives don't have the performance/stuttering issues. It is NOT the Core Series SSD which use MLC NAND flash.

The drive in question (and which is the subject of this article and Anand's review yesterday) is an MLC drive -- the Core Series.

RE: meh


RE: meh
By DigitalFreak on 9/9/2008 2:56:06 PM , Rating: 1
Hmm... Shall I trust the opinion of someone with the handle "therealdickdanger", or Anand?

Not really that difficult of a decision.

