Best SSD For Music Production

Sources

1. Kristian Vättö, AnandTech, 20140701
   Samsung SSD 850 Pro (128GB, 256GB & 1TB) Review: Enter the 3D Era

   “Samsung does not cease to amaze me with their SSDs as the 850 Pro just kills it in every aspect. The performance is there. The endurance is the best of the class. Heck, even Samsung's feature and software suites beat the competition by a mile. To be honest, there is not a single thing missing in the 850 Pro because regardless of the angle you look at the drive from, it it will still top the charts.”

2. Geoff Gasior, Tech Report, 20140630
   Samsung's 850 Pro solid-state drive reviewed

   “I can't make a rational case for the 850 Pro. Heck, if it were my money, I'd probably get a much larger SSD and live happily with slightly slower access to a lot more data. But I still want the 850 Pro—or better yet, a version with a PCI Express interface. Another V-NAND SSD is due before the end of the year, so perhaps I'll get my wish.”

3. Christopher Ryan, Tom's Hardware, 20140630
   Samsung 850 Pro SSD Review

   “Frankly, most readers (even the enthusiasts) won't need the 850 Pro, particularly given relatively steep pricing. Most of us with desktops and notebooks are well-served by superb offerings battling it out at the budget end of the market. There are too many options going for less than $.50/GB, including certain configurations of the 840 EVO, to jump all over flagships selling for twice as much. But then there are the most hardcore users who willingly pay handsomely for the fastest CPUs and graphics cards. They run entry-level servers, edit high-resolution video, build performance-sensitive RAID arrays, and so on. They're the ones who'll find what the 850 Pro can do most interesting.”

4. Kristian Vättö, AnandTech, 20141208
   Samsung SSD 850 EVO (120GB, 250GB, 500GB & 1TB) Review

   “In terms of capacities the 850 EVO lineup is similar to the 840 EVO. The only difference is that the 850 EVO drops the 750GB model, which from what I've heard wasn't a very popular model and to be honest it was kind of an odd middle capacity that generally wasn't price competitive against the 500GB and 1TB models. Initially I was told that the 850 EVO would come in 2TB capacity as well, but later on Samsung opted against it due to the limited demand. Samsung has always been after the high volume markets, so I see the logic behind the decision not to release a 2TB model just yet as its price would drive most people away. The good news, however, is that Samsung has the technology to bring a 2TB drive to the market.”

5. Geoff Gasior, Tech Report, 20141208
   Samsung's 850 EVO solid-state drive reviewed

   “... the 850 EVO 1TB pictured above uses the same triple-core MEX controller as the 850 Pro, while the rest of the family taps a newer MGX chip with only two cores. Samsung contends that V-NAND's raw performance is good enough for the smaller drives to reach top speed with one fewer core. The greater "hardware automation" introduced with the MEX generation likely lessens the need for additional general-purpose horsepower, as well.”

6. Various, Apple Support Communities, 20140812
   Upgrading Your MacBook Pro with a Solid State Drive

   “Many people come to the MacBook Pro forum asking about SSD upgrades, so this user tip is applicable to those, primarily, who have already made the decision to upgrade. Note that I only recommend using a SSD in 2009 and later MacBook Pros with a 3.0Gbps to 6.0Gbps interface speed – and I recommend buying a 6.0Gbps SSD regardless of the fact that models with a SATA II interface won’t be able to use the full-negotiated speed of 6.0Gbps.”

7. Various, Apple Support Communities, 20140910
   Samsung Evo 840 For Music Production On Macbook Pro (2012)

   “The 840 Pro is not only one of the fastest SSDs around, no amount of data you read/write a day is going to affect your 5 year warranty. I've had nothing but SSDs in my machine since April of 2012 and my MacBook Pro sleeps quite well.”

8. Nathan Edwards, The Wirecutter, 20150418
   Best SSDs

   “The 500GB 850 EVO costs between $180 and 210 (36 to 42 cents per gigabyte). It has a five-year warranty, and includes Samsung’s great Magician software for easy drive installation, maintenance, and even faster transfers (on Windows). It also supports full-disk self-encryption, which is necessary for some corporate use.”

9. Kristian Vättö, AnandTech, 20150410
   Crucial BX100 (120GB, 250GB, 500GB & 1TB) SSD Review

   “With the BX100, Crucial is moving to user capacities that are similar to Samsung's EVO SSD series. That gives the BX100 a little more over-provisioning over the traditional 2^n capacities and I also suspect that even hundreds like 500GB are easier to market than 480GB or 512GB given that consumers are accustomed to hard drive capacities. ”