Best Deals: November 18th (Archive)

[IInuyasha74]

Because shopping for bargains on new computer hardware can be a considerably time consuming endeavor, we regularly compile a list of the best deals.

Best Deals: November 18th : Read more

 

[adamovera]

Archived comments are found here: http://www.tomshardware.com/forum/id-2865803/deals-november-18th.html

 

[Onus]

As often as the Corsair CX-600 is lambasted in the forums (and for good reason: capacitors that do not hold up to heat), I do not believe it should be a featured deal.

 

[boytitan2]

As often as the Corsair CX-600 is lambasted in the forums (and for good reason: capacitors that do not hold up to heat), I do not believe it should be a featured deal.

I have had a cx600 since summer of 2012 still working strong. It was in a cramp micro atx tower with a core 2 quad q 8200 and nvidia gtx 550 ti and only a intake and outake fan in the case before being moved to a mid tower with a gefore gtx 760 and a intelcore i54440 in 2014. The case it was originally low temps are around 50c idle that thing is a oven compared to my corsair carbide series spec 03.

 

[Nid]

This was disappointingly sent on 31/12/'16 - too late for all the deals...

 

[Turb0Yoda]

@boytitan2
The matter of the fact is, one individuals experience doesn't help against all of the proof that the cx unit is garbage. Bad capacitors is what makes this PSU crap. The fact that it lasted for you so long is good luck.

 

[ipwitan]

Confused with the description of Samsung 850 Evo M.2 500 GB SSD. While some M.2 SSDs are much faster than the SATA3, I don't think this one is. The SAMSUNG 950 PRO M.2 512GB PCI-Express 3.0 x4 Internal Solid State Drive (SSD) MZ-V5P512BW, on the other hand, is advertised as about 4-5x faster, but at a cost of $320. If I am wrong, I am hoping someone will correct me and I will buy one!

 

[Non-Euclidean]

Confused with the description of Samsung 850 Evo M.2 500 GB SSD. While some M.2 SSDs are much faster than the SATA3, I don't think this one is. The SAMSUNG 950 PRO M.2 512GB PCI-Express 3.0 x4 Internal Solid State Drive (SSD) MZ-V5P512BW, on the other hand, is advertised as about 4-5x faster, but at a cost of $320. If I am wrong, I am hoping someone will correct me and I will buy one!

There are different types of M.2. It depends what incarnation you have.

M.2
10Gb/sec, older, == EVO 850 M.2
(still 4 Gb/Sec faster than SATA III, dirt cheap now)

M.2 Ultra
32 Gb/sec, PCI-E x4 (NVMe), == 950 PRO M.2
(screaming, pricey)

Note the following about M.2 Ultra from
(http://www.newegg.com/Product/SingleProductReview.aspx?reviewid=4505001)
1) Awesome info there, DannyL knows his @#$&.
2) If you have any intention of installing an M.2 Ultra boot SSD, bookmark that page!!!

-Requires adequate cooling fans and decent chasis to disperse heat away from SSD NAND and controller, otherwise SSD controller will thermal throttle to avoid overheating as well as reducing slight read/write performance
-Requires NVMe driver to install
-Requires PCIe Gen3 X4 Lanes from CPU (Skylake/Haswell-E)
-Requires North Bridge Chipset that supports NVMe protocol (X99/Z170/Z97)
-Refer to User's Manual to know that if M.2 Slot is occupied, then one of PCIe slots would be disabled since it's directly connect to PCH (Platform Controller Hub)

 

[scook9]

Confused with the description of Samsung 850 Evo M.2 500 GB SSD. While some M.2 SSDs are much faster than the SATA3, I don't think this one is. The SAMSUNG 950 PRO M.2 512GB PCI-Express 3.0 x4 Internal Solid State Drive (SSD) MZ-V5P512BW, on the other hand, is advertised as about 4-5x faster, but at a cost of $320. If I am wrong, I am hoping someone will correct me and I will buy one!

There are different types of M.2. It depends what incarnation you have.

M.2
10Gb/sec, older, == EVO 850 M.2
(still 4 Gb/Sec faster than SATA III, dirt cheap now)

M.2 Ultra
32 Gb/sec, PCI-E x4 (NVMe), == 950 PRO M.2
(screaming, pricey)

Note the following about M.2 Ultra from
(http://www.newegg.com/Product/SingleProductReview.aspx?reviewid=4505001)
1) Awesome info there, DannyL knows his @#$&.
2) If you have any intention of installing an M.2 Ultra boot SSD, bookmark that page!!!

-Requires adequate cooling fans and decent chasis to disperse heat away from SSD NAND and controller, otherwise SSD controller will thermal throttle to avoid overheating as well as reducing slight read/write performance
-Requires NVMe driver to install
-Requires PCIe Gen3 X4 Lanes from CPU (Skylake/Haswell-E)
-Requires North Bridge Chipset that supports NVMe protocol (X99/Z170/Z97)
-Refer to User's Manual to know that if M.2 Slot is occupied, then one of PCIe slots would be disabled since it's directly connect to PCH (Platform Controller Hub)

So the problem here is that the description in the article AND yours are both WRONG. While you are right that PCIe based M.2 is faster, this drive is NOT. The 850 EVO is a SATA 3 drive, period, end of story. It can be delivered in both the 2.5" SATA format as well as in an M.2 format that is wired for and only support SATA 3. Either way you are getting the exact same SATA 3 bandwidth and protocol from the host controller just in different physical formats. The original M.2 drives were just SATA (NOT PCI EXPRESS!!) in a different form factor. This is still a good drive at a good price if you have a compatible system but it is NOT a PCIe drive (need the 950 Pro for that) and should not be represented as such.

 

[Darkbreeze]

Actually, the CX600 isn't listed here, the CX430 is, which we've discussed in depth as probably being the only worthwhile model in the CX series since the low powered systems it's likely to be used on aren't going to see the kinds of demands that a higher end system would.

 

[Onus]

I have a NIB CX-430M that I will use when a likely system presents itself, most likely one that does not need a PCIe power cable.

 

[Darkbreeze]

Yessir. Even I will use a CX430, whereas, I won't use any of their other middle of the road models in a build. They have a few high end models that I'd use, if they were free or drastically discounted.

 

[IInuyasha74]

@Onus: The Corsair CX power supplies aren't the best, but the CX 430 I used in the article at $20 is hard to compete with at that price point. They aren't problematic to the point that they should be out right avoided, especially not on budget builds. I have recommended the CX 600 before, but it is only when the price is low enough to make it a better deal than just about every competing PSU on the market for that price during the sale. There will always be better quality units, so I really focus in on what you get for your money. I think when I used the CX 600 a while ago it was marked down to like $25 or $30, been a few months so I don't remember, but at that I figured it as about as good as you are going to get for the price. Beyond that I typically won't look any closer at the Corsair CX PSUs, because once you start getting better quality PSUs above that which make the CX not so worthwhile.