XPS 8950, SSD questions

I do not know the manufacturer of the OEM drive but I did add a second NVMe gen 4 drive to my 8950. I only went with another 1 TB. I got a Seagate Firecuda 530 with heatsink because it had good speeds, a 5 year warranty, 3 year data recovery warranty and an endurance rating of 1275 TB. The 2 TB model has a endurance rating of 2550 TB. A 2TB is gonna be spendy though... $350 - $400. If the new drive is only gonna store stuff and not have system logs or browser cache being written to it, it will last a very, very long time. With the 2 TB Firecuda 530 if you wrote 400 Gb per day, it would take over 15 years before the drive wore out. I changed the bios setting from RAID 0 to AHCI. There are some other posts on the XPS forum that detail how to properly switch from RAID to AHCI.

My 8950 was shipped w/ this: https://www.harddrivebenchmark.net/hdd.php?hdd=KXG70PNV2T04+NVMe+KIOXIA+2048GB&id=28703

I added a 2tb Samsung 970EVO Plus. It's only been a few days, but so far, so good.

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@gordo3735 wrote:

My 8950 was shipped w/ this: https://www.harddrivebenchmark.net/hdd.php?hdd=KXG70PNV2T04+NVMe+KIOXIA+2048GB&id=28703

 

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Until relatively recently Toshiba also used to make a lot of SSDs. But Toshiba is no more, at least not in the memory or storage world, now it is called Kioxia.

Sequential Read 3,273 MBytes/Sec
Sequential Write 2,935 MBytes/Sec

@dsm8950 

Looks fine to me.

Gotta run, but I'll try to post later on your other questions.

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@dsm8950 wrote:

I ordered an XPS 8950 with the 2TB NVMe SSD boot drive, and have three questions:

2) If I want to add a second 2TB SSD to store data, what should I buy? (priorities are reliability, performance, energy efficiency, and cost, in that order)

 

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You would install a 2.5-inch SATA-3/600 SSD like this Samsung . It says this one has a 5-year warranty. I have many old Samsung SSDs still in use (some are 9 years old). I've never had one fail. 

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@mr_drey wrote:

1) My 8950 / 2TB NVMe hard drive is Western Digital Black 810 NVMe

 

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That is what came pre-installed by Dell ?

That would make sense as they likely already have a pre-standing arrangement with Western-Digital from over the years.

If so, sounds like the XPS models are getting Kioxia/Toshiba or WD (Black series) NVMe-SSD's . I suppose you could classify both of those as Tier-1 (up there near Samsung). 

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@Tesla1856 wrote:

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@mr_drey wrote:

1) My 8950 / 2TB NVMe hard drive is Western Digital Black 810 NVMe

 

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That is what came pre-installed by Dell ?

That would make sense as they likely already have a pre-standing arrangement with Western-Digital from over the years.

If so, sounds like the XPS models are getting Kioxia/Toshiba or WD (Black series) NVMe-SSD's . I suppose you could classify both of those as Tier-1 (up there near Samsung). 

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So these would be considered some of the best SSD drives?

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@dsm8950 wrote:

I ordered an XPS 8950 with the 2TB NVMe SSD boot drive, and have three questions:

Longer term, what are recommended ways to protect against drive failure?   My current scheme is to keep images of the system on external backup drives (refreshed occasionally) and use a combination of dropbox (real time), a  cloud backup service (daily), and File History backing up all my data files to the external drive(s) (hourly).   I figure with that I don't need RAID, but am I missing something or screwing up the performance of my system?

Thanks for any and all advice!

 

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@dsm8950 

That is exactly what you do. I use Macrium Reflect. Yes, Image-file backups to an external USB-drive. https://www.macrium.com/reflectfree/

My Aurora-R6 wakes-itself everyday at 3am. If it is the 1st-day of the month, it does a Full-System Backup (of all drives) with Macrium-Reflect. On any other day, it does a daily Differential Backup. I create all Image-Files with the "Verify after file creation" option Enabled. It keeps detailed logs and you get various notifications. You can also just occasionally take a peek at the backup destination folder on the locally attached drive (or similar accessible drive, like a network-drive or NAS-drive).

I like Differential-backups because they include all changes since (that month's) last matching Full Backup. Therefore, you only need the Full Backup and matching latest Differential to do a full current system restore. In about an hour, you can restore your whole system to "yesterday". However, you can also just "browse into" previous backups and extract a single-file or folder.

You should create their Windows-RE based Rescue USB-Flash-drive . It can boot against "bare-metal" (your recently-repaired or erased computer system) and it will boot, work, and restore Image-Files. Microsoft specifically authorizes and allows Macrium, so you do not need to turn-off SecureBoot or anything like that.

For most systems, you can fit about 2-3 months worth of Full and Daily Image-file backups on a 2tb drive. Macrium-Reflect has settings to delete the oldest files in a rotation (so it can run for months unattended, if you wish). All your recent backups are just sitting there (in case you need them).

You can even occasionally take a Full-System-Image-file backup off-site (or copy it into cloud). This "off site" backup will protect you from Theft, Fire, or Flood. That is why I always recommend an "external USB Drive" because if the house or office is burning-down, you can grab the small-drive on your way out the door (with the family and pets), and you will save all the family's home-videos, pics, and family-records.

Since you can Image to a network-drive, I suppose it could conceivably be a Cloud-based drive (although, I've never had an account with enough room to try it).

