[SOLVED] Why would you buy an expensive ssd over a cheap one?

[Patrickibsen]

As the title says, why not buy a ssd like "WD Blue SN550" or a "Kingston NV1" over a "Samsung 980 pro" for example. What's the down side of buying the cheaper ones and the cons of the expensive ssd's

 

[JohnBonhamsGhost]

downsides aren't exactly rated by price.
you may find the same "expensive" drive for cheap prices and vice versa at other outlets.

but a lot of those exceptionally cheaper drives can just be manufactured with lower quality chips, circuits, etc.
they may have a shorter warranty or charge for labor and/or shipping with RMA.
they may also have a shorter life expectancy.

there's many factors that may make one hardware component cheaper than another or considered lower quality.

 

[hotaru.hino]

The cheaper SSDs tend to have worse performance than expensive ones with extensive write file operations, though it may or may not be a problem depending on how often said operations are done.

Also since cheaper SSDs tend to exclude DRAM, there's the potential to wear out faster due to using flash to cache things. Though I'm sure recent DRAMless SSDs can use system RAM if special software is installed, this doesn't bring the performance levels to SSDs with DRAM.

 

[fzabkar]

I would expect that cheaper SSDs would use cheaper NAND. Kingston rebadges NAND flash with its own part number, so it's difficult to know where it is actually manufactured, or what grade it is.

Crucial is often recommended in this forum, but this manufacturer routinely omits protection devices such as TVS diodes or electronic fuses. Since these components cost $1 or less, one would have to wonder what other short cuts have been taken.

 

[Zerk2012]

For your average user it doesn't matter. I would avoid Kingston.

 

[Pextaxmx]

WD Blue SN550 for example comes with QLC NAND chips - along with a DRAMless controller, the current price is actually more than what you get in my opinion. Can be really slow in some situations. I would rather get a SATA TLC drive with DRAM over SN550 or Crucial P2.

I think PCIE 4 drives are overpriced as well, for what you get over PCIE 3 drives.

I personally value SSDs in this order (again, this is my personal, uneducated silly preference)

MLC PCIE3 > TLC PCIE4 wDRAM > TLC PCIE3 wDRAM > TLC PCIE4 DRAMless > TLC PCIE3 DRAMless = TLC SATA wDRAM > all the DRAMless SATA and/or QLC NAND drives...

Not sure where to put MLC SATA drives, then there are planar and 3D MLC NANDs (I have a SM883 1.92 drive and a Samsung 830 fantastic snappy, peaceofmind, workhorse drives. Love them.) tempted to say they are on par with PCIE4 drives but I chose to pretend there is no such thing as MLC SATA drives...

I think TLC PCIE3 wDRAM drives are at the performance/price ratio sweet spot right now.