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Samsung 840 Evo SSD Upgrade

Here are the results, first while in the USB 3 Dock and the second in the Mini

Very happy with the speed :)

Mac Mini (late 2012) base i5 with Samsung 840 Pro 256 GB
 

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Nice results!

Worth the extra money for the Pro by the looks of it :)
 
I got it for £115 as at the time the evo was £95 but if I could have got the evo for £70-75 then I would have gone for that instead.
 
Are these SSD Samsung drives really reliable? I've been checking Newegg reviews and there seemed to be a string a bad drives from mostly 2013 but overall positive.

Also are the SSDs that Apple install in there computers generally any more reliable even though they may be from the same manufacture?
 
I don't think they are any different from the ones that apple gets, however when samsung send out SSD's they may only test 1 in 10 of them, where as apple may test them all before they go out.

This is just a theory though. I know all their displays have higher tolerances for things like dead pixels.

----------

I've not had any problems with my 5 day old 840 pro lol
 
andeify said:
I don't think they are any different from the ones that apple gets, however when samsung send out SSD's they may only test 1 in 10 of them, where as apple may test them all before they go out.

This is just a theory though. I know all their displays have higher tolerances for things like dead pixels.

----------

I've not had any problems with my 5 day old 840 pro lol
Click to expand...

heh. That's the thing I always wonder because it's seems like there is less issues with SSDs in general with ones in Apple computers than buying them from a store. Maybe my imagination but i'd venture it's factually true if there is stats on it. I rarely hear about SSDs failing on Apple computers like I do when I read reviews on aftermarket installs by users.

Honestly even though you can save a lot I wonder if it sometimes its better to opt for the premium to have Apple put it in :eek:
 
fhall1 said:
Nope....for the Apple premium you can buy another drive as a spare if the first goes belly-up - which chances are it won't.
Click to expand...



True. I guess I was looking at it from a time to money prespective. How much is your time worth....ie How much time would I spend in total if spare went belly up....including backups reinstall? This isn't as big of a deal on the mini since it's easy to swap SSDs out. Probably next mini we won't have this option so.... :D
 
fathergll said:
...it seems like there are less issues with SSDs in general with ones in Apple computers than buying them from a store. Maybe my imagination...
Click to expand...
It is only your imagination:
https://forums.macrumors.com/threads/1410577/
and
https://forums.macrumors.com/poll.php?do=showresults&pollid=10426

Btw:
http://uk.hardware.info/reviews/417...-with-final-conclusion-final-update-20-6-2013

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That-Guy said:
Nice results!

Worth the extra money for the Pro by the looks of it :)
Click to expand...
The 840 Pro is the best choice for desktop computers (price/performance). For mobile applications or in a "green" household or company i recommend the 850 Pro or the 840 EVO. Both use much less power than the 840 Pro.
 
andeify said:
I don't think they are any different from the ones that apple gets, however when samsung send out SSD's they may only test 1 in 10 of them, where as apple may test them all before they go out.

This is just a theory though. I know all their displays have higher tolerances for things like dead pixels.

----------

I've not had any problems with my 5 day old 840 pro lol
Click to expand...

From my understanding, the SSD used in the original Retina Macbook Pro was the Samsung O.E.M. equivalent of the Samsung 830 / 840 Pro. These are great drives along with the newer 850 Pro.

The Samsung 840 and 840 EVO appears to suffer from slow read speeds, when reading old data. There was a long thread on overclock.net forums and verified by anandtech.
http://www.anandtech.com/show/8550/...40-evo-read-performance-bug-fix-is-on-the-way

Once the new firmware is released in a few days time and performance and reliability is confirmed, these might be considered to be good drives again.

By the way, there is no point in testing for this problem with Blackmagic, as this writes new data and reads it again, while the problem with the 840 / 840 EVO relates to older data that was written months (or at least several weeks) earlier and is now slower to read than when it was first written.
 
alex0002 said:
From my understanding, the SSD used in the original Retina Macbook Pro was the Samsung O.E.M. equivalent of the Samsung 830 / 840 Pro. These are great drives along with the newer 850 Pro.

The Samsung 840 and 840 EVO appears to suffer from slow read speeds, when reading old data. There was a long thread on overclock.net forums and verified by anandtech.
http://www.anandtech.com/show/8550/...40-evo-read-performance-bug-fix-is-on-the-way

Once the new firmware is released in a few days time and performance and reliability is confirmed, these might be considered to be good drives again.

By the way, there is no point in testing for this problem with Blackmagic, as this writes new data and reads it again, while the problem with the 840 / 840 EVO relates to older data that was written months (or at least several weeks) earlier and is now slower to read than when it was first written.
Click to expand...

This was also one of the reasons I went with the pro, at the time I was looking to buy prices for the EVO were at£95 and Samsung had just announced they were working on a firmware fix. I didn't want to wait for that, and the better write speeds swayed me towards the 840 PRO
 
You are all doing it wrong! Apple hates Samsung. Dump them in the trash and buy a kingston v300 immediately :rolleyes:
 
Firmware Update Released

alex0002 said:
The Samsung 840 and 840 EVO appears to suffer from slow read speeds, when reading old data. There was a long thread on overclock.net forums and verified by anandtech.

http://www.anandtech.com/show/8550/...40-evo-read-performance-bug-fix-is-on-the-way

Once the new firmware is released in a few days time and performance and reliability is confirmed, these might be considered to be good drives again.

By the way, there is no point in testing for this problem with Blackmagic, as this writes new data and reads it again, while the problem with the 840 / 840 EVO relates to older data that was written months (or at least several weeks) earlier and is now slower to read than when it was first written.
Click to expand...

The following article provides info on the update:

http://www.guru3d.com/news-story/sa...-firmware-update-solves-slow-reads-issue.html

Haven't tried it yet.

Cheers

Edit: looks like it is Windows only for a couple of weeks:

https://forums.macrumors.com/threads/1801427/

Maybe update the firmware using Bootcamp? Probably best to start with a clean slate if taking that route but I think I can wait for Samsung to release for Mac.
 
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drsox said:
Here's my results with the 256GB 840 Pro as a fusion drive with the 500GB 5400rpm stock drive. Not as fast as the Pro by itself, but still good.
Click to expand...

whats involved in upgrading the fusion drive?

I ordered a 1TB 850 pro to replace the 128GB samsung that came with the mini.
 
hugodrax said:
whats involved in upgrading the fusion drive?

I ordered a 1TB 850 pro to replace the 128GB samsung that came with the mini.
Click to expand...

If it's already been made into a fusion drive, then I guess it would involve the following :

1. Unmake the fusion drive ( try this - http://macs.about.com/od/diyguidesprojects/ss/Split-Your-Fusion-Drive-Apart.htm )
2. Replace the old SSD with the new SSD.
3. Allow Disc Utility to make a new fusion drive.


I've no experience of this so I don't know what would be involved in restoring the original copy of OSX, but if you have another USB drive, then I guess you can just use this as the boot and restore drive.
 
When you get the new ssd and leave the older drive in and setup the ssd with a clean install of the OS can you just go into your old drive and copy over all your things or should you do that before you even start the install of the ssd
 
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