Is SSD ok to handle these transactions?

Is SSD (Intel X25-M / 510) able to handle 200-300 writes per-day? If so, how long the SSD would last? Plan to use it in the office server for test drive.

Here's what I confuse:
In disk drive, you can write/read as many as you want until the mechanical part broke. So if you're lucky, the disk will run 10+ years or forever (we have disk drive that has been running for 11-12 years already in linux box).

Now when I read about SSD where it's supposed to be the future, it seems that SSD life is being limited by the number of writes. The more you write, the faster it's going to die.

Is my understanding correct? If so, next question is:
Supposed an SSD has 50,000 writes limit; once the limit is reached, is the SSD going to die immediately?

What is the best practice to keep SSD live forever other than limiting the writes?

I have read the explanation online about SLC/MLC, GC garbage collection (I have no idea what that is), etc and it makes me more confused.

I can understand an SSD/electronic will die because of voltage shock, burned, etc. But, it's hard for me to understand that
1. SSD will die because it writes!
2. its performance will be degraded when you use more space (isn't the purpose of storage to store?)

I am sorry for this stupid question and I will appreciate if you guys can explain it in "easy-to-understand" word.

 

1. Mechanical drives (especially those faster than 10 000 rpm) have "spin up" limit set smth. like 250 000 (even if you consider that magnetic sector could be write 600 000 times per single sector then you have this spin-up limitting factor which is lower). Therefore even if magnetic medium will last much much longer, mechanical parts are rated much lower. Drive of 15000rpm drive could survive 5 years but most due to 24h/7 use that is expected in servers. This limits a bit count of spinn-ups.

2. SSD will not die, when it wears out it is read only through period of (theoretical) 10 years.

3. SLC drives (like most known for me X25-E) have limit of 2PB writes (which means that you can write full 64GB disk 31250 times! it means 85 years that you EVERY day write SSD to full capacity).
2PB = 2000TB = 2000000GB /64 => 31250/365 ->85 yrs.

[EDIT: Not 9PB but 2PB. sorry. http://download.intel.com/design/flash/nand/extreme/319984.pdf ]

Now, is this satisfy You? Well this SSD is for server use. No one in regular setup will write that much. Normally You write from 2,2TB - 4TB Year.
SSD has "counter" that measure number of Host Writes - that's why You could be warned (by S.M.A.R.T.) months before when Your SSD will be "done/caput/going to ssd heaven".
300 GB X25-M G3 has 60TB writes , depending of how much You write per day (20GB, 40GB ... or more) this accounts for anything from 10 - 30 yrs. of use.
You can stretch this even x5 times (this is Intel data) by formatting secure erased SSD with lover capacity than is designed for (160GB formatted to 97GB gives x5 longer life - 150TB writes). This is called overprovisoning.
Such solution could be used as 5 yrs. home server SSD then. This is not necessary when we talk about very large SSD's (like 300GB) but it is still possible to apply this method to also, them extending their expected host write count even further !

Simply put, if You know that you:
a) download A LOT small portions of data (torrent? ) AND+
b) have small Database running in backgroud AND+
c) also VMs that request for this data .... AND+
d) you every week edit lots of HD videos, convert and upload to YT AND+
e) sleep/wake up laptop 4/6 times per day...
... then
just buy bigger one like 300GB install and forget that it is there.

If you want run full production database in rack server - buy SLC (like X25-E mentioned or Vertex PRO -old ones that had SLC).

In any other case: buy any reliable regular SSD (80, 120, 160, 250 GB) and join happy SSD user group. Any of those will last minimum 5 yrs. Choose known and proven controllers:
SandForce, Intel -best
Samsung 470 -suitable (used by many vendors: Dell, Sammy, Apple)



Sidenote 1: Everything could fail (like production bug) SSDs are no exception. Caution is welcome, when you buy new generations.

Sidenote 2: If you did overprovisioning to your SSD then even when you fill up your partition, writes will not drop. But if you need space (and you formatted as designed max capacity) then rule of thumb is - leave at least 15% free space - this will allow SSD controler to work efficiently and write speed will not drop. There are controllers that are more/less sensitive when SSD is full (like Indillinx that will loose more write throughput when SSD is full).

 

The number of writes is irrelevant. What matters is the total amount of data you write to the drive. Post that, plus the exact model of drive (you listed to very different ones in your post), and we can give you a better answer.

As an aside, I'd remove SandForce from the list of "best" controller vendors. They're fast, sure, but they're also very new to the game and many models of SSDs that have their controllers have suffered reliability issues.

Intel's been in the game for a long time, and they have the best reputation for reliability of any of the non-OEM vendors. There's a reason for that.

 

At the end of the day, the SSD market is still in its very early stages and nobody can say what's going to happen 10 years from now. SSDs today are products for early adopters, not the mainstream masses, so if you're going to buy an SSD then you need to adjust your expectations accordingly and accept the risks that come with the benefits.

If you need storage that will still work in 2021, don't buy an SSD.

 

Agreed.

I'd put Crucial C300 and Samsung 470 in the same league. Reviews on Newegg seem to confirm this.

Samsung has been in the game for a long time too. Possible even longer. I remember my first SSD in 2007 was a 32GB Samsung.