OCZ Intros New 3.5-inch "Colossus" SSD

[JMcEntegart]

SSD’s are fast becoming a viable option, and with prices dropping pretty steadily, more folks are opting to go SSD rather than HDD.

OCZ Intros New 3.5-inch "Colossus" SSD : Read more

 

[njalterio]

I would not pay more than $300 for the best SSD. For that much money I could get a 300 GB Velociraptor and a 1 TB drive, which would also be a quite a bit more capacity. Wouldn't be quite as fast, but for what I do its more than fast enough.

 

[Tindytim]

I was wondering why I didn't see any 3.5" SDDs. Makes sense to me.

Although, I never really wanted a SSD that large considering I'd only install my OS and some apps on it.

 

[Pei-chen]

I wouldn't pay more than $200 for any single piece of hardware in my computer so better keep this below $200 (fat chance). OCZ will ask for $1k+ for this.

 

[awaken688]

Glad to see they are getting there with the 3.5" drives. Also glad to see the sizes increase. For professional photo stuff, I am loving having fast hard drives speeds, especially for LR to fetch all its previews and stuff. I'd have to see the speeds, but if it is 2x as fast as a standard drive, I'd drop $200 on the 512GB model. Maybe $250. It is just trade-offs. The increase in system performance would have to be better spent than getting a $100 faster processor or video card.

 

[awaken688]

Glad to see they are getting there with the 3.5" drives. Also glad to see the sizes increase. For professional photo stuff, I am loving having fast hard drives speeds, especially for LR to fetch all its previews and stuff. I'd have to see the speeds, but if it is 2x as fast as a standard drive, I'd drop $200 on the 512GB model. Maybe $250. It is just trade-offs. The increase in system performance would have to be better spent than getting a $100 faster processor or video card.

 

[mirkos]

I believe that the average user wouldn't pay more than double whatever a usual drive cost. E.g. If a 200G disc cost 100$ He would pay 200$ for a SSD 200G. It's really nice to have high speed SSD but the cost must be relevant to the capacity and what most users can afford or are willing to pay.

The good thing is that more SSD are coming out and the price are dropping. Soon we will be able to buy affordable 256GB SSD for OS and programs and we will have a second or external disc for data.

Stay tunned!!!!

 

[BorisChechev]

How much would I pay? Maybe $300 if it got good reviews. But this drive isn't being made for me. I'm sure the server-farm people with corporate budgets are loving this device.

 

[spanspace]

I wont by an SSD till they come down the what the HD pricing structure is now. Memory is so cheap right now its ridiculous they are charging so much.

 

[sublifer]

Maybe $150 for the 512GB drive, but I'd like to say that I'd wait until it was $70 or so before I bought one but I know I'd probably buy it at 150 anyways. I just hope it has the Barefoot controller or better... no more lemon controllers!

 

[scooterlibby]

I'm no expert, but I guess my answer would depend on whether it's SLC and what memory controller they are using. Aren't those some critical issues that should be covered?

 

[grieve]

There just isn't enough information in this article to get excited or even comment on...

-3.5-inch SSD dubbed Colossus
-512 GB and 1 TB versions
-available in the next two months

 

[razzb3d]

[citation][nom]mirkos[/nom]I believe that the average user wouldn't pay more than double whatever a usual drive cost. E.g. If a 200G disc cost 100$ He would pay 200$ for a SSD 200G. It's really nice to have high speed SSD but the cost must be relevant to the capacity and what most users can afford or are willing to pay. The good thing is that more SSD are coming out and the price are dropping. Soon we will be able to buy affordable 256GB SSD for OS and programs and we will have a second or external disc for data.Stay tunned!!!![/citation]


I wouldnt pay double for an SSD. 50% more, yes. 100% more... no way.

 

[jacobdrj]

For my desktop, Raptors will do. I have a RAID 0 of 2x74 in my main rig, and RAID 0 of 3x36 in my secondary rig. All 5 of those drives combined cost me less than $200. Speeds have been great. I have a SSD in my laptop, and for what I do, it is the only way to go. Vertex 60. Why? Because cost-benefit, it was the best. I need my lappy to turn on and off fast. I need it to be durable and I can't wait for Office to start, even 15 seconds... It does the job.

 

[Guest]

I do a lot of music production using extremely large sample libraries. Streaming these libraries direct from disk has always required very fast drives with the lowest access times so SSD's are a significant leap forward for the audio production industry.

The same is true for musicians that use their samplers/sample libraries in a live situation.

I wouldn't have any problem paying $1.00-$1.50 per Gigabyte. This may sound like a lot, but it is actually only a small portion of the overall cost of putting together a production quality Digital Audio Workstation (DAW).

 

[Tindytim]

[citation][nom]mirkos[/nom]I believe that the average user wouldn't pay more than double whatever a usual drive cost. E.g. If a 200G disc cost 100$ He would pay 200$ for a SSD 200G. It's really nice to have high speed SSD but the cost must be relevant to the capacity and what most users can afford or are willing to pay.[/citation]
I wouldn't buy an SSD for capacity, I'd buy one for performance, some multiplicative idea by capacity is silly, since capacity isn't the main attraction.

 

[scryer_360]

For 512gig and 1 terabyte capacities..... Maybe $512 and $1024? $1 per gig is actually rather good for an SSD.

 

[blackened144]

[citation][nom]Tindytim[/nom]I wouldn't buy an SSD for capacity, I'd buy one for performance, some multiplicative idea by capacity is silly, since capacity isn't the main attraction.[/citation]
You are correct. I already have more than enough storage with my 2x400GB raid0 and 2x500gb raid0 arrays. My OS drive, just recently died, another 400gb drive. Rather than put another 7200 drive in I worked out a deal with a customer that got me 2 30gb Vertex drives for the price of one. These things in raid0 absolutely kill the Velociraptor.

 

[jeverson]

OK... a Western Digital VelociRaptor 300GB is $230 at Newegg... I would buy 2 for RAID0... so $460 gets me 600GB of pretty fast traditional storage... or i could get 2 Western Digital Caviar Black 500GB for $140 ($70 each) in RAID0 and the is 1TB of pretty darn fast storage... so for the VelociRaptor I am paying $0.77 per GB and for the Caviar Black I am paying $0.14 per GB... so I guess i would be willing to pay $0.90 - $1.00 per GB for the SSD as long as it is at least twice as fast as the VelociRaptor setup. After all it is new and new = $$$. Also I don't think I would need a bigger drive than 500Gb for my primary drive as I have had a 320Gb drive for years and i have tons of media and games installed and still have plenty of room.

 

[Kill@dor]

My 7200rpm 500GB Western Digital's are still kicking...even my 160GB IDE Western too ^_^. Prices need to be relaxed for anything new in the 500GB area i think...

 

[TheZander]

This is just evolutionary. This is where tech is headed, and it's going at a decent pace. I wouldn't buy one myself, but for server/workstation apps this will be perfect for some, again depending on price. But for performance, reliability, AND capacity, some are more than willing to pay a premium. These drives are a step in the right direction, and another stage of the progress we're making on solid state technology.

Kudos to OCZ for bringing the field one step further. While not practical for most of us, someday these might be. I've heard the "Oh, for half that I can buy two Velociraptors and put them in RAID 0 for almost as much performance!!!" Yeah, you can, but we gotta start somewhere. Remember back when Zip disks and drivers were all the rage? Flash memory is really where things are headed, and the more mainstream it becomes, and the more they manufacture, the cheaper the unit cost is going to be. This has happened in the TV market, computer monitor market, video card market, processor market, and in other areas. Now we're seeing huge advances and development in the storage market.

 

[tipoo]

Good...It allways confused me as to why most SSD's were laptop-targeted, when they are an enthusiast product.

 

[Tindytim]

[citation][nom]tipoo[/nom]Good...It allways confused me as to why most SSD's were laptop-targeted, when they are an enthusiast product.[/citation]
Well, SSD's are great for laptop's because there aren't any mechanical parts that can be harmed while moving the laptop.

 

[tipoo]

[citation][nom]Tindytim[/nom]Well, SSD's are great for laptop's because there aren't any mechanical parts that can be harmed while moving the laptop.[/citation]


I know, but they have always been an enthusiast product so it would make sence to have more desktop versions.

 

[Luscious]

SSD's advantage is in speed and reliability, not capacity. 1TB of SSD storage is a grand waste. Four regular 500GB drives in RAID 0 with a good raid card will cost far less.

I recently built a rig for a high-end gaming/encoding job. I used dual 64GB SSD drives in RAID 0 for the OS and apps, five 300GB velociraptors in RAID 5 for storage/games, and two 2TB drives in RAID 1 as dedicated backup. The whole system works like a charm, boots in seconds, loads applications near instantly and offers plenty of storage.

For the near-term, I'd say traditional drives in a raid configuration will beat SSD in the desktop market. For notebooks though, SSD's have all the advantages, and should come down in price as more and more manufacturers offer them.