Which SSD for x220

[pederbruusgaard]

Hi,

I'm planning on ordering an x220 pretty soon, but I'm not sure which one to pick. There's one at 128 GB that just says Solid state, and one at 160, from Intel. Now, how much difference is there (besides the 32 GB, obviously)?

Is it worth the extra money and more than 4 weeks shipping time?

Thanks!

[jyeah]

The Intel X25-M 160 GB is a very reliable SSD, probably one of the best generation 2 SSD if not the best (I personally own one).

The 128 GB one is made by Samsung and honestly, I don't know about it's performance.

However, with the Intel X25-M 160 GB (maybe it is the Intel 320 series now and I can't say for sure that the same slow POST problem occurs for the 128 GB SSD), it would take approximately 14 seconds for your BIOS to POST compared to 7 seconds when using just a regular HDD. You can check the thread on the Slow BIOS POST TIME.  That really isn't a big issue as myy laptop still boots from powering up to loading firefox in about 40 seconds (with a bunch of programs such as MatLAB, LabVIEW, Norton Internet Security and all the factory installed software), but just the fact that I can potentially shave another 7 seconds out of 40 seconds annoys me.

I would suggest at least 160 GB for a solid state drive, because at the end of the day, you will thank yourself for spending the extra money it does make a difference (I own a Crucial 128 GB SSD for my desktop and boy it fills up fast even with only programs, not videos or other storage files).

Whether or not it's worth the 4 weeks shipping time is to your disgression. You may very well just purchase your own SSD on the side and just run the factory recovery disks on it, it's cheaper and less time consuming, but you lose the convenience factor of just letting Lenovo fix everything when something is wrong (but then again, Lenovo doesn't do that good of a job at fixing problems sometimes),

Edit: Just make sure if you do get your own solid state drive it's modifiable to 7 mm height instead of the standard 9.5 mm otherwise it will not fit into the X220. You can google up List of Compatible drives with X220, for a more comprehensive list of compatible drives.

[x220forMe]

I've got x220 4290-CTO with Intel 320 Series SSD 120 Gb. It's the new model more fast and reliable then x-25 with 9,5 and 7 mm form factor (I've got the second one). The factory configuration of laptop was with Hitachi HDD which has been replaced by me. I've just transferred partitions, Windows system, applications and data using Intel Data Migration Software (based on Acronis sw) which works fine. Then I've tuned and optimized the SSD and system with Intel Toolbox as these operations are absolutelly needed. And NOTE - there aren't any POST delay issues in my laptop.

There are several guys at this forum who've fitted 9,5 mm disk w/o prolems they've claimed. As for me there is a little but solved problem with laptop case for fiiting 9,5 mm disk.

I guess the Factory Recovery disks can't build the new partitions clearly as the size of hdd and ssd is different. But I may be mistaken. For this reason I've used the special Intel sw.

I assume also that 160 Gb SSD, factory installed in new x220, isn't an Intel 320 Series as this disk is new and more cost expensive.

Why to wait 4 weeks and to pay expensive price while good result can be reached by yourself, faster and more cheaply?

[stevod]

Is the 128GB SSD a Samsung in all markets, and which model is it?

On the UK CTO it doesn't say which SSD it is.

I'm thinking of ordering and wondering whether to CTO with SSD or fit an Intel 320 160GB in myself.

Cheers,

S