PC Discussion Thread II - All PC related discussion goes here.

[PuFu]

I wanna grab myself a SSD for my gaming rig at home (the i7 2600k in the spoiler), especially for A3. I am looking for something around 180gb sata3, with a price range of no more than 250EUs (could push some more if it does worth it).

Now, I got contradictory opinion from the web, regarding what would be the best SSD for the money, as well as why the fuck are so many types of SSDs available. Obviously, i would like to get the best out there in terms of read/write speeds, that is using the latest tech (what that is i really don't know anymore, at the office i have some intel SSDs in raid, but those are first or second generation. things seemed to have moved along quite a bit.). Some information would be appreciated:

This is what i got on the list so far:
200EUs - Corsair Force Series 180GB
230EUs - Corsair Force Series GT 180GB (does the 30RUs difference really make any difference?)
240EUs - OCZ Agility 3 180GB
250EUs - Kingston SSDNow V+200 240GB
280EUs - OCZ Agility 3 240GB

For now, i only want one SSD, will most likely push another next month just as well for the other rig i have.

I am obviously open to suggestions. Would prefer first hand experience with the drivers vs off the web commentaries.

[batto]

Just FYI if you didn't know: Those 500MB/s write speeds in OCZ SSDs are measured on text files. It has some controller that (de)compress on-the-fly. I guess it's same with any SSD that advertises +- 500MB/s write speed.

[Placebo]

The Asus board would be more suitable for high overclocking (4Gz+) so in order from most recommended -

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Produc...82E16813131757

Thanks again for your suggestions, I just ordered the Asus M5A97 (went with the standard one as the extras for the pro/evo weren't necessary for me) and also ordered G.Skill 8GB DDR3 1866MHz (2x4) looking forward to the hopeful improvements

[Bee8190]

I wanna grab myself a SSD for my gaming rig at home (the i7 2600k in the spoiler), especially for A3. I am looking for something around 180gb sata3, with a price range of no more than 250EUs (could push some more if it does worth it).

Now, I got contradictory opinion from the web, regarding what would be the best SSD for the money, as well as why the fuck are so many types of SSDs available. Obviously, i would like to get the best out there in terms of read/write speeds, that is using the latest tech (what that is i really don't know anymore, at the office i have some intel SSDs in raid, but those are first or second generation. things seemed to have moved along quite a bit.). Some information would be appreciated:

This is what i got on the list so far:
200EUs - Corsair Force Series 180GB
230EUs - Corsair Force Series GT 180GB (does the 30RUs difference really make any difference?)
240EUs - OCZ Agility 3 180GB
250EUs - Kingston SSDNow V+200 240GB
280EUs - OCZ Agility 3 240GB

For now, i only want one SSD, will most likely push another next month just as well for the other rig i have.

I am obviously open to suggestions. Would prefer first hand experience with the drivers vs off the web commentaries.

I am about to get my first SSD sometimes next month too, although I'll be looking for 128Gb, plenty for my own needs. Now, AFAIK, the NAND cells are pretty much same in all of the SSD's (TCMS supply for everyone, the 28nano*m) and the only real difference is the controller. The fastest is sand force and have been since Vertex 2 SSD drives, in both random writes and reads. However, sandforce seems to be slightly less reliable too, according to ''history''. Intel and even more so OCZ had quite alarming amount of failed drives within few weeks or even right out of the box. Nontheless, seems like they (OCZ especially) got their firmware sorted and I no longer see forums full of complaints.

The most reliable manufacturers still are (apologies as I no longer can find the SSD failure chart) - Intel, Crucial, Corsair, Samsung,and Kingstone. I no longer kept an eye on OCZ drives (like the new Vertex 4 series) as my trust to them was shaken.
(by the way newegg has more than plenty evidence from customer reviews on OCZ Vertex 2 / 3 drives)


For those reasons and plenty of positive reviews I'd recommend either of these -

Samsung 830 256Gb - 240Eur http://www.amazon.co.uk/Samsung-256G...9369521&sr=8-2

Crucial M4 256Gb - 203Eur http://www.amazon.co.uk/Crucial-CT25...9369449&sr=8-1

Corsair force 256Gb - 215Eur http://www.amazon.co.uk/Corsair-CSSD...9369581&sr=8-1

Many items on amazon are eligible for free delivery across EU and is as reliable and fast as any paid delivery FTW

Just FYI if you didn't know: Those 500MB/s write speeds in OCZ SSDs are measured on text files. It has some controller that (de)compress on-the-fly. I guess it's same with any SSD that advertises +- 500MB/s write speed.

Yes, the controller compress the files before it stores them on to the nand cells.It is my understanding that this is happening to allow even wear of every cell in SSD, so that some cells doesnt get overwritten 2000 times while others 20 times.

Thanks again for your suggestions, I just ordered the Asus M5A97 (went with the standard one as the extras for the pro/evo weren't necessary for me) and also ordered G.Skill 8GB DDR3 1866MHz (2x4) looking forward to the hopeful

My pleasure man!

Fine print - I hope everything will go well as I'm not looking forward to being banned hahah

[BangTail]

I wanna grab myself a SSD for my gaming rig at home (the i7 2600k in the spoiler), especially for A3. I am looking for something around 180gb sata3, with a price range of no more than 250EUs (could push some more if it does worth it).

Now, I got contradictory opinion from the web, regarding what would be the best SSD for the money, as well as why the fuck are so many types of SSDs available. Obviously, i would like to get the best out there in terms of read/write speeds, that is using the latest tech (what that is i really don't know anymore, at the office i have some intel SSDs in raid, but those are first or second generation. things seemed to have moved along quite a bit.). Some information would be appreciated:

This is what i got on the list so far:
200EUs - Corsair Force Series 180GB
230EUs - Corsair Force Series GT 180GB (does the 30RUs difference really make any difference?)
240EUs - OCZ Agility 3 180GB
250EUs - Kingston SSDNow V+200 240GB
280EUs - OCZ Agility 3 240GB

For now, i only want one SSD, will most likely push another next month just as well for the other rig i have.

I am obviously open to suggestions. Would prefer first hand experience with the drivers vs off the web commentaries.

Crucial all the way tbh.

OCZ flashing procedures for RAID arrays leave alot to be desired and the Agility 3 series are asynchronous NAND which is significantly slower than synchronous.

http://www.hardocp.com/article/2011/..._asynchronous/

The SF2281 controller has been an unmitigated disaster for OCZ.

At this point I've tried most brands and generations and the Crucial M4 drives are fast, solid, reliable and reasonably priced.

I've seen the 256GB as low as $214.00 and the 512 as low as $409.00 (Crucial is rumoured to be trying to start a price war which is good for us )

'AS SSD' is a more reliable measure of speed as it uses uncompressed data, as such you get much more reliable results.

Programs like ATTO use compressed data which make certain drives appear much faster than they actually are.

More here:

http://www.overclock.net/t/754763/as...nchmark-thread

Nothing wrong with Corsair or Kingston btw - both quality components.

[PuFu]

cheers for the tips lads.
Unfortunately, crucial is not really a brand i can find at my trusted retailed (don't ask, things with hardware is a bit different in terms of brands available here than in UK US DE etc, mainly because there are just a couple of national wide hardware importers that provide all the stock for the hundreds of retail stores. monopol ftw.

Indeed, i was able to find them at a local provider, just that i have no experience with them whatsoever, for around 220EUs (256GB, which should fit my OS an A2 needs perfectly).
I'll see if i can get myself one 256gb M4, if not, i guess Corsair Force GT should do the trick.

bangtail, sorry, send that PM again please, seems i had my inbox full without any notification on the forums whatsoever. I cleaned all the hate-mail i received recently

[Kernriver]

Guys, does OS have to be installed on SSD, or just Arma? What are the benefits of having both installed on SSD?

I'm asking this because those SSDs are pricey, so I want to get one as cheap as possible.

For example 128GB vs 64GB...is the latter enough for Arma2/3?

[Tonci87]

OS on SSD= Much faster PC in tems of startup and other things. 128 GB is the way to go, that way you can put some island addons on it as well^^

[Kernriver]

Thanks for the info mate.

My wallet is already crying.

[PRE]

Working on my PC build for Arma 3.... on the topic of SSD's

Crucial M4 64gb 75.00$
128gb 125.00$
256gb 215.00$

Would you purchase 1 256gb SSD and put the OS and arma on that drive? Or should I get a combination of 2 SSD's, one being the 64gb drive for Arma, and another drive for the OS and other programs? Is there a benifit in having an independent drive for arma?, and is it practical to set up 2 drives in this manner, in other words how difficult is it to make this configuration- I've never had 2 HD drives.

Thanks