You must have backups. You really should have 2-backed-up-copies of anything vital. Especially small-businesses, you really need at least something (ie, copies of vital data-files like docs or accounting) stored Off-Site (I personally think the Cloud counts as off-site). This can be accomplished by something as simple as straight-file-copying these vital data-files into a directory in the cloud (like Google-Drive or Drop-Box). Folder Mirroring/Syncing would also work.

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@Joe Shades wrote:

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@Tesla1856 wrote:

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@mr_drey wrote:

1) My 8950 / 2TB NVMe hard drive is Western Digital Black 810 NVMe

 

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That is what came pre-installed by Dell ?

That would make sense as they likely already have a pre-standing arrangement with Western-Digital from over the years.

If so, sounds like the XPS models are getting Kioxia/Toshiba or WD (Black series) NVMe-SSD's . I suppose you could classify both of those as Tier-1 (up there near Samsung). 

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So these would be considered some of the best SSD drives?

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See my other post about Samsungs. Samsungs are the best in my book. They also make "Pro class" drives. Those used to even come with MLC memory chips (but not sure if they still do, due to speed I think). Give me a Samsung with a 5-year warranty, and I'm happy. Like I posted previously, I've got old Samsungs going-on 10 years now, and they run perfect.

I've got some newer Dell laptops here with Toshiba XG5/XG6 SSDs and those seem fine, so I'm thinking the new Kioxia SSDs are fine based on that history.

I have no first-hand experience with WD SSDs really. I just know that WD is a leader in HDD technology. Doesn't seem like they would go with bad SSD tech. Also, Dell is willing to provide a warranty on them, that matches the rest of the system on extended contract. Maybe check reviews on a reputable tech website that rates SSDs?  Let us know what you find.

I think one of the main-things that keeps SSDs running flawlessly for years is Over-Provisioning them.

Regarding Over-Provisioning. You never want your SSDs to fill up and run-out of space. This includes normal space as well as the hidden space that the SSD controller uses to occasionally re-map worn-out sectors (memory chip locations). This Over-Provisioning (or raw, un-partitioned space at end of drive) provides this buffer.

I agree with @Tesla1856 about Samsung SSDs, but with all manufacturers, you have to be careful which model you purchase because some SSDs do not have DRAM cache which makes them less expensive or use QLC NAND vs TLC NAND flash memory; QLC flash memory has less endurance and is usually reflected in the shorter warranty. 

From reading lots of reviews, it seems that the Samsung 980 Pro with Heatsink is very highly recommended.   I acknowledge that it may be overkill for what I need, but given that reliability, performance and efficiency are more important to me than cost, is there any reason this wouldn't be a good choice? (I want to "future proof" this system, and am OK spending an extra $100 if I get 5 good years from this system!)

Amazon.com: Samsung Electronics 980 PRO SSD with Heatsink 2TB PCIe Gen 4 NVMe M.2 Internal Solid State Hard Drive, Heat Control, Max Speed, PS5 Compatible, MZ-V8P2T0CW : Electronics

Thanks - and completely agree with the sentiment!    Any reason to use Macrium over Acronis?   And what "wakes up" your system?   I've always stressed whether/when to put the system to sleep when backups need to run...

Also, any reason not to use Microsoft File History in addition to the 3rd party backup software?   I like File History because it keeps any/all revisions of files, so if I overwrite a file by mistake, I can always go back and find the correct version...

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@dsm8950 wrote:

1. Any reason to use Macrium over Acronis?   

2. And what "wakes up" your system?   I've always stressed whether/when to put the system to sleep when backups need to run...

3. Also, any reason not to use Microsoft File History in addition to the 3rd party backup software?   I like File History because it keeps any/all revisions of files, so if I overwrite a file by mistake, I can always go back and find the correct version...

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1. I had to stop using Acronis years ago. For one, it let me down a couple of times (so I stopped trusting it). Also (back then) it was having trouble with UEFI-based systems and bare-metal restores on systems with SecureBoot enabled. 

And before Acronis, I used Ghost.

2. IIRC, it's a standard Windows Scheduled Event (but Macrium-Reflect takes care of it).

3. Since it's not a replacement for a proper backup, I've just never used it. 

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@dsm8950 wrote:

From reading lots of reviews, it seems that the Samsung 980 Pro with Heatsink is very highly recommended.   I acknowledge that it may be overkill for what I need, but given that reliability, performance and efficiency are more important to me than cost, is there any reason this wouldn't be a good choice?

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Well, I suggested a 2.5inch SATA-SSD because you said you wanted a "data/storage drive". I also saw that you ordered your XPS-8950 with a 2tb NVMe SSD (as your C-Drive) .  All your Windows, Programs, and Apps will easily fit there. 

Since the XPS-8950 can apparently can hold two NVMe-SSDs, I guess we are finally at a point where you can use one for data/storage if you so choose. Best I can tell, nothing mounts over/across it, so the heat-sink should not cause a problem either.

Just seems a bit extreme somehow. Maybe someone else will chime-in.

I agree that a NVMe drive is excessive for a storage drive and probably not needed but I kinda did the same thing for no other decent reason except that I could....I have two 1Tb NVMe gen 4 drives and I replaced the HDD with a 2.5 Samsung 870 Evo SATA SSD. I cloned the original SSD to a Firecuda 530 because the endurance rating was more than double of the WD drive that came with the PC.