Best SSD for system drive

[csendesmark]

Hello Forum,
It planning to buy a new system SSD for some time, but now it's fells like time to get it.
I have a Samsung 970 PRO 512GB, which is amazing. Sadly I did not have the buck for the 1TB version back then
The most important thing is that how reliable the drive is and generally big TBW.
I had to return a Samsung 980 PRO this year, and it felt really bad, luckily it was only a temp storage drive.
Secondly I would like to have a fair chunk of SLC cache, if I can't have the luxury of the full pseudo-SLC of the awesome 970 PRO
I seen the new Samsung 990 PRO 1TB only has 114GB of SLC
And costs about the same as the Kingston Fury Renegade 2 TB which has a relative big ~679GB SLC cache
For a long time my best candidate was the Seagate FireCuda 530 1TB but according to TPU's SSD DB it only has 55GB dynamic cache. (Mostly this is the reason why I opening this thread.)

 

[Toothless]

980/990 had issues that were fixed with firmware updates. My 980 1TB has been extremely solid for a while. I like Samsung drives but the P5 Pro 1TB I'm using for boot has been nothing but awesome for a long while now and never even seen it slow down from running out of cache. While not on your list it is super nice.

Curious on why the super large cache. Trim happens weekly by default and OS stuff won't even get close to using it all.

 

[bonehead123]

Well, for most of the better consumer drives currently available, .50GB of cache per TB of capacity is fairly standard, plus or minus a few GB here & there....so in that regard, the Sammy 990 Pro would win the cache contest (and is an excellent drive overall but a tad pricey), but you seem to be comparing 1TB drives to 2TB ones, which isn't really fair, but I would stay away from the Firecuda for sure.

Speaking from personal experience, I can HIGHLY recommend the WD SN850x, which I use exclusively for both my personal rigs & my client's builds, very fast & reliable, nottaproblemo

 

[TumbleGeorge]

If you don't have a valid reason, I don't see why you shouldn't continue using your Samsung 970 PRO 512GB for boot/system/program device. If you need bigger size SSD for games/media storage just bought never mind which name model with capacity that you need at price of your budget.

 

[Toothless]

If you don't have a valid reason, I don't see why you shouldn't continue using your Samsung 970 PRO 512GB for boot/system/program device. If you need bigger size SSD for games/media storage just bought never mind which name model with capacity that you need at price of your budget.

Honestly OP could add a fourth NVME to their board which would be a better option.

 

[TumbleGeorge]

Honestly OP could add a fourth NVME to their board which would be a better option.

I was under the impression that he even vacated one of the used slots by returning one of the devices he was using. So there will be no need to occupy the last free slot.

 

[FreedomEclipse]

Im rocking an 970 Evo as an OS drive for the longest time, still have plenty of space and not looking to change it anytime soon.

Western Digital drives are very very solid (although ive heard nightmares about data corruption on their USB storage drives)

I would look at TPUs recent reviews of Lexar drives and pick one of them but if they arent available in your region or cost too much then I would hang on for a bit. Black friday and Cyber monday are coming very very soon and prices are bound to drop.

I would avoid buying anything with QLC NAND. Youll know they are QLC because 99% of the time the price of the SSD sounds too good to be true compared to the competition.

 

[bug]

Hello Forum,
It planning to buy a new system SSD for some time, but now it's fells like time to get it.
I have a Samsung 970 PRO 512GB, which is amazing. Sadly I did not have the buck for the 1TB version back then
The most important thing is that how reliable the drive is and generally big TBW.
I had to return a Samsung 980 PRO this year, and it felt really bad, luckily it was only a temp storage drive.
Secondly I would like to have a fair chunk of SLC cache, if I can't have the luxury of the full pseudo-SLC of the awesome 970 PRO
I seen the new Samsung 990 PRO 1TB only has 114GB of SLC
And costs about the same as the Kingston Fury Renegade 2 TB which has a relative big ~679GB SLC cache
For a long time my best candidate was the Seagate FireCuda 530 1TB but according to TPU's SSD DB it only has 55GB dynamic cache. (Mostly this is the reason why I opening this thread.)

Are you positive you need a SLC cache tat bug? Do you often write >114GB at once?

I wouldn't worry about getting the "best" drive. As long as it's not QLC to suffer from slow access times, anything will work as a system SSD just fine. 500GB is still plenty, my OS drive is still 500GB (though I have one each for Linux and Windows). Can't tell the difference between them under normal usage either, even if they're from different generations.
My advice? Get the biggest TLC drive that you can get your hands on within you budget. If it comes with extra warranty, that would a plus.

