Which SSD to go with for a HTPC

[Ophidio]

I need help deciding which SSD would be a better option for my HTPC/Console Killer that I will be building this Christmas. 

 

I've narrowed my options down to two different drives but I'm not really sure which would be the best. It's the only drive going in the case so of course it has to be somewhat spacious but I would also like it to be fast and reliable. 

 

The two drives are the...

 

Crucial MX300 750GB

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16820156124&cm_re=crucial_mx300-_-20-156-124-_-Product

I chose this drive because it seems to have decent speeds, it comes in 750GB with "530 MB/s write speed and 510 MB/s read speeds" but I have seen no real information on how well this drive actually does since it's somewhat new. So if anyone has any opinions on this drive could please help?

 

the other drive

 

Samsung 850 EVO 500GB

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16820147373&cm_re=samsung_850_evo-_-20-147-373-_-Product

Obviously this is the most popular and most trusted drive on the market write when it comes to Sata drives. Everyone knows what it's capable of but it has only 500GB compared to the crucial drive. 

 

So which drive would be better for this use? Both are $170 on newegg so there no price difference whatsoever. Just space and speeds are the only difference besides some internal technology that they use. 

[NTDaws]

do crucial

[EunSoo]

I would go for the crucial simply becuase it is bigger. There shouldn't be that much of a difference between the drives too. But if you want watchdogs 2, you can get it for free with the samsung, i guess.

[NTDaws]

3 minutes ago, SCGazelle said:

I would go for the crucial simply becuase it is bigger. There shouldn't be that much of a difference between the drives too. But if you want watchdogs 2, you can get it for free with the samsung, i guess.

its also only a sata drive so it doesn't really matter for speeds. should be pretty much the same.

[Zytoc]

I'm slightly confused why you are going with a large SSD?  Are you not using large HDD to store your media/games?  I use Plex for media and the only part stored on the SSD is the Metadata as it needs to be accessed quickly.  All my media and games are on a 4 TB BLACK WD.

 

Also, due to boot times, snappiness and metadata load time I use M.2 NVME Samsung SSD.

[Ophidio]

6 minutes ago, Jordan Scott said:

I'm slightly confused why you are going with a large SSD?  Are you not using large HDD to store your media/games?  I use Plex for media and the only part stored on the SSD is the Metadata as it needs to be accessed quickly.  All my media and games are on a 4 TB BLACK WD.

 

Also, due to boot times, snappiness and metadata load time I use M.2 NVME Samsung SSD.

I'm using an SSD because it's a really small form factor case and there won't really be any room for a HDD. Plus, I don't really play games on my tv very much anyway so It won't that many stored on it. 

 

16 minutes ago, SCGazelle said:

I would go for the crucial simply becuase it is bigger. There shouldn't be that much of a difference between the drives too. But if you want watchdogs 2, you can get it for free with the samsung, i guess.

ewww Watchdogs is nastyyyyyy.

[Gonio]

Would say that both of these are fine for the loads it mostly will run but the 850 will be more handy if you are transfering a lot of data over a longer time like 5-10 minutes. Steady state performance of the MX 300 drops significant more after a few minutes. If large ammount of transfers don't happen go with the cheapest and most ammount. Are you sure btw you didn't find a larger then 500 GB version of the 850? Think there is a bigger one aswell. But could be 1 TB.

[Zytoc]

4 minutes ago, Ophidio said:

I'm using an SSD because it's a really small form factor case and there won't really be any room for a HDD. Plus, I don't really play games on my tv very much anyway so It won't that many stored on it. 

 

Ah.  Thanks for the explanation.  In that case, I would go for the crucial, quite a good price on it and I've never had one fail on me.

[Ophidio]

3 minutes ago, Gonio said:

Would say that both of these are fine for the loads it mostly will run but the 850 will be more handy if you are transfering a lot of data over a longer time like 5-10 minutes. Steady state performance of the MX 300 drops significant more after a few minutes. If large ammount of transfers don't happen go with the cheapest and most ammount. Are you sure btw you didn't find a larger then 500 GB version of the 850? Think there is a bigger one aswell. But could be 1 TB.

There is a bigger one and it's the 1TB but I didn't really want to spend more than $175 on an SSD for this system and these two came up and seemed like the best options for my price point. Especially the crucial one since it's 750GB and has decent read/write speeds.