Average Reviews:
(More customer reviews)The Samsung 128GB SSD is a nice drive which works well. Assuming it performs well over the next month, I will increase it's rating to 5 stars, and will probably buy another one.
Some things to know before you buy.
1) Although it's marketed as 128GB, it's actually 120GB, just like the competition. See FAQ 358344 at http://www.samsung.com/us/support/owners/topic/MZ-5PA128/US.
2) Before you install it, write down the serial number found on the drive itself, as the serial number on the box may be different(!), thus saving you to have to remove it once installed. You will need this to register the drive (optional), if you decide to do so. However, you can also register with the serial number on the box, but since the serial number includes info on the date manufactured, it's best to provide the right one.
3) If you use Windows 7, make sure the drive has the latest firmware before you activate Windows 7, and install all your programs and data. Download and install the Samsung SSD Magician, which will tell you whether you need to update the firmware. If so, it will erase the entire drive, so you will have to reinstall everything, and your Win7 activation code may no longer be recognized. Magician does not support OS X or Linux.
4) If you can't download the Magician utility from http://www.samsung.com/us/support/downloads/MZ-5PA128/US, it may be because your firewall is blocking it. Just temporarily open all the Peer-to-Peer and Instant Messaging ports, and the download should work.
5) Samsung Technical Support is primitive. Live Chat is not available for SSD drives. Email Support has a 72-hour turnaround, although it's been more than 72 hours since I emailed my 2 questions. Phone support hours are shorter than what's listed. There are only 10 questions in the Community Forum, http://www.samsung.com/us/support/allQuestion.do?prd_mdl_name=MZ-5PA128&moduleurl=sems/jsp/iframeExport/supportAllQuestion.jsp, of which only 5 are answered. And the web site is quite slow.
6) Samsung doc could use a bit of help with English. "'Samsung SSD Magician' toolkit application would be a collection of apps..." Well, I would be king too!
Other things to note.
1) Before buying a SSD, check out Tom's hardware and AnandTech for their reviews, such as http://www.tomshardware.com/reviews/ssd-trim-firmware,2800.html.
2) Late February and early March, OCZ and Intel released much faster and more expensive SSDs, respectively. If you can afford it, make sure your h/w has the required 6Gbps SATA interface, otherwise you're wasting your money. There are probably a couple of models, but I am not aware of any notebook or laptop with more than a 3Gbs SATA interface.
3) OS X supports TRIM, but only for Apple provided SSDs. However, I'm using my SSD in a MacBook Pro with no problem. I expect the drive will start to slow down dramatically in about 6 months to a year during normal usage, but I'm hoping Apple will support TRIM on all SSDs by then, otherwise there are Disk Utility tricks to manually do the same thing as TRIM, but it's a bit involved. Since I'm primarily using BootCamp with Win7 which supports TRIM, I'm hoping my SSD will be ok.
Hope this helps!
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