Ocz Vertex 2 50GB SSD for $75!

[Zax]

NewEgg has a great deal on the 50gb V2. The 50GB model has 28 percent over provisioning which allows it to recover faster after getting hammered as well as maintain top speeds under heavy use. For raid users this is a must as it helps to make up for the lack of trim in an array.

Model No : OCZSSD2-2VTX50G
Price: $74.99 with a $15 MIR...$89.99 without (Last week they were $130!)
Shipping: FREE

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Produc...82E16820227528

[WiCKeD]

On the face of it, it's a good deal.

However, I suggest you may want to look at some of the reviews for OCZ's other Sandforce based SSDs.

Number one, they have switched to 25nm flash, which is apparently far slower than advertised.

Number two, it has a problem with write cycle endurance - it lasts less, which is why they need the additional overprovisioning, which costs you several extra gigabytes in hard drive space. These are probably more like 40GB drives.

Number three, the failure rate on these drives seem to be far, far higher. Not sure if this applies to the 50GB drives, but the 60GB drives have been dying within months. I bought a 60GB Agility 2 and it failed within 3 months with all data lost. The SandForce controllers are encrypted so recovery is virtually impossible. Not a major problem as an OS drive, but still an issue.

[Zax]

Ocz made the mistake of using 25nm/64Gb nand dies which resulted in not all the controller channels being used (like to 40Gb model). The 64Gb configuration also caused the drives to format below IDEMA specs costing 4GB of drive space. They have since switched to 25nm/32Gb dies so now all channels are being utilized. This also remedies the formatted capacity issue. Those that received 25nm/64Gb drives can swap for a 32Gb drive free of charge, all shipping paid. In the end the slower write drives are totally indistinguishable in a boot drive deployment...iow if you take the labels off you can't tell which is which just by using them. The reason I know this is because I bought a 60E for my wife's rig and observed this with my own eyes. No one is thrilled with this whole fiasco, including myself. Ocz should never have used the same part number as the 32nm drives...that was a stupid maneuver that has ****ed off a lot of customers and they are catching total hell for it as they should.
Thankfully the upcoming SF22xx and SF25xx sata 6Gb/s controllers have absolutely zero problems using the 25nm nand. The new Vertex 3s are fast as hell...here's a link to the 20 page internal beta testing thread...it WILL make you salivate. lol Oh...also, the new SFs are muuuuch faster than before with incompressible data.

http://www.ocztechnologyforum.com/fo...rtex-3-Reviews