Should I get this used NVME SSD? Cheap 1TB NVME recommendation?

[FRD]

Short topic, so I found a good deal on a 1TB m.2 NVME SSD. The brand is Kingspec, as featured in Linus' video before (see below).

These are Chinese SSDs that are sold on Aliexpress too. Usually they are $100 new, the one I found is $50 (converted, I use Euros). Should I take the gamble?

Speeds are pretty slow at 1500/1000 mb/s according to benchmarks.

 

Give me good reasons to NOT buy it, other than price.

By the way, what's the cheapest 1TB NVME that I can get at the moment? Sub $100 preferably, other than the usual Kingston A2000.

 

 

 

 

[0591ryan]

Wait for a sale-plenty if mainstream budget models go on sale for sub$100 prices for 1tb models

 

personally I wouldn’t trust my data to knock off SSDs to save a buck nor would I assume performance is anywhere near what has been benchmarked-regular SSD manufacturers are guilty of swapping components out, I assure you the race to the bottom will ensure these low budget options do the same

 

i would only buy from WD or Samsung, they make quality products and the whole thing is done in house-if you really are budget constrained, buy used parts from within the past 3 years, unless they have been really abused they have plenty of life left

[Chris Pratt]

As long as you're just using as a pure boot drive or otherwise don't care if you lose all the data on it, I suppose it's fine. The video thumbnail alone should be enough to tell you that you should probably stay away, though. Any time Linus is facepalming, it's not exactly a good sign.

[Freakwise]

50 minutes ago, FRD said:

Give me good reasons to NOT buy it, other than price.

quality, durability 

52 minutes ago, FRD said:

what's the cheapest 1TB NVME that I can get at the moment?

PCPartPicker Part List: https://pcpartpicker.com/list/rfKGQD

Storage: Kingston A2000 1 TB M.2-2280 NVME Solid State Drive  ($116.99 @ Amazon) 
Storage: Western Digital Blue SN550 1 TB M.2-2280 NVME Solid State Drive  ($104.99 @ Lenovo) 
Storage: Crucial P2 1 TB M.2-2280 NVME Solid State Drive  ($102.90 @ Amazon) 
Storage: Samsung 980 1 TB M.2-2280 NVME Solid State Drive  ($109.99 @ Amazon) 
 

 

any reason why you want to buy a used ssd? other than the price...

[FRD]

3 hours ago, 0591ryan said:

Wait for a sale-plenty if mainstream budget models go on sale for sub$100 prices for 1tb models

 

personally I wouldn’t trust my data to knock off SSDs to save a buck nor would I assume performance is anywhere near what has been benchmarked-regular SSD manufacturers are guilty of swapping components out, I assure you the race to the bottom will ensure these low budget options do the same

 

i would only buy from WD or Samsung, they make quality products and the whole thing is done in house-if you really are budget constrained, buy used parts from within the past 3 years, unless they have been really abused they have plenty of life left

Yeah, I guess I'm a bit impatient too. Just need to wait for the next sale, probably the best thing to do.

Data is an important thing. In my case I would just use it as a game drive, never would I use a secondhand SSD as a boot drive. Another case would be backup, but only as a 2nd or 3rd backup. I've seen Linus' videos about the recent swapping of components by manufacturers in SSDs. Some good options already fell off due to this.

I agree that WD and Samsung are both really good brands (even though I had WDs fail before, but those were HDDs).

3 hours ago, Chris Pratt said:

As long as you're just using as a pure boot drive or otherwise don't care if you lose all the data on it, I suppose it's fine. The video thumbnail alone should be enough to tell you that you should probably stay away, though. Any time Linus is facepalming, it's not exactly a good sign.

True, Linus' videos usually tell it all and warn buyers. I would plan to only use it as a game drive or backup drive, not a main one. But yeah, we never know how long it could last.

2 hours ago, Freakwise said:

quality, durability 

PCPartPicker Part List: https://pcpartpicker.com/list/rfKGQD

Storage: Kingston A2000 1 TB M.2-2280 NVME Solid State Drive  ($116.99 @ Amazon) 
Storage: Western Digital Blue SN550 1 TB M.2-2280 NVME Solid State Drive  ($104.99 @ Lenovo) 
Storage: Crucial P2 1 TB M.2-2280 NVME Solid State Drive  ($102.90 @ Amazon) 
Storage: Samsung 980 1 TB M.2-2280 NVME Solid State Drive  ($109.99 @ Amazon) 
 

 

any reason why you want to buy a used ssd? other than the price...

Thanks, those are pretty much the most popular budget SSDs out there.

Some notes though. I've heard about the A2000s problems, which is why I'm not really into that one. SN550 seems pretty good, but price is close to better drives in here. The Crucial P2 was on sale for $90 before, but I decided to pass on it, since it's a QLC drive. I rather spend $10 more on a P5 when on sale. Finally I'm eyeing the 980, but I'm doubting about that one since it has no DRAM cache.

