Crucial M500 480GB mSATA Internal Solid State Drive CT480M500SSD3

Crucial M500 480GB mSATA Internal Solid State Drive CT480M500SSD3..

Grab Now Crucial M500 480GB mSATA Internal Solid State Drive CT480M500SSD3 By Crucial

Most helpful customer reviews

27 of 33 people found the following review helpful.
Great Drive-Compares With Samsung and Intel
By Anthony J.
When I opened the packages to assemble my Intel Next Unit I thought "Where is the drive?". Well, there was no box and the little container might have held a stick of RAM. Now, I use two Intel 530's and a bunch of Samsung Pro's and they evidently have a lot of case, ..anyway. If you need installation help, YouTube has Crucial and other videos to guide you and Crucial's memory advisor includes compatible SSD's.

Let me tell you about what I found researching this drive and what I know from building computers for 25 years. This drive has an advantage over many because it has error checking and built in power backups to keep your data safe just like their Enterprise server drives, however it doesn't have any software, but that's not a problem if you optimize Windows by a guide like Sean's for Windows or The SSD Review's. Remember to make sure TRIM is enabled in your OS or your drive will slow down over time and you'll have to use a secure erase utility to regain your performance. Firmware can also be a cause and as of today the last firmware update was 9/13, so in Windows you can check your's under the drive's Properties in the Device Manager, but I haven't had a problem. I'm told it has over provision built in, which extends the life of the drive, because a 120GB is really 128 with 8GB over provision and a 240 is 256 and they use a Redundant Array of Independent NAND technology to achieve this. It also uses an adaptive thermal protection circuit to adjust its power to allow it to run cooler, which seems to work except at idle, where it draws above average power according to HardOCP which means more heat. Many claim the NUC's have problems with SSD's overheating but this drive hasn't and I've never noticed it throttling back or slowing down. All of my other SSD's are 240GB but I haven't had any issues using this 120GB. After formatting it was 111GB and Windows 7 Pro and programs used 21GB. My Samsungs format and then use software to over provision to about 200GB, so this 240GB version, like my Intels, will end up 10% larger.

My main reason for choosing the Samsung and Intel was that they were willing to put a 5 year warranty on their drives, which of course means I'm just hoping for the best reliability, but this has a 3 year which means it has a lower cycle life rating and will wear out sooner. It has been absolutely reliable in the months I've been using it and I will likely replace it or the whole computer before 3 years anyway. As for speed I've been using this in the 1.8GHz i3 NUC Intel Next Unit of Computing Kit with HDMI, Thunderbolt, Core i3-3217UDC3217BY running Win 7 and my slowest computer for comparison would be my 2.3GHz i7 laptop using a Samsung Pro and twice as much RAM, so I assume this drive to be the explanation for why my mini i3 feels so fast. I use nothing but SSD computers these days and thought the i3 NUC would feel slow, but it doesn't. So I like this drive as much as my more expensive drives, although this drive does test slower just using it I wouldn't know it.

So optimize your OS and remember the firmware because it optimizes the drive, don't use a defrag program and leave 25% unused on it like you should for all SSD's and this inexpensive, speedy little drive should satisfy most for 3 years or more.

It's been perfect in every way and I trust Crucial. Good brand name, fast and reliable, very competitive pricing, it's a good choice.

Update: After 6 months this drive is still making an i3 seem fast to an i7 user and it has been trouble free. This is how I feel about this drive...I've purchased two more because they are a great value, price is no longer a valid reason not to have a SSD. Don't worry if your mSATA is SATA 2, the performance jump is still enormous, just do your install research and buy one.

13 of 16 people found the following review helpful.
Fast, tiny drive (240GB version)
By J. Linford
I installed this msata in my Lenovo Ideapad Y580. Installation was easy (thank you, Crucial, for including screws with this drive!) and the machine recognized the drive immediately. After a little work, I was able to install Ubuntu on this drive and dual-boot between Linux and Windows 8.1. Booting into Linux is super fast, even compared to regular Linux boot times.

For anyone else looking to do the dual-boot trick, the key is to use the most recent version of Ubuntu (the older versions don't play well with the Windows UEFI boot loader) and make sure you disable the Secure Boot option in your BIOS. Also, turn off the Fast Startup in Windows 8 if you want to be able to access your Windows partition from Linux, otherwise Windows just hibernates instead of doing a complete shut down.

7 of 8 people found the following review helpful.
POWER HUNGRY but RELIABLE: BEST for Desktops: UPDATED
By Stephanie Sullivan
I did research on mSATA drives before purchasing a drive for a Intel NUC home office desktop computer.

The M500 is a very good performer among the current competition; not the best but near the top. I think the difference is not likely to be noticeable in real-world use. The main reason for selecting the M500 was its reputation for reliability because of the kind of memory used.

This is a drive which has fairly high power consumption, over 1W at idle and approaching 4W when busy. This is comparable to a mechanical laptop drive and higher than many of those. It will run warm with use so cooling can be a consideration. This isn't a problem in my desktop application with a Intel NUC (4th Gen Core i5) which take mSATA format drives. A version that takes 2.5" drives is also available: Intel NUC Intel 4th Gen Core i5, 2.5 drive capable.

If you are a reliability "paranoid" like me you'll be happy to know the M500 drives work fine in RAID1 (mirroring) arrays.

Speaking of reliability: nothing is 100% failure free. I've worked with Crucial for decades for RAM and flash. Their warranty support has always been hassle free and I generally get replacement components cross-shipped saving on down time. Crucial stands-out in the marketplace for high quality service. A reliable drive is great, but a company that also stands solidly behind their products is priceless.

The M500 performs fully to my expectations, it's a bit power hungry but that's fine in my desktop, and it's a reliable drive with a dependable manufacturer. That adds up to 5 stars in my book.

Hope this is helpful to someone. POWER HUNGRY but RELIABLE: BEST for Desktops

UPDATED: April 29, 2014

The Crucial M550 SSD DriveCrucial M550 is out now and uses about 1/10th the power of the M500 at idle. It is about $90 more expensive than the M500, but that may be worth it for folks who want the best battery life from their mobile systems. The M550 specs are somewhat faster and the drive is about 5% (or 32GB) larger comparing the M550 512GB to the 480GB M500.

Except for battery life I expect the real world performance experience to be similar to the M500.

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