Tooling around
The read/write figures drop in the more demanding AS SSD and CrystalDiskMark results – both of which use incompressible data, which can be a bit of an Achilles heel for Sandforce equipped drives. Still, the read figures in both benchmarks hold up quite well, which is no doubt a sign of Intel’s hand on the firmware.
CrystalDiskMark 3 Results
Data throughput in Megabytes per Second (MB/s)
Longer bars are better
The 520 series supports 256-bit AES (Advanced Encryption Standard) and better password protection for better security than previous Intel drive ranges. The new drives also work with the latest version of Intel’s excellent SSD Toolbox utility. SSD Toolbox offers a host of routines to keep the drive running as close to fresh out-of-the-box as possible; drive optimisation, system tuner, firmware updater and, if all else fails, Secure Erase. Intel also backs the drive with a five year warranty.
Performance comes at a price
Verdict
For many, the fact that there is the Intel name on a Sandforce controllers drive will allay some of the fears that people might have over the controller's sometimes notorious reliability issues in previous incarnations. It’s a fast drive all right but it does come with a hefty price tag that impacts on its overall rating here. ®
More SSD Reviews |
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 Samsung 830 |
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Technology HyperX |
 OWC
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Intel 520 240GB SSD
COMMENTS
"Hence, the 240GB capacity, which, when the drive is formatted, drops even further to 224GB"
Actually the capacity doesn't drop when formatted, rather you change from using the hard disk drive manufacturer's standard decimal-based measurement of 1 GB = 10 to the power 9 bytes, to using the more widely used (at least, by filesystems) binary-based measurement of 1GB as 1024 to the power 3.
I rather think you're mistaken. The original idiom was "all told", although the "all tolled" version is used, if much less frequently.
http://www.word-detective.com/2008/04/11/all-told/
Power consumption
I imagine most people are most interested in SSDs for their speed. The next most interesting number to me is power consumption. It's a shame that it doesn't feature much in these reviews.
My laptop runs continuously, mostly used as a desktop replacement rather than being lugged around. I was keen to replace the HDD with a SSD to increase reliability and lower power consumption, until I discovered that most SSD seem to have about the same power consumption as the equivalent HDD. That was disappointing. Would be nice if power consumption were included in the summary box.
Re: Just have to say
Unless you are referring to a peal of bells, "all told" is the correct form.
