# Samsung 870 QVO 4 TB - your thoughts?



## wheresmycar (Dec 3, 2021)

I want to swap my intermittently loud HD for a SSD. I already have a fast Sammy 970 for my system drive but now looking to pick up larger capacity secondary storage for images, videos, backups, etc. I know, HD's are cost effectively fantastic but honestly i just prefer a dead silent SSD.

The Samsung 870 QVO (4 TB) is currently available for £287 on Amazon (UK). Is this a decent unit for the intended purpose?


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## GerKNG (Dec 3, 2021)

i have two of them.
as long as you only want to read from them they are "okay". otherwise they are absolute trash (literally the worst SSD on the market... slower than a BX300)

rather look for a TLC SSD (the 4 TB MX500, Sandisk 3D Ultra (which is a WD Blue) or a WD Blue) 
rather pay a few bucks more and enjoy 5X the write speed. (the SLC Cache gets much slower and smaller when you have it filled even just like 25%)


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## Quigly (Dec 3, 2021)

It seems fit for purpose. Good TBW rating and 3 year warranty if I read that right.

No idea about the price per se, but it will do the job admirably and you can't beat the noise level / power consumption. 

You might also consider looking at a 4tb laptop spinner if you're price conscious, they tend to be pretty quiet and run probably half the cost (if you don't mind the speed reduction and have 15mm clearance - they're very tall drives). I've got a seagate 4tb 2.5" (Seagate ST4000LM016-1N2170) for the same purpose (caveat: i have a synology NAS for safe backup, this is more storage / redundancy).


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## chrcoluk (Dec 3, 2021)

wheresmycar said:


> I want to swap my intermittently loud HD for a SSD. I already have a fast Sammy 970 for my system drive but now looking to pick up larger capacity secondary storage for images, videos, backups, etc. I know, HD's are cost effectively fantastic but honestly i just prefer a dead silent SSD.
> 
> The Samsung 870 QVO (4 TB) is currently available for £287 on Amazon (UK). Is this a decent unit for the intended purpose?


Depends how often the backups are down as backups are write heavy.  Keep the drive powered up all (or most) of the time as well.

Are you limited on SATA ports/caddies? or you just prefer to have all the capacity on a single drive?


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## newtekie1 (Dec 3, 2021)

It's a decent drive for the purpose, but you'll probably find a better TLC drive for right around the same price.


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## wheresmycar (Dec 3, 2021)

GerKNG said:


> i have two of them.
> as long as you only want to read from them they are "okay". otherwise they are absolute trash (literally the worst SSD on the market... slower than a BX300)
> 
> rather look for a TLC SSD (the 4 TB MX500, Sandisk 3D Ultra (which is a WD Blue) or a WD Blue)
> rather pay a few bucks more and enjoy 5X the write speed. (the SLC Cache gets much slower and smaller when you have it filled even just like 25%)



It's most read only other than full (monthly) and differential (weekly) backups using Cobian. Backups are usually done in the background hence wandering whether 870 QVO is fit for the task.

£285 is the cheapest i've found for a "4TB" SSD. The MX500 is next in line at £330? Money isn't a problem but I don't want to spend £45 more if the performance difference will go unnoticed.



Quigly said:


> You might also consider looking at a 4tb laptop spinner if you're price conscious


Nah, i've decided to push past spinners.



chrcoluk said:


> Depends how often the backups are down as backups are write heavy.  Keep the drive powered up all (or most) of the time as well.
> 
> Are you limited on SATA ports/caddies? or you just prefer to have all the capacity on a single drive?



I do monthly full backups, and weekly differential ones. Other than that it's read only.

I have x4 SATA ports available. Originally I was looking to grab x2 2TB SSDs. Seeing 4TB's are now less pricier, the preference has shifted to a single unit.



newtekie1 said:


> It's a decent drive for the purpose, but you'll probably find a better TLC drive for right around the same price.



The second cheapest 4TB available is MX500. I believe its a TLC. I'm just wandering, for the purpose at hand, is it worth forking out £45 more? Do TLC's last longer? That would be a compelling reason to grab one


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## Quigly (Dec 3, 2021)

TLC is, as far as I can tell the cheapest and the lowest endurance of the two (870 qvo being advertised as MLC based drive). According to Kingston MLC NAND comes with approximately 10,000 P/E cycles whereas TLC is rated to 3,000 P/E cycles. SLC iss the gold standard for endurance at 100,000. Take it for what you will, here's the reference: https://www.kingston.com/en/solutions/pc-performance/difference-between-slc-mlc-tlc-3d-nand

Per samsung spec, you get 3 years and 720TBW warranty, the MX500 looks to be 5 years and 1000TBW.


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## newtekie1 (Dec 3, 2021)

wheresmycar said:


> The second cheapest 4TB available is MX500. I believe its a TLC. I'm just wandering, for the purpose at hand, is it worth forking out £45 more? Do TLC's last longer? That would be a compelling reason to grab one


The QLC in the 870 Evo will wear out faster than the TLC in the MX500, but that likely won't matter. The 4TB 870 QVO is rated for 1,440TBW, I don't see anyone writing that much to the drive under normal use. The MX500 is rated for 1,000TBW, again I don't see anyone writing that much data to a drive under normal use. And those ratings are just warranty crap anyway, they are just there so the manufacturer can limit the warranty. The MX500 has a 5 year warranty and the 870 QVO has a 3 year, that's more important to me. If it is worth it is up to you. IMO, the extra warranty is worth it.