 

Reasons I want to buy a used SSD is mainly price, but other reasons are that the market offers drives that are discontinued or in some cases the older drives (like XPG) that still have the better components than the newer ones where the components are swapped with worse ones.

[0591ryan]

8 minutes ago, FRD said:

Yeah, I guess I'm a bit impatient too. Just need to wait for the next sale, probably the best thing to do.

Data is an important thing. In my case I would just use it as a game drive, never would I use a secondhand SSD as a boot drive. Another case would be backup, but only as a 2nd or 3rd backup. I've seen Linus' videos about the recent swapping of components by manufacturers in SSDs. Some good options already fell off due to this.

I agree that WD and Samsung are both really good brands (even though I had WDs fail before, but those were HDDs).

True, Linus' videos usually tell it all and warn buyers. I would plan to only use it as a game drive or backup drive, not a main one. But yeah, we never know how long it could last.

Thanks, those are pretty much the most popular budget SSDs out there.

Some notes though. I've heard about the A2000s problems, which is why I'm not really into that one. SN550 seems pretty good, but price is close to better drives in here. The Crucial P2 was on sale for $90 before, but I decided to pass on it, since it's a QLC drive. I rather spend $10 more on a P5 when on sale. Finally I'm eyeing the 980, but I'm doubting about that one since it has no DRAM cache.

 

Reasons I want to buy a used SSD is mainly price, but other reasons are that the market offers drives that are discontinued or in some cases the older drives (like XPG) that still have the better components than the newer ones where the components are swapped with worse ones.

I’d just get a second hand drive then-check the S.M.A.R.T data to see the wear and tear on the NAND and if it’s not at acceptable levels, resell it to someone who doesn’t care and try again but odds are good that any newer drive from the past 3 years will be more than sufficient for your purpose at a steep discount since they are “old” by PC hardware standards

[FRD]

4 minutes ago, 0591ryan said:

I’d just get a second hand drive then-check the S.M.A.R.T data to see the wear and tear on the NAND and if it’s not at acceptable levels, resell it to someone who doesn’t care and try again but odds are good that any newer drive from the past 3 years will be more than sufficient for your purpose at a steep discount since they are “old” by PC hardware standards

That's right. I might just try with a cheaper secondhand drive at first, just to try it out. It's hard since not every seller wants to/can give out S.M.A.R.T. data. What you said, I could always resell it or maybe using it as a external drive in an enclosure or something.

I'm looking at PCIe Gen 3 drives, which are considered "old" already opposed to people using Gen 4 nowadays. I'm honestly fine with older drives that still can maintain good speeds, for me it just has to be at least double the speed of SATA SSDs.

[0591ryan]

6 minutes ago, FRD said:

That's right. I might just try with a cheaper secondhand drive at first, just to try it out. It's hard since not every seller wants to/can give out S.M.A.R.T. data. What you said, I could always resell it or maybe using it as a external drive in an enclosure or something.

I'm looking at PCIe Gen 3 drives, which are considered "old" already opposed to people using Gen 4 nowadays. I'm honestly fine with older drives that still can maintain good speeds, for me it just has to be at least double the speed of SATA SSDs.

I’ve used both gen3 and sata SSDs and honestly can’t tell the difference between my optane drive and the mx500 I was using before

 

i hear you about the SMART data, i include it in any listings I make for old drives but I doubt too many people are actually aware of it or care for that matter

 

EDIT: I forgot about something else-check to see for returns/open box for current budget stuff

 

You get a deal and keep the warranty for essentially shitty packaging and really, who cares about that anyways

[FRD]

1 minute ago, 0591ryan said:

I’ve used both gen3 and sata SSDs and honestly can’t tell the difference between my optane drive and the mx500 I was using before

 

i hear you about the SMART data, i include it in any listings I make for old drives but I doubt too many people are actually aware of it or care for that matter

Thanks for telling me that. I feel like there's a debate of whether you need to use a m.2 drive or SATA drive for your OS. I have my OS on a SATA SSD for now, but I'm debating if I want to change my OS to a m.2 drive later.

Yeah, for SMART data I've even seen sellers who don't know how to check that kind of thing. Also, sometimes I find actual shops selling secondhand SSDs, so they won't individually check each product to send you the SMART data.

[Chris Pratt]

27 minutes ago, FRD said:

True, Linus' videos usually tell it all and warn buyers. I would plan to only use it as a game drive or backup drive, not a main one. But yeah, we never know how long it could last.

I would absolutely not use it as a backup drive. A game drive would be fine, as long as you could redownload all the games from Steam or whatever again. It would actually be fine to use as a boot drive, as long as you moved your profile to a separate drive. Then, if the drive should fail, you need only reinstall Windows on a different drive and you're back up and running. Definitely don't use it for backups, though.