Intel SSD 530 (240GB) Review
by Kristian Vättö on November 15, 2013 1:45 PM EST- Posted in
- Storage
- SSDs
- Intel
- Intel SSD 530
Final Words
Ultimately there is one crucial thing that the SSD 530 provides over the SSD 520: price. The SSD 520 has been rather expensive and it hasn't really been able to compete, in price or performance, with the newer SSDs with smaller lithography NAND. As a result, I haven't been able to recommend the SSD 520 for ages as it simply hasn't provided any value for the extra cost. With the SSD 530 Intel's pricing is more reasonable and closer to other high-end SSDs. In fact, Intel's pricing is very competitive if you compare the SSD 530 to OCZ Vector 150 or SanDisk Extreme II, although those two also outperform the SSD 530 by a fairly big margin.
| NewEgg Price Comparison (11/12/2013) | ||||
| 120/128GB | 180GB | 240/256GB | 480/512GB | |
| Intel SSD 530 | $120 | $170 | $200 | N/A ($419) |
| Intel SSD 520 | N/A | $195 | $250 | N/A |
| Intel SSD 335 | N/A | $155 | $180 | N/A |
| OCZ Vector 150 | $135 | N/A | $240 | $490 |
| OCZ Vertex 450 | $115 | N/A | $220 | $460 |
| Samsung SSD 840 EVO | $100 | N/A | $175 | $340 |
| Samsung SSD 840 Pro | $150 | N/A | $250 | $570 |
| Crucial M500 | $120 | N/A | $150 | $310 |
| SanDisk Extreme II | $150 | N/A | $230 | $460 |
| Seagate SSD 600 | $110 | N/A | $150 | $380 |
We aren't able to find the 480GB model in stock anywhere right now (at least, not at any of the major online resellers), but it's interesting to note that Intel's ARK page shows a bulk price of just $419; by comparison, the 240GB has a bulk price of $219, so if Intel can truly sell the 480GB for close to $400 it's at lest worth a look. Still, the competition is fierce, with the M500 and 840 EVO getting closer to $300 than $400 for 480-512GB capacities.
Other than price, power consumption is the only other major improvement in the SSD 530. Performance is mostly similar to the SSD 520, although I don't think this surprises anyone. The SF-2281 is well over two years old now, so there are no tricks left to increase performance.
I'm still of the opinion that Intel should offer a consumer orientated drive with its own SATA 6Gbps controller (i.e. the one used in the DC S3500/S3700). However, I do understand that it may not be cost effective, especially as the controller was designed for enterprise to begin with, making it not suitable for the consumer market with slimmer profits. It will be interesting to see what Intel's approach will be with SATA Express as it gives Intel a new chance to design something in-house. With SATA 6Gbps Intel was very late to the game, which forced them to use third party controllers (first Marvell and then SandForce). With SATA 3Gbps, on the other hand, Intel was one of the first players to come up with a good controller and firmware (the X25-M series), so I certainly hope that we will see something similar this time around.
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AnnonymousCoward - Monday, November 18, 2013 - link
I enjoyed the review, but why can't you have a single real world benchmark??? You compare CPUs based on the time it takes to encode/decode, and fps in games. That tells readers the quantified difference. Your SSD data tells the reader nothing about Windows startup time, file copy time, and program load time. This has been an overlook on Anandtech from Day 1. I've brought this up multiple times in these comments, but you guys somehow don't get it.dhisumdhisum - Tuesday, November 19, 2013 - link
Debroah, will you marry me? I don't work, I am a bum.dac7nco - Tuesday, November 19, 2013 - link
Greatest reply ever.Bullwinkle J Moose - Saturday, November 23, 2013 - link
Technically, that was a proposal...The reply has not yet been given
Tjalve - Wednesday, November 20, 2013 - link
I have actually don that kind of testing. But i use 20min idle time.http://www.nordichardware.se/SSD-Recensioner/svens...
The text is in swedish so use google translate to translate to english. But scroll down and qlik on the links.
But check the diffrence between test 6 and 7 in the graphs.
Tjalve - Wednesday, November 20, 2013 - link
I have actually don that kind of testing. But i use 20min idle time.http://www.nordichardware.se/SSD-Recensioner/svens...
The text is in swedish so use google translate to translate to english. But scroll down and qlik on the links.
But check the diffrence between test 6 and 7 in the graphs.
nicolaim - Wednesday, November 27, 2013 - link
MyDigitalSSD sells M.2 SSDs at retail, so saying M.2 SSDs are OEM-only is incorrect.mi1stormilst - Friday, December 6, 2013 - link
The Intel 530 is $169.99 on newegg today ... tack on the 10% discount code floating around (NAFSAVETENDEC6W) for newegg and you have a bargain at $155.98 shipped!!!PKR - Sunday, December 8, 2013 - link
With my Macbook pro Mid 2010, and Intel 530 240gb with DC12 firmware, I think this ssd is slow - I am only getting about 200 mbps write and 260 mbps read speed. Very disappointed, as I the reviews online pointed to speeds in the range of 500 mbps.I tried the installation two ways - one by cloning the system partition using carbon copy cloner, and another using a fresh install from super-drive and updating .. In both cases, speed didn't change.
If it matters, I have 4 partitions on the drive. The system partition is of size 100gb, with about 40gb free space after migrating my content.
Wolfpup - Monday, December 16, 2013 - link
I switched from Intel to Micron/Crucial after Intel switched to Sandforce controllers...I'd still pick this over OTHER sandforce drives, but I'm still picking an M500 over this...