Famous Maker 1TB mSATA Internal SSD

Famous Maker 1TB mSATA Internal SSD
Price: $249.99
Shipping Options:: $5 Standard
Shipping Estimates: Ships in 3-5 Business Days. (Thursday, Jul 20 to Tuesday, Jul 25) + transit
Condition: Factory Reconditioned

[http://www.wootstalker.com/images/buy.png

Buy It](Famous Maker 1TB mSATA Internal SSD) [http://www.wootstalker.com/images/amazon.png

Search Amazon](http://www.amazon.com/s/?field-keywords=Famous Maker 1TB mSATA Internal SSD) [http://www.wootstalker.com/images/google.png

Search Google](Famous - Google Shopping Maker 1TB mSATA Internal SSD)

Let the sleuthing begin.

Here’s a pic that matches the photo chip-for-chip

http://qa.pricenacdn.com/files/images/products/original/362/Samsung-850-EVO-1TB-mSATA-Internal-SSD-MZ-M5E1T0BW-1-TB_3671663_52bafaa23b2508abc5591db066331c93_t.jpg

The pic might not mean it’s that exact one (if they’re photoshopping a pic, would they take the time to make it also be accurate?).

But, I assume it’s at least a Samsung model.

Looks like a Samsung 850 Evo. The specs list some Samsung only technologies.

This looks like a good drive for a small laptop which only has an mSATA slot. (Edit: mSATA, not m.2) But for other situations a normal 2.5" SATA drive works fine, or get an NVMe m.2 drive for insane performance.

Comparison against similar 2.5" drive:

Comparison against NVMe drive:

Pretty sure it’s a Samsung 850 EVO. Some of the 850 EVO pics have different circuitry, but probably just different revisions.

The descriptions do perfectly match the 850 EVO though, with “Famous Maker” in place of “Samsung”.

Seems to be $370-$399 for new.

Mothership suspect link.

also, image

No, this is NOT an m.2 drive, it’s an mSATA drive, the older and obsolete interface. Besides the name, m.2 has a single, centered, semi-circle screw hole at the edge of the board. mSATA has two screw holes, as the product picture shows.

Do NOT buy this unless you KNOW that your computer has an mSATA slot. And having a physically compatible slot isn’t enough, there are older computers out there that will accept the card, but only have electrical signals to support a WiFi card. So you can install it, but the computer can’t see it.

Most anything built in the last couple of years will have an m.2 slot, not an mSATA slot.

Ah, there we go: mSATA on the left, m.2 on the right.

Samsung makes quality SSDs, but for the price of this I would rather have the full warranty.

As said before, this is an mSATA SSD, not an M.2! mSATA was the precursor to the M.2 form factor, which supports both SATA and NVMe signalling. mSATA just supports SATA signalling, and used the common mini-PCIe slot form factor. Unless you know that your computer will specifically take an mSATA drive (not M.2!) this will not work for you.

As an aside though, mSATA is easily adaptable to regular 2.5" SATA ports. mSATA to 2.5" adapters can be had for a few dollars online and would make this usable with a desktop computer or laptop with a 2.5" drive bay.

As a warning, should one decide to go this route - particularly in a desktop computer, get an adapter that is not enclosed (and definitely one that is not plastic). mSATAs will get HOT (I’m talking 60-70°C) if not cooled. If you place them in an area where they will get significant airflow, even better.

Any info on the warranty? I didn’t see anything specified on the product page.

If you look down at the bottom of the description, it says:

Warranty: 90 Day Woot

It comes with a 90 Day Woot Warranty but you can purchase a year for $37.99.

Just as a comparison: the Samsung 1TB 850 EVO has a 5 year warranty.

I’ve heard pretty good reviews for Famous Maker.

I searched for the word “Warranty” in Chrome and it only had one hit, that was on the bottom of the page for the general Woot warranty terms. They must have updated the page after I posted my question … or I amd just too tired …

The price is really good if this is the Samsung one, but is it worth losing the 5 year warranty on this?

Fyi woot also has the same “famous maker” 1t ssd in a M2 flavor for the same price

It really depends.

On one had, the closest priced 1 TB SSD drive I can find is $310, so you will save $60 (or $22 if you buy the 1 year warranty). If this is really a refurbished EVO 850, then you are saving $100.

The down side is that they do not say what they refurbished with this drive. It is quite possible that they only replaced the memory controller but left the flash memory. Flash memory is only good for so many writes.

The other possibility is that there was never anything wrong with the item. Lots of times refurbished means that there was a large stock of them that never got sold. In order to keep their agreements with distributors and sellers the units must be liquidated on the market as a refurb and given the reduced warranty. The last couple of Samsung tablets I’ve purchased are almost certainly under this scenario. Tablets were in generic brown carton but had all accessories, pamphlets, screen protection etc. There were no markings anywhere on them indicating that they were refurbs and I was able to register them with Samsung who shows them as new units with full warranties.

Refurb with SSDs can also mean someone bricked the drive with a botched format, firmware update, etc. that can’t be recovered via the standard drive interface but CAN be recovered with specialized equipment at a mfr. facility.

As for limited write cycles on flash memory, endurance tests indicate you’ll likely upgrade the drive or your entire computer well before that becomes a relevant concern.