# Samsung T3 2TB external SSD for Sample Libs.



## colony nofi (Jan 2, 2017)

Hey knowledgable people... Happy New Year.
I'm needing some portable (read : bus powered) storage for my sample library for a project I'm working on this year. This rules out my current Pegasus J4 (which is mains powered)

I'm looking at the Samsung T3 2TB external SSD - this is the one here :
https://www.bhphotovideo.com/c/product/1217672-REG/samsung_mu_pt2t0b_am_2tb_t3_portable_solid.html

I had looked at the 2TB sandisk 900 extreme - but it *seems* that for some reason it has been discontinued... It certainly had better max IOPS / read and write times...

Does anyone know of a 4TB bus powered solution? I can use thunderbolt or USB3. Obviously thunderbolt is better for throughput - but I'm not sure it will make much difference for sample playback.

4TB would be simply awesome - as it would allow me to use the majority of the libs I have. 2TB would mean culling.

Any ideas much appreciated.

Cheers! Brendan.


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## ctsai89 (Jan 2, 2017)

damn i should've bought one of those during thanksgiving sale. dammit


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## Andrew_m (Jan 3, 2017)

Holy shit that's pricey. Much rather get a 2 TB hard drive and wait a little bit longer for loads. Anything I'm missing here? Does an ssd make such a different?


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## colony nofi (Jan 3, 2017)

Pricey? Its quite good for 2TB of SSD in a case... You don't want to know how much 4TB of SSD cost me about 3 years ago....
As for are they worth it? For composers using sample libraries, there has been no bigger "step up" in speed in any recent tech release than going from spinning drives to SSD's. Its amazing for OS as well. 
Of course, a lot has to do with your workflow, but I would never use a single spinning disk for OS or sample libs anymore. The only spinning disks at our studio are in a network attached storage server for projects and a backup server. 

Anyway - anyone else able to chime in on using the Samsung T3's for sample libs? Or indeed - any links to tests for sample libs when using SSD's in Thunderbolt vs USB3 environments. (This last question I've always been very curious about but never been able to test)

A well known editing house in London is using loads of T3's for media drives for their FCP editors. I've never seen a facility do this in recent years (as opposed to a central media server) but they were pleased with what the T3's could achieve. (In fairness, they are looking at a central server, but have not settled on the tech yet... its a huge investement)

B.


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## Andrew_m (Jan 3, 2017)

colony nofi said:


> Pricey? Its quite good for 2TB of SSD in a case... You don't want to know how much 4TB of SSD cost me about 3 years ago....
> As for are they worth it? For composers using sample libraries, there has been no bigger "step up" in speed in any recent tech release than going from spinning drives to SSD's. Its amazing for OS as well.
> Of course, a lot has to do with your workflow, but I would never use a single spinning disk for OS or sample libs anymore. The only spinning disks at our studio are in a network attached storage server for projects and a backup server.
> 
> ...


Pardon my lack of understanding - but can't you just load your libraries directly from a plugged in HDD ? Wouldn't it take relatively the same time to load?


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## mac (Jan 3, 2017)

FYI, the 2TB sandisk is still for sale in the UK (I bought one a couple of weeks back).


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## synthpunk (Jan 3, 2017)

Welcome to 2017 Andrew  SSD will generally boot your system in 30 seconds or less and are five times faster read speed for any data including samples than the conventional spinner drives.

You can get a good 1TB SSD (Crucial mx300 for ie) for about $230 us. These Samsung are higher because they're self-contained and also the equivalent to Samsung's top-of-the-line I believe.

In the end it's only money, work hard for it and spend it on the things and people you love. One day It may buy you a house as our esteemed Mr. Zimmer has said



Andrew_m said:


> Holy shit that's pricey. Much rather get a 2 TB hard drive and wait a little bit longer for loads. Anything I'm missing here? Does an ssd make such a different?


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## Andrew_m (Jan 3, 2017)

synthpunk said:


> Welcome to 2017 Andrew  SSD will generally boot your system in 30 seconds or less and five times faster than the conventional spinner drives.
> 
> You can get a good 1TB SSD (Crucial mx300 for ie) for about $230 us. These are higher because they're self-contained and also the equivalent to Samsung's top-of-the-line I believe


What about loading samples from an HDD compared to an SDD?


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## mac (Jan 3, 2017)

Andrew_m said:


> What about loading samples from an HDD compared to an SDD?



Expect around 5 x faster loading times.


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## NameOfBand (Jan 3, 2017)

colony nofi said:


> Does anyone know of a 4TB bus powered solution?


Why not just get two?


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## colony nofi (Jan 3, 2017)

NameOfBand said:


> Why not just get two?


Its a good question - but it essentially boils down to trying to keep things as simple as possible. But it is a possibility. 



Andrew_m said:


> What about loading samples from an HDD compared to an SDD?


Aside from 5x faster loading times (which can be 15x faster with internal m.2 drives!) there's also RAM usage. It allows you to run far lower preload amounts, which can reduce your RAM usage massively. When working on a macbook pro with only 16GB of ram, this can be a game changer. Even with 64GB on a workstation, it opens up new possibilities.