 

[Arco]

Hello Forum,
It planning to buy a new system SSD for some time, but now it's fells like time to get it.
I have a Samsung 970 PRO 512GB, which is amazing. Sadly I did not have the buck for the 1TB version back then
The most important thing is that how reliable the drive is and generally big TBW.
I had to return a Samsung 980 PRO this year, and it felt really bad, luckily it was only a temp storage drive.
Secondly I would like to have a fair chunk of SLC cache, if I can't have the luxury of the full pseudo-SLC of the awesome 970 PRO
I seen the new Samsung 990 PRO 1TB only has 114GB of SLC
And costs about the same as the Kingston Fury Renegade 2 TB which has a relative big ~679GB SLC cache
For a long time my best candidate was the Seagate FireCuda 530 1TB but according to TPU's SSD DB it only has 55GB dynamic cache. (Mostly this is the reason why I opening this thread.)

Could you consider the SN770? Cheap and very good. It doesn't have DRAM but the results speak for itself. 325 GB of SLC!

2TB model has SLC cache at 740 GB! Plus its only 100 bucks in the US which is pretty awesome.

 

[csendesmark]

Honestly OP could add a fourth NVME to their board which would be a better option.

I can add 3 more m.2 SSD-s if I wanted.
The main reason is to just have a bigger space for the Windows and non-game programs.
The 970 PRO would stay with me as a scratch drive, since it still quite fast, and actually beats the 980 and 990 PRO SSD-s in average speed

Well, for most of the better consumer drives currently available, .50GB of cache per TB of capacity is fairly standard, plus or minus a few GB here & there....so in that regard, the Sammy 990 Pro would win the cache contest (and is an excellent drive overall but a tad pricey), but you seem to be comparing 1TB drives to 2TB ones, which isn't really fair, but I would stay away from the Firecuda for sure.

Speaking from personal experience, I can HIGHLY recommend the WD SN850x, which I use exclusively for both my personal rigs & my client's builds, very fast & reliable, nottaproblemo

As I mentioned, the 2TB Kingston Fury gives almost 700GB of SLC, and currently my system could live only in that, and costs about the same as the 990 PRO
Wish TPU had tested SN850X, but the specs and price looks right.

Are you positive you need a SLC cache tat bug? Do you often write >114GB at once?

Sometimes when I have many many layers in PS.

Could you consider the SN770? Cheap and very good. It doesn't have DRAM but the results speak for itself. 325 GB of SLC!

If WD, then I would choose the SN850X, also nice SLC buffer

If you don't have a valid reason, I don't see why you shouldn't continue using your Samsung 970 PRO 512GB for boot/system/program device. If you need bigger size SSD for games/media storage just bought never mind which name model with capacity that you need at price of your budget.

Good point, and I am still thinking heavily how could I manage my things, the drive is on 95% TBW, so still have years in it.

@FreedomEclipse
I noticed how good the Lexar SSDs are
Would buy a 4TB KC3000 or one of these Lexar drives for fast media storage 4K60 or 8K-RAW footages.
But that is for next year.

 

[bug]

Sometimes when I have many many layers in PS.

This isn't going to help much, but I'd keep that kind of work away from the system drive. If you work with images >100GB in size, a 2TB drive would hold less than 20. I'd look into a roomy drive for that.

 

[Arco]

I can add 3 more m.2 SSD-s if I wanted.
The main reason is to just have a bigger space for the Windows and non-game programs.
The 970 PRO would stay with me as a scratch drive, since it still quite fast, and actually beats the 980 and 990 PRO SSD-s in average speed

As I mentioned, the 2TB Kingston Fury gives almost 700GB of SLC, and currently my system could live only in that, and costs about the same as the 990 PRO
Wish TPU had tested SN850X, but the specs and price looks right.

Sometimes when I have many many layers in PS.

If WD, then I would choose the SN850X, also nice SLC buffer

Good point, and I am still thinking heavily how could I manage my things, the drive is on 95% TBW, so still have years in it.

@FreedomEclipse
I noticed how good the Lexar SSDs are
Would buy a 4TB KC3000 or one of these Lexar drives for fast media storage 4K60 or 8K-RAW footages.
But that is for next year.

The SN770 is super cheap! (SN850X 2TB is 50 bucks more.) The difference between the SN770 and the SN850X is a fiveish percent.

 

[csendesmark]

Honestly OP could add a fourth NVME to their board which would be a better option.

I was under the impression that he even vacated one of the used slots by returning one of the devices he was using. So there will be no need to occupy the last free slot.

Will addres this two good comments once more:
I partly selected my current mainboard to be able using 4 m.2 drives, but learned that M2_B and M2_C slots under a big GPU was not a great choice...
Wish Gigabyte gave us 2 full 16× PCIe slots so I could use 4 SSD-s in my AORUS Gen4 AIC Adaptor

Really helps manage heat, much better than +n number slots on the hot board under an even hotter videocard....
I cannot say this enough in the forum, hope it will gat traction!

The SN770 is super cheap! (SN850X 2TB is 50 bucks more.) The difference between the SN770 and the SN850X is a fiveish percent.

