Samsung SSD's speed up with new 830 series
Today, Samsung Electronics unveiled its next-generation solid-state drives, the 830 series, which goes on sale in October. Pricing isn't immediately available.
The new SSDs incorporate Serial ATA Revision 3.0, which Samsung claims doubles the bandwidth of the 470 series. SSDs use flash memory and aren't susceptible to the same kind of failures as magnetic drives.
"Solid state drives have long been the preferred choice for those seeking the very best in performance", UnSoo Kim, Samsung's vice president of memory brand product marketing, says in a statement. "With the Samsung SSD 830 Series, we are raising that performance to even higher levels, while also delivering unparalleled Samsung design and convenience in the package".
I'll be interested to see how the 830 series compares to its predecessor. A few months ago my circa-2009 Sony VAIO Z720 laptop got upgraded to the 256GB 470 SSD. Config before upgrade: 2.53GHz Intel Core 2 Duo processor (1066MHz front-side bus), 13.1-inch LED backlit display with 1600-by-900 resolution, (dedicated) 256MB nVidia GeForce 9300M GS graphics (DDR3) and Mobile Intel Graphics Media Accelerator 4500MHD, 4GB of DDR3 memory, 320GB SATA hard drive (7,200 rpm), dual-layer DVD burner, Bluetooth 2.1 + EDR, 10/100/1000 Ethernet, fingerprint reader, 802.11 a/b/g/n wireless, two USB ports, FireWire 400 port, HDMI port, Verizon EVDO modem and Windows Vista Business 64-bit.
It was a honking machine then and still rocks two years later for graphics and display, so I didn't want to replace it. Swapping the hard drive with SSD was like getting a new computer. There were way too many screws involved (bad Sony), but the 2.5-inch SSD popped right in. I could have put the drive into a 13-inch MacBook Pro, but Windows 7 supports TRIM, Mac OS X Snow Leopard did not. Successor Lion does, including third-party drives. TRIM is important for ensuring that data space is properly utilized.
BTW, Samsung offers Norton Ghost in the new "full upgrade" SSD kit. Many techies should be familiar with this tool, and others like it, for capturing and restoring disk images.
My exeperience: Going SSD is life changing. The Z720 starts and resumes in seconds. It was one of the best upgrade experiences in years.