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## GerKNG (Dec 3, 2021)

wheresmycar said:


> The MX500 is next in line at £330? Money isn't a problem but I don't want to spend £45 more if the performance difference will go unnoticed.


would this be noticeable for you?

870 QVO writing with ~100MB/s
MX500 writing with 350-400MB/s
not to mention that the MX500 will last longer


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## wheresmycar (Dec 3, 2021)

I think it's a no-brainer: *MX500** PURCHASED!!

Quigly | newtekie1 | GerKNG and others,*

Much appreciated! Had to look up some of these descriptions and that was some interesting read. 

I didn't realise the difference in write performance was so significant. Will definitely be useful when backing the system drive folders and files, phone backups and the regular video transfers. Longer warranty is a big "+" too. Also for endurance, 1000TBW is plenty for me.

Thanks again!


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## chrcoluk (Dec 4, 2021)

Fingers crossed you don't get a MX500 unit with buggy firmware, I believe the latest revision is ok though, so a good choice.

Performance wise the QVO probably would have been ok provided your writes always hit the SLC cache, but I think with the price difference, the TLC was the better buy, good luck.


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## Bomby569 (Dec 4, 2021)

I think no one mentioned this, but there are silent HDD's, not ssd silent, but i doubt you can hear them over a couple fans.


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## Pumper (Dec 4, 2021)

You'd need a 5400 HDD for it to be somewhat silent while not idle, not to mention that the vast majority of the noise is from the vibration when the whole case is humming when the HDD is spinning.


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## newtekie1 (Dec 4, 2021)

GerKNG said:


> would this be noticeable for you?
> 
> 870 QVO writing with ~100MB/s
> MX500 writing with 350-400MB/s
> not to mention that the MX500 will last longer


That's only the write performance of the QVO after you write 80GB straight. Yeah, that might happen in a full system drive backup, but not usually in most other uses.


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## Bomby569 (Dec 4, 2021)

Pumper said:


> You'd need a 5400 HDD for it to be somewhat silent while not idle, not to mention that the vast majority of the noise is from the vibration when the whole case is humming when the HDD is spinning.



That's not true, i can show you a silent 7200 and a noisy 5400. The vibration doesn't need to be a thing, nylon washers, a piece of rubber fixes that.


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## GerKNG (Dec 4, 2021)

newtekie1 said:


> That's only the write performance of the QVO after you write 80GB straight


that's what they advertise and what is the case when the SSD is empty.
both of mine (4 TB, around 1TB filled each) have basically ZERO SLC cache left.
it starts writing at around 80-100MB/s after just 2-3 GB. (Even after a fresh format, TRIM and firmware update)


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## wheresmycar (Dec 4, 2021)

Bomby569 said:


> I think no one mentioned this, but there are silent HDD's, not ssd silent, but i doubt you can hear them over a couple fans.



Honestly I just want to move past the spinners. I know it's a crap deal as I don't really need a SSD for a secondary storage solution but the dead silent flash preference adds value i guess. I was considering picking up a 8TB HD (double the capacity overkill) for around half the cost of a 4TB SSD... but the SSD preference took precedence.

Over the years (work and persona) i've crunched through a bunch of 5400rpm/7200rpm HDs, various capacities, some CMRs, some SMRs, different manufacturers, etc.... some ran quieter than others, some made weird clicky sounds and others cried like a whining baby. Unlike before, now I'm focused on a silent build regardless of necessitation/cost 

(i also ditched the dual 3.5" drive cage under the PSU shroud for easier cable management)


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## Wooden Law - Black (Dec 4, 2021)

Quigly said:


> TLC is, as far as I can tell the cheapest and the lowest endurance of the two (870 qvo being advertised as MLC based drive). According to Kingston MLC NAND comes with approximately 10,000 P/E cycles whereas TLC is rated to 3,000 P/E cycles. SLC iss the gold standard for endurance at 100,000. Take it for what you will, here's the reference: https://www.kingston.com/en/solutions/pc-performance/difference-between-slc-mlc-tlc-3d-nand
> 
> Per samsung spec, you get 3 years and 720TBW warranty, the MX500 looks to be 5 years and 1000TBW.


The 870 QVO doesn't have MLC flash but QLC (Samsung listed it as "MLC 4-bit" probably, but it doesn't mean it's MLC, they do this for marketing), and the MX500 has a better endurance (around 3000 PEC) as the flash is TLC.


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## Tetras (Dec 4, 2021)

Black [Super Saiyan Rosé] said:


> The 870 QVO doesn't have MLC flash but QLC (Samsung listed it as "MLC 4-bit" probably, but it doesn't mean it's MLC, they do this for marketing), and the MX500 has a better endurance (around 3000 PEC) as the flash is TLC.



Is there anything that prevents Crucial from using QLC in the MX500 with the large capacities? The TBW seems quite low for a TLC drive.


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## Wooden Law - Black (Dec 5, 2021)

Tetras said:


> Is there anything that prevents Crucial from using QLC in the MX500 with the large capacities? The TBW seems quite low for a TLC drive.


ComputerBase review shows NY135 NAND ICs, so 176L TLC.


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## chrcoluk (Dec 5, 2021)

For reference I cannot hear any of my 5400s.  7200s on the other hand.


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