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## colony nofi (Jan 3, 2017)

mac said:


> FYI, the 2TB sandisk is still for sale in the UK (I bought one a couple of weeks back).


This is good to know! Working well for samples?


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## mac (Jan 3, 2017)

colony nofi said:


> This is good to know! Working well for samples?



Works beautifully, and its built like a tank.


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## NameOfBand (Jan 3, 2017)

colony nofi said:


> Its a good question - but it essentially boils down to trying to keep things as simple as possible. But it is a possibility.


Wouldn't it basically give doubled performance also?


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## colony nofi (Jan 3, 2017)

NameOfBand said:


> Wouldn't it basically give doubled performance also?


No - you won't get close to doubling performance.
For instance - loading samples - kontakt doesn't load more than one instrument at a time. 
During playback - you may be able to playback more voices. Theoretically of course - real world won't see those numbers since you'd have to perfectly load balance your system.
Not to mention - that when working remotely, USB ports can become hot property... USB hubs / thunderbolt hubs still only have the throughput of the connection to the machine available....


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## charlieclouser (Jan 3, 2017)

I got some of the T3 2tb SSDs for my wife's photo workstation (iMac 5k) and they are awesome. Judging from the speed tests, I think the T3 is basically the guts of an 850 Evo in a slick little case. Note that there is only one USB-C connector on the back of the T3, so if you are short on ports you may need a hub - but since it's USB-C it's future proof and ready for the latest MacBooks. It comes with a USB-C > USB type A cable included, so nothing further is needed to plug into a machine with "normal" USB. 

Freaking things are so small and light it's unreal - two of them end-to-end are the size of an iPhone, and they are so light weight that the strength of the USB cable trying to coil itself back into the shape it was folded into in the box will drag the drive across the desk. This is one aspect of the "consumer-ification" of formerly high-end technologies that I really love - two years ago it was exotic and rare to have 2tb SSD drives, and most likely they were in some bad-ass rack mount box like the BlackMagic MultiDock (mine are!), but now it's just a tiny little thing that's on the shelf at your local. I love it.


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## colony nofi (Jan 4, 2017)

Looking at specs, it seems the sandisk is slightly more futureproof. Even though the T3 will be similar speed on my nMP, the sandisk is significantly faster when running native USB 3.1. The size really isn't a huge issue for me - though I do LOVE the form factor of the T3. 
Decisions decisions.....


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## Nick Batzdorf (Jan 4, 2017)

In my experience it's more like 10x faster, and I don't even pay attention to all the SSD specs - meaning my 1TB sample drive has fewer vaginal whetstones than the Samsung that costs twice its price, but it's still fast as blazes.


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## Nick Batzdorf (Jan 4, 2017)

Wow. $730 for a 2TB drive. My 1TB was $200, so I wasn't exaggerating when I said twice the price.


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## gsilbers (Jan 5, 2017)

hollyfuk, im behind the times... 

so you guys using these as backup or as a main hard drive for streaming samples?


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## colony nofi (Jan 5, 2017)

gsilbers said:


> hollyfuk, im behind the times...
> 
> so you guys using these as backup or as a main hard drive for streaming samples?


I'm using it for samples when needing to be on the move. My pegasus J4 (which has 4x1TB SSD's inside) uses mains power - which I won't always have access to on this particular project.



Nick Batzdorf said:


> In my experience it's more like 10x faster, and I don't even pay attention to all the SSD specs - meaning my 1TB sample drive has fewer vaginal whetstones than the Samsung that costs twice its price, but it's still fast as blazes.


Nick - The Sandisk is actually more expensive than the Samsung.... 

And both these drives will be slower on my nMP than my current solution (which glides along at around 740MB/S). Sure - you don't notice huge speed differences - except in max voice counts (things like HZP can eat it up quickly, ditto SSS). And of course when opening projects (I've gone back to a non-VEP methodology of working).


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## Nick Batzdorf (Jan 5, 2017)

Well sure, that's always true: you don't notice the difference between any drives until you run out of voices.

But the difference with these SSDs is only bandwidth. I did spend $40 for a SATA 3 card just because I was curious what the difference was between it and the SATA 2 (300 meg) internal bus on my main Mac, and the same QL Piano that took 10 sec to load now takes 8.

Am I wrong to be cynical about the value of spending over 2X the price for a SSD with better specs? To me it makes more sense to add more drives. You'll get more of everything that way.

But the wild card is longevity, and I don't think they've been around long enough to know about that.


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## NameOfBand (Jan 7, 2017)

Nick Batzdorf said:


> Wow. $730 for a 2TB drive. My 1TB was $200, so I wasn't exaggerating when I said twice the price.


Care to mention where you got that deal?


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## Nick Batzdorf (Jan 7, 2017)

It was Newegg. The same drive (Mushkin) has been $229 more recently, so maybe the one I got was last year's model.


