120GB SanDisk Extreme 2.5" SATA III Internal Solid State Drive SSD (SDSSDX-120G-G25) $109.99 with free shipping *Starts 4/18 ~2AM PST*

Quote from Divine_Madcat : Mine was shipped in a bubble envelope, and was ordered with 2 day shipping that i paid for. I expect better... no more Buy.com for me.

I don't know why you guys chose to pay $5 for shipping anyway. What's the big hurry? I did free shipping and it arrived today.

Mine is DEAD

Got it 2 days ago and only tonight opened the package and installed it in my desktop. Win7 didn't see it, not even the disk manager.

Rebooted, went into the BIOS - it doesn't see it either.

How is BUY.com with returns?

Quote from Probedude : Mine is DEAD Got it 2 days ago and only tonight opened the package and installed it in my desktop. Win7 didn't see it, not even the disk manager. Rebooted, went into the BIOS - it doesn't see it either. How is BUY.com with returns?

On a whim I decided to try and use a SATA3 cable instead of the SATA2 cable. Now my BIOS recognizes the drive.

Power cycled 3X, even tried a different SATA port on the motherboard and it was recognized fine.

Reused the SATA2 cable, worked once, then no more. Tried a different SATA2 cable, didn't work.

Existing HD in this system is SATA2 only, motherboard will do SATA2 and 3.

Odd.

Looks like my drive isn't DOA, but my SATA3 cables do make a difference at SATA3 speeds.

Quote from Probedude : On a whim I decided to try and use a SATA3 cable instead of the SATA2 cable. Now my BIOS recognizes the drive. Power cycled 3X, even tried a different SATA port on the motherboard and it was recognized fine. Reused the SATA2 cable, worked once, then no more. Tried a different SATA2 cable, didn't work. Existing HD in this system is SATA2 only, motherboard will do SATA2 and 3. Odd. Looks like my drive isn't DOA, but my SATA3 cables do make a difference at SATA3 speeds.

There is no physical difference between SATA2 cables and SATA3 cables, SATA is SATA when it comes to cables. You probably just had some cables that were worse quality than the one that worked for you because SATA3 is a bit more suceptible to bad quality cables.

Quