SSDs

I regard @stratman as our authority on SSDs and I have a question.

I am looking at the Samsung EVO 850 500GB SSD £144 @Amazon in the UK. Should I be looking at anything else?

Many thanks in advance.

No they are bloomin brilliant and bench test out of sight I am using one.

Emulator said:

I am looking at the Samsung EVO 850 500GB SSD £144 @Amazon in the UK. Should I be looking at anything else?

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I agree with @3dogs . Samsung is making an excellent product at this time and I wholeheartedly recommend them. The 5 year warranty is very nice. The accompanying software - Samsung Magician - is quality as well.

I have done clean installs of the Operating System, not cloned a previous HDD onto the new SSD. According to Samsung's PDF concerning their proprietary Data Migration cloning software, hidden partitions, such as for recovery designed by companies like Dell and HP, with few exception will not be cloned over to the new SSD. See #6 of Samsung's PDF. People have used 3rd party software like Macrium Reflect and others to perform the clone including the hidden partition from my reading, but I cannot personally verify this.

I have, however, made a backup clone of my SSD onto another exact same model SSD with O&O DiskImage via a Thermaltake BlacX docking station. (No hidden partitions on my disk) I tried some other software which did not work -- don't recall which ones.

If the price is right with you then buy it.

Whatever drive you get, let us know what you think.

Thanks for all the comments, I am upgrading from a 250GB Samsung EVO 840 as I need more space. I agree there is no question about the benefit of an SSD.
As far as automatic backup is concerned (this appeared to be a problem with the 250GB), I found eventually there was a method tucked away in the Samsung software which allowed me to backup automatically to a 1TB HD. With the 10 year life for the 850 Pro and a little less for the standard version there should not be a reliability problem.

Cheapest in UK i could find http://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/181760078434

I have now received my EVO850 500GB, in the end £139.89 from Amazon, free delivery. They must be looking at each other's prices!

Now all you SSD experts, what is the opinion on usage. Migrate from the old 250GB to the 500GB and take the 250 out for use elsewhere? Or leave it in and configure the system to use it as a spare drive? I am not sure the latter is possible or a wise setup?

If it can stay leave all the program stuff where it is.
My computer 2 was set up with all programs on C a Hybrid SSD with all things photo storage and processing on the velociraptors and that worked real well for me. Why decomission the 840 when it can stay put leaving the programs where they are with all your master images and lightroom on the new 850?

When initially connected the 850 shows only a fraction of its 500GB capacity. It requires the installation process, which effectively means running the migration software, hence the problem. Raid is talked about on the web, but is not a sensible or possible option in this case.

It may be that running the migration process and running everything from the new 500GB SSD, but leaving the 250GB SSD attached might work, but you do not know 'til you try it. Then it might be an unrecoverable failure. The Samsung literature is not good on the subject.

Emulator said:

When initially connected the 850 shows only a fraction of its 500GB capacity. It requires the installation process, which effectively means running the migration software, hence the problem. Raid is talked about on the web, but is not a sensible or possible option in this case.

It may be that running the migration process and running everything from the new 500GB SSD, but leaving the 250GB SSD attached might work, but you do not know 'til you try it. Then it might be an unrecoverable failure. The Samsung literature is not good on the subject.

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WOT!!!!!
STUFF migration process all you are doing is adding another drive connect it up copy your pics to it and tell LR where you moved them to....simple. Then delete the copied pics off the 840.

I have at last got the new drive in and formatted as a separate drive and transferred a folder full of some of the images from the smaller SSD.

There seems no point in not migrating all of the smaller drive to the larger and clearing out the small drive, or better still keep the smaller as a backup as @stratman does. Even stick it in the old desktop computer as the C drive.