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## synthpunk (Jan 8, 2017)

Some of us got this micron 1TB (made by crucial) for $189. Also picked up a 750G mx300 for $99 on Amazon.

https://www.smithbuy.com/micron-1tb-2-5-sata-solid-state-drive-mtfddak1t0mbf-1an1zabyy.html


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## Nick Batzdorf (Jan 8, 2017)

I can't say I spend hours combing the internet for SSD prices, but I haven't seen them that low recently.


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## NameOfBand (Jan 9, 2017)

colony nofi said:


> No - you won't get close to doubling performance.
> For instance - loading samples - kontakt doesn't load more than one instrument at a time.
> During playback - you may be able to playback more voices. Theoretically of course - real world won't see those numbers since you'd have to perfectly load balance your system.
> Not to mention - that when working remotely, USB ports can become hot property... USB hubs / thunderbolt hubs still only have the throughput of the connection to the machine available....


Yeah, saying it would double the performance was a bit naïve. And I understand that USB-ports might not grow on trees. But wouldn't your template load a lot faster, and your max number of voices be basically doubled? SSDs have like 500 mb/s tranfer rate right, so if the port is USB 3.0 (at least 625 MB/sec) or later you should benefit from having two SSDs plugged into one port. Isn't that how it works? :O


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## colony nofi (Jan 9, 2017)

Nick Batzdorf said:


> I can't say I spend hours combing the internet for SSD prices, but I haven't seen them that low recently.


Yeah - know the feeling! I only look when I need something. 
But SSD prices have been on an upwards tick recently.
Good to know re those other drives - thanks! Looking into more now...


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## Nick Batzdorf (Jan 9, 2017)

It's like airplane tickets. They have someone hiding outside my window, listening for when I'm going to travel so they can raise the prices.


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## Viegaard (Jan 9, 2017)

Just so you know that external SSD will not work as fast as a "regular" internal SSD.


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## synthpunk (Jan 10, 2017)

I just keep my ear to the railroad tracks occasionally and I also check this site maybe once every couple of weeks.
http://www.hardware-revolution.com/best-sdd-solid-state-drive-december-2016/



colony nofi said:


> Yeah - know the feeling! I only look when I need something.
> But SSD prices have been on an upwards tick recently.
> Good to know re those other drives - thanks! Looking into more now...[/QUOTE


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## colony nofi (Jan 10, 2017)

Viegaard said:


> Just so you know that external SSD will not work as fast as a "regular" internal SSD.


That depends on how you connect it. Connecting an SSD via thunderbolt can give extremely similar results to using a drive internally in your computer. 

I guess its best just to say, it's complicated, and not as cut and dry as you say.
NMVE vs SATA II vs SATA III. Thunderbolt 3 vs USB 3.1 vs PCie (and knowing what the differences are!), RAID vs non-raid. Hardware vs software raid. 

Anyway.....


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## Nick Batzdorf (Jan 10, 2017)

That's right.

You also have to be careful of the word "fast." Speed and bandwidth are two different things.


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## Viegaard (Jan 10, 2017)

colony nofi said:


> That depends on how you connect it. Connecting an SSD via thunderbolt can give extremely similar results to using a drive internally in your computer.
> 
> I guess its best just to say, it's complicated, and not as cut and dry as you say.
> NMVE vs SATA II vs SATA III. Thunderbolt 3 vs USB 3.1 vs PCie (and knowing what the differences are!), RAID vs non-raid. Hardware vs software raid.
> ...



I am talking about that specific SSD. It says speeds up to 450 MB/S.

Most SSDs has 540+ MB/S read and the new PCI SSDs can do up to 3500 MB/S read.


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## Viegaard (Jan 10, 2017)

Nick Batzdorf said:


> That's right.
> 
> You also have to be careful of the word "fast." Speed and bandwidth are two different things.



Fast, as in fast read/load times.


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## colony nofi (Jan 11, 2017)

This whole thread was specifically about finding a good external solution . Yes - internal drives can be incredibly fast these days. But that doesn't suit the use case for me at this time. I'm needing to add at least 2TB of external SSD....
And the sandisk 900 is looking like the solution for me at the moment, even though it is expensive. Just being a single unit, somewhat future proof (usb 3,1 with around 750MB/s read/writes and 400 on usb 3 which I'll be using to start with) and bus powered ticks a lot of boxes for me.
Another thread today raised this as an interesting idea : http://www.tomshardware.com/news/mydigitalssd-boost-external-portable-ssd,33380.html
Using m.2 drives. And fairly fast again for a usb 3,1 drive. Only 1TB at the moment (though you could build yourself a 2TB or even 4TB drive using the bare chassis, which they are selling....


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## Viegaard (Jan 11, 2017)

Mate. Please focus. You said you were looking at:

https://www.bhphotovideo.com/c/product/1217672-REG/samsung_mu_pt2t0b_am_2tb_t3_portable_solid.html

I was simply stating that you will not get the same speeds as with an internal SSD with _THAT_ particular SSD.


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## Nick Batzdorf (Jan 11, 2017)

> Just so you know that external SSD will not work as fast as a "regular" internal SSD.



Viegaard, it's the missing comma. Try not to get too irritated.


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