In my shop it is only $16 difference (28400HUF vs 34400HUF)

This isn't going to help much, but I'd keep that kind of work away from the system drive. If you work with images >100GB in size, a 2TB drive would hold less than 20. I'd look into a roomy drive for that.

Wish I could just afford the new Threadripper, would get 256GB RAM and just not care

 

[Arco]

In my shop it is only $16 difference (28400HUF vs 34400HUF)

Nevermind then. I still highly recommend both of those options! Goodluck

 

[csendesmark]

Nevermind then. I still highly recommend both of those options! Goodluck

You are right by default, but
This is already black Friday season

 

[Arco]

You are right by default, but
This is already black Friday season

The storage strikes back! (Against your wallet)

 

[P4-630]

I use a 980 Pro 1TB since May last year as OS drive (with pagefile on C) and few games, no issues.

 

[SPDIF]

Yes Samsung had some problems with the 870EVO, 980 and 990PRO, but it was all due to bad firmware. They fixed everything, there are no issues anywhere reported.
The other brands had their problems too, but at least the quality from Samsung is back in business.

Here a screenshot of a brand new 980PRO 2TB.

If you have buyed a drive with older firmware, just update it and you should be fine. 5B2Q is the latest firmware for 980PRO.

 

[kapone32]

You used expensive drives and they are not as inexpensive as they were due to popularity but the Kingston NV2 punches above it's weight even on TPU.

Will addres this two good comments once more:
I partly selected my current mainboard to be able using 4 m.2 drives, but learned that M2_B and M2_C slots under a big GPU was not a great choice...
Wish Gigabyte gave us 2 full 16× PCIe slots so I could use 4 SSD-s in my AORUS Gen4 AIC Adaptor
View attachment 320435
Really helps manage heat, much better than +n number slots on the hot board under an even hotter videocard....
I cannot say this enough in the forum, hope it will gat traction!

In my shop it is only $16 difference (28400HUF vs 34400HUF)

Wish I could just afford the new Threadripper, would get 256GB RAM and just not care

Those adapter cards are click bait in modern Main stream systems. Unfortunately those adapter cards were born in the Consumer space during X99 and X399. Asus was the first to give us one on the consumer space and they were inexpensive ($60 CAD) on Amazon. Where it does not make sense is how AMD cuts lanes on the APUs so you can't even use that to get mass storage at 4x4x4x4.

The other board that has these are believe it or not B550.. Yep Asus gave us a B550 XE board that is better than 90% of X570 boards in terms of flexibility. It really shows the potential of when they actually try.

I want TR to be successful enough that AMD gifts us plebs with a 12 core chip with VCache. I don't even need all 128 lanes but I want to see what 5.0 is in RAID 0 across 4 drives.

 

[csendesmark]

You used expensive drives and they are not as inexpensive as they were due to popularity but the Kingston NV2 punches above it's weight even on TPU.

Would buy NV2 or KC3000, but for storage only

 

[SPDIF]

I would keep my 970PRO as boot drive, i use one myself and they are as you say amazing. Good speed, uses less power, big TBW.
Best thing is that this SSD is still using the superior 2-bit MLC and not 3-Bit MLC (TLC) like the 980 and 990 PRO.

 

[bug]

I would keep my 970PRO as boot drive, i use one myself and they are as you say amazing. Good speed, uses less power, big TBW.
Best thing is that this SSD is still using the superior 2-bit MLC and not 3-Bit MLC (TLC) like the 980 and 990 PRO.

My older OS drive is a 850 EVO. 5+ years old and still above 90% health. TLC is perfectly fine. But, of course, if you still have the 970 Pro, don't throw it away, that thing has a lot of life left in it.

 

[kapone32]

Would buy NV2 or KC3000, but for storage only

I can understand why you feel that way but in April I built my Daughter a PC for her Bday and I used a 1TB NV2 and 2 2TB NV2s in RAID 0. I promise you it is difficult noticing the difference in daily use of the NV2 vs other 4.0 drives. I can't speak to endurance because none of my drives ever go over 60% but I had an Adata SX8100 (not even the good one) that fell in the rain. It did not work when I tried it initially but after a few months sitting in the air it came back and even has all the data that was on it before. I know there is a post about QLC drives dying but I don't have any to verify that. I can say though that the best thing about the first QLC drive Intel 660P was the endurance.

 

[SPDIF]

Just as the OP i also have an 970PRO of only 512GB, the bigger ones where are at that time extremely expensive!
Here a screenshot of it, still at 100 Percent! It's life has just begin.

 

[csendesmark]

Just as the OP i also have an 970PRO of only 512GB, the bigger ones where are at that time extremely expensive!
Here a screenshot of it, still at 100 Percent! It's life has just begin.

View attachment 320440
View attachment 320441

Spare space is also 100% for me, only the TBW indicator went down.
That is just a simple % based on written data and the arbitrary TBW number given by the manufacturer.
HDD sentinel can give you this number... I know, the name is dating this util a bit old, but it is getting updated