nvme vs sata

[Dr. Dro]

NVMe all the way. SATA is an obsolete connector and is best used with slower devices (whose maximum speed are below 500 MB/s) such as mechanical HDDs.

Even the cheapest QLC drives will last for everyday workloads, and being NVMe they'll be innately faster and lower latency than SATA. No need to break the bank with newer Gen 4 or even the flagship Gen 5 NVMe drives, pick up a nice previous-generation high-end Gen 3 NVMe drive at a budget price and enjoy.

 

[LabRat 891]

Even the cheapest QLC drives will last for everyday workloads

Agreed.

The earliest-purchased one was my boot drive for over a year. Both now reside in 'short-trace PCB' passive M.2 M-key->PCI-e x1 adapters, connected over PCIe4.0 to my X570 chipset.

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Solidigm is (more/less) Intel's sell-off of their NAND division to SK Hynix.
NGL, I'm a fan.

 

[AusWolf]

Agreed.

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The earliest-purchased one was my boot drive for over a year. Both now reside in 'short-trace PCB' passive M.2 M-key->PCI-e x1 adapters, connected over PCIe4.0 to my X570 chipset.

Do they still work? What's their condition? I wouldn't want to replace a drive after only a year, even if it's cheap.

Edit: I bought the MLC SATA drive that's in my bedroom HTPC now sometime around 2015, and it still shows 100% in Crystal Disk Info. I used it as a primary/game drive for a good few years before it got relegated to HTPC use.

 

[LabRat 891]

Do they still work? What's their condition? I wouldn't want to replace a drive after only a year, even if it's cheap.

Both work great. I saw no 'issue' with putting them in an x1, as I intended to (justabout) fill them.
When I mostly-filled the one I had for boot, it slowed down considerably. Reformatted and used for game installs, it (more/less) maxes out the X570's 4.0x1's bandwidth.

 

[Dr. Dro]

Do they still work? What's their condition? I wouldn't want to replace a drive after only a year, even if it's cheap.

Edit: I bought the MLC SATA drive that's in my bedroom HTPC now sometime around 2015, and it still shows 100% in Crystal Disk Info. I used it as a primary/game drive for a good few years before it got relegated to HTPC use.

I have an Intel 320 160 GB that's been in dozens of my builds since I purchased it in 2011. It's written over 100x its capacity, 96% life. I just put it on the mac mini I got for retro gaming. Still trucking there.

On the super budget QLC front, I've got 2 WD Green SN350's, 480 GB type. They have a single QLC die on them. Both pass smart tests, although one has been showing signs of slow read (probably a file system issue). Too lazy to format them though

 

[DaemonForce]

All of this is fine. Your preferences are determined by needs and if you're adding storage to a server, you want to go with the fastest scratch or largest capacity at any speed.

When it's a workstation or gaming computer you're going to want sata at a minimum. I see some updates nearing triple digit GBs but some tell me we're well into that now.

Personally my next purchase will be a pair of NVMes in RAID 0. I don't care about the storage size when my biggest HDD is holding 1.25TB of Steam games and a modest 256GB Epic library that will zoom right by the 1.75TB mark by the time I finish downloading everything. My suggestion is go with your gut.

 

[AusWolf]

Both work great. I saw no 'issue' with putting them in an x1, as I intended to (justabout) fill them.
When I mostly-filled the one I had for boot, it slowed down considerably. Reformatted and used for game installs, it (more/less) maxes out the X570's 4.0x1's bandwidth.

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I have an Intel 320 160 GB that's been in dozens of my builds since I purchased it in 2011. It's written over 100x its capacity, 96% life. I just put it on the mac mini I got for retro gaming. Still trucking there.

On the super budget QLC front, I've got 2 WD Green SN350's, 480 GB type. They have a single QLC die on them. Both pass smart tests, although one has been showing signs of slow read (probably a file system issue). Too lazy to format them though

Good to know, thanks. I'll keep this in mind the next time I'm shopping for a new drive.

 

[LabRat 891]

Personally my next purchase will be a pair of NVMes in RAID 0

Beware: Some platforms/combinations have major 'overhead issues' (read: performance regression) w/ RAID0 NVME.
The most tragic for me, was realizing 4x 118GB Optane P1600Xs nuked both drive/array-level performance, and system-wide performance (on AMD R5 5600)
I suspect the minimum 'cache tag' or Stripe Size is just too big for the Optanes to handle, or there's some mitigation Intel put in (wouldn't be the 1st time).

Oh well. Now I get to have 2 modern and 2 retro rigs*, "Optane Enabled"
*Stacking bootloaders is a Royal PITA. I do not recommend it.

 

[A Computer Guy]

IMO there's not much point in nvme, outside of a boot drive, or a machine that just has one drive anyway. It's convenient because it's clean and compact, no cables anywhere. Sure, they're fast, but they also have problems with overheating and probably draw more power than a standard SSD drive. SSDs, on the other hand, are fast enough and cheaper than their nvme counterparts. I think that the extra speed of an nvme drive is wasted anyway, unless you enjoy copying the entire contents of one nvme to another on a regular basis, while watching the big fast numbers and go "woooooooow".

Another possible downside to NVMe is they seem more susceptible to corruption under sudden power loss or BSOD and risks seem higher with NVMe that relies on HMB requiring more emphasis on stable RAM. Just speaking from my own limited experience I've corrupted more windows OS installations in the past two years with NVMe than I ever have with SATA SSD's. If getting NVMe try to get one that has features to deal with power loss or get a uninterruptible power supply so your PC can have an opportunity to shutdown safely after power loss.

 

[LabRat 891]

Another possible downside to NVMe is they seem more susceptible to corruption under sudden power loss or BSOD and risks seem higher with NVMe that relies on HMB requiring more emphasis on stable RAM. Just speaking from my own limited experience I've corrupted more windows OS installations in the past two years with NVMe than I ever have with SATA SSD's.

Point.

If getting NVMe try to get one that has features to deal with power loss or get a uninterruptible power supply so your PC can have an opportunity to shutdown safely after power loss.

As you mentioned, this can be mitigated or avoided by using (retired Server) NVME drives that have write-thru protection
-Lil Tiny Super/Ultracaps, on-PCB. Same thing as a storage controller's BBU, but micronized and integral to the drive.

My first NVME 'setup' were 2x eBay-purchase SM963 960GBs w/ write-thru protection, in RAID0.
They now reside in my best friend's Skt939 machine for fast storage.

IMO, most (MLC and TLC) server NVMEs that haven't already failed, 'should' have quite a bit of life left (for SOHO/consumer applications)

 

[Wirko]

Not as long as SATA drives are cheaper and the real world usage is pretty much the same. Not to mention, there's only so much space for m.2 ports on a motherboard, but the number of SATA ports is basically only limited by the chipset's and/or controller's capabilities. Let's not forget about hard drives, either. They are still the no.1 option for cheap sata storage.

Also we shall not forget that PCIe to multiple SATA adapters exist (M.2 or add-in card), which can come in handy when there are very many ports needed.

 

[LabRat 891]

Also we shall not forget that PCIe to multiple SATA adapters exist (M.2 or add-in card), which can come in handy when there are very many ports needed.

There's also arguments to be made for 'spreading wear' over multiple SSDs in RAID.
-and, I've seen 4xSATA SSD RAID0 handedly beat gen3 NVMEs (only in raw throughput).

Personally, I adore parallelizing many cheap/small drives. Tho, it's rarely the most-economical or most-reliable solution.

 

[iameatingjam]

I got a couple 4tb sn850x for 230.us a pop now they are double nearly.

Even you got it pretty good compared to us Canadians. The SSD market was a goldmine there for a while but now prices are back up into the ridiculious levels like they were a few years ago. For me to get a sn850x 4TB is $300 USD and thats before tax (12%) and shipping if there's anything. Last year I bought a 2TB sn850x for $100! ( well with a 20 rebate but close enough!). I was buying brand name drives for the same price as bargain bin drives, sometimes even less. Mx500 for $50 for 1TB. Thats long gone, now its literally double that.

My Lovely 2TB P5 Plus for $115 (I think it was, going off memory - oh and I'm approximating to usd btw). Yup thats history now, its almost hard to even find that drive anymore... are they being discontinued or something? Newegg canada only has low capacity and amazon only has high capacity from third party sellers :/ 2TB from said seller, only $240 CAD! (~ $180 US!) Don't forget about my 12% sales tax tho.... not to mention whatever nasty write cycles the vendor has been perpetrating on the poor nand. |

Gotta love the savings you get when micron cuts out the middle man. Thanks for savings the day Micron!

I'm sorry I'm bitter and rambling because ssd shopping has been soo frustrating lately. I tried looking locally and two places were trying to sell me sn510 1TB for $110 CAD before taxes. Add taxes to 124 then convert to USD... nearly $92 for 1TB of the worst god damn ssd WD has ever made.

 

[Wirko]

are they being discontinued or something?

That seems to be the case, yes. I often check Amazon Germany/France/Spain/Italy (because those can ship to me, from Germany it's even free). Then geizhals.eu tells me how many retailers have it on stock or arriving soon. Fewer and fewer do.

Note - French French Amazon doesn't always understand what "2tb" is. Canadian French Amazon also seems to have some issues, giving me different results for "2tb" and "2to".

 

[kapone32]

Even you got it pretty good compared to us Canadians. The SSD market was a goldmine there for a while but now prices are back up into the ridiculious levels like they were a few years ago. For me to get a sn850x 4TB is $300 USD and thats before tax (12%) and shipping if there's anything. Last year I bought a 2TB sn850x for $100! ( well with a 20 rebate but close enough!). I was buying brand name drives for the same price as bargain bin drives, sometimes even less. Mx500 for $50 for 1TB. Thats long gone, now its literally double that.

My Lovely 2TB P5 Plus for $115 (I think it was, going off memory - oh and I'm approximating to usd btw). Yup thats history now, its almost hard to even find that drive anymore... are they being discontinued or something? Newegg canada only has low capacity and amazon only has high capacity from third party sellers :/ 2TB from said seller, only $240 CAD! (~ $180 US!) Don't forget about my 12% sales tax tho.... not to mention whatever nasty write cycles the vendor has been perpetrating on the poor nand. |

Gotta love the savings you get when micron cuts out the middle man. Thanks for savings the day Micron!

I'm sorry I'm bitter and rambling because ssd shopping has been soo frustrating lately. I tried looking locally and two places were trying to sell me sn510 1TB for $110 CAD before taxes. Add taxes to 124 then convert to USD... nearly $92 for 1TB of the worst god damn ssd WD has ever made.

I remember getting Kingston NV2 2TB for $129. Those were good times. RAID 0 is fine but better on SSD vs NVME. All NVME drives suffer from slow down once you get a certain amount of data going. RAID 0 will not ever show that slow down with SSD. Looking at it as objective as possible Optane drives are the best for daily use but not part of the actual channel and too expensive when they were. I use a MP700 and it is plenty fast for me. Those drives are also more expensive now too as the 2TB was $199 for a lond time. That is much better than 215-249. In a strange world SSD and NVME prices are pretty similar. Even though it was untested we can be pretty sure that NAND is fine. People still use origianl NES cartridges.

The aboslute best deal lately was the Kingspec 4TB 7000 mb/s for $229 with a $25 rebate card from Newegg. I did not get it though as I am not sure about the vendor.