best cheap SSD for small office server?

[giantbucket]

i need to grab a pair (RAID1) of small SSDs for an office server. it'll be running 2012R2 Essentials (or maybe Standard). i figure 60G min / 128G max, no need for anything massive. it's just holding the OS.

being a server, boot time is obviously irrelevant, but handling multiple user requests [10-14 people / clients] is probably really important. i guess something with good to great deep queue performance? what review site tailors to server use instead of desktop gamer / consumer use?

what should i buy? buying from Newegg.ca or Canada Computers. would a Crucial MX100 or OCZ Arc 100 be fine? i even considered a Patriot Blaze 60G but is that too down-n-dirty?

 

[Italiandogs]

So are you saying you want two SSDs to RAID together?

If not. I don't know much about RAIDing but correct me if I'm wrong. Don't you need to use the Same exact hard drive/SSD to perform RAID?

To answer your question I personally have the Crucial M500 240GB drive. Amazon has it for about $99. although the Sequetial Write Speed is slower than the MX100 i think it is great. Since you plan to run anywhere from 10-14 clients

 

[giantbucket]

yes, i will have two identical SSDs in a RAID1 (mirror) for the operating system. whatever is ideal for my case, i'll buy 2 of them.

 

[thx1138v2]

I advise you to avoid "cheap" anything in a server. Small is OK but get good drives. SSD's can be trashed by unexpected power outages to the drive. A UPS will protect only the power line from the outlet to the PSU. Things can and do go wrong inside the box that will cause an unexpected power outage. There is circuitry on the later drives that will help mitigate the problem but my guess is the cheap drives don't have it. Should a problem occur your whole office will be down because you tried to save a few bucks.

More info:
Are power outages killing your SSDs?

SSD stress testing

Enhanced power-loss SSD data protection

I'm not pushing Intel drives in particular. I just wanted you to be aware of the issue and know what to look for.

 

[giantbucket]

hmm, i seem to recall one of those articles from before. yeah, the intel drives that have the power loss prevention stuff on them (S3500, but not 530) are quite $$$, like $135 for 80G. times two. being that it's a family run business, i know where the money is coming from so i do have to be wise! it's not like some giant faceless dot-com with billions in shares. i'll have a UPS on the server anyways (current old server is already on a UPS).

after 2 SSD drives, 2x$60 versus 2x$135 is only a difference of $150. but that does buy me at least 2 replacement 1T / 2T HDD for the data RAID10 group.


would a plain small HDD be more resilient than an SSD (even if it's slower)? i'm specifically thinking of something like a 320G 7200rpm 2.5" laptop drive for the OS instead of going for SSDs.

 

[Italiandogs]

What I would do is go with RAID 10. Have 2 SSDs in RAID and then have 2 more HDDs in RAID to back up anything on the SSDs. This way if something would to go wrong you would have a backup on the trusty HDD.

edit: i didnt see that you just mentioned RAID 10.

Also, isn't there a hard drive that is meant to be on 24/7 NAS Drives. on amazon a lot come in housings but you could easily take them out and plug it into a server

 

[giantbucket]

for the OS, i plan on having 2 (SSD or HDD) drives in RAID1. i am avoiding RAID0 - i'd rather write the OS onto toilet paper.
for the data, i plan on having 4 HDD drives in RAID10. probably WD Red since i already have one at home that'll get donated.

we do daily and weekly backups of the data onto separate drives (external), and i can easily grab an OS image once a week or once a month for "just in case".