[drstove2]

Like others, I have been very tempted to go with an SSD as a boot drive. Problem is that whenever I see an ad for an SSD and look at the reviews there are ALWAYS a significant number of drives that were dead on arrival (DOA). Worse, is the fact that so many people report their SSD failing after a few months, consequently losing all the time that went into building up the drive. It doesn't seem to matter who the drive manufacturer is. Based upon reviews I have read, all of them seem to be a crap shoot. In my opinion, there is absolutely no excuse for DOAs with a solid state component with no moving parts, yet every review I have read of any SSD include a number of customers who have experienced the hassle of having to return the drive as soon as they installed it. Many others report that the "drive was great while it lasted," which is frequently just a few weeks or months. Why does it seem that quality control is so lacking on SSDs? With as many manufacturers selling SSDs as there are, shouldn't at least one of them be getting it right? What are SSD manufacturers doing to improve the quality and reliability of their drives? Does anyone know of a SSD manufacturer who builds reliable drives?

[Rommel]

Hi,

SSDs are becoming more reliable as many firmware updates have been released.
Platter drives also have failure rates and some enough that I didn't buy it when looking.
Some also were DOA.

Lately there have been some great deals on high end SSDs with 120-128GB capacity.
Under $100.
To me, that is worth the concerns you mentioned.
No matter what type of boot drive you own, a backup method should be in place.
Some SSD manufactures offer a 5yr warrenty.
They feel confident in their product to do so.

Most bad reps are from the earlier introduction of SSDs.
They now have more veriety of controllers that seems to be doing well.
Currently my 128GB OCZ vertex 4 drive has been flawless.
Though no doubt some are dudes like any other component.

You could also believe operator error in some reviews.
W7 allowcates a portion of the drive so you may not see the full capacity, yet the vendor gets a lesser review for whats not there fault.

[waldojim]

drstove2, on 19 July 2012 - 04:46 AM, said:

Like others, I have been very tempted to go with an SSD as a boot drive. Problem is that whenever I see an ad for an SSD and look at the reviews there are ALWAYS a significant number of drives that were dead on arrival (DOA). Worse, is the fact that so many people report their SSD failing after a few months, consequently losing all the time that went into building up the drive. It doesn't seem to matter who the drive manufacturer is. Based upon reviews I have read, all of them seem to be a crap shoot. In my opinion, there is absolutely no excuse for DOAs with a solid state component with no moving parts, yet every review I have read of any SSD include a number of customers who have experienced the hassle of having to return the drive as soon as they installed it. Many others report that the "drive was great while it lasted," which is frequently just a few weeks or months. Why does it seem that quality control is so lacking on SSDs? With as many manufacturers selling SSDs as there are, shouldn't at least one of them be getting it right? What are SSD manufacturers doing to improve the quality and reliability of their drives? Does anyone know of a SSD manufacturer who builds reliable drives?

First, the manufacturer of the drive plays more of a role in the failure rate than you realize. For example, Plextor claims less than 1% failure rate for all drives up to one year old. That number is impressive for any part.The Samsung 830, and Crucial M4 are also excellent drives. The key here, seems to be finding drives based on a controller that isn't Sandforce.

I will say that I went with Plextor for many reasons. Warranty, and reliability being two of them. Check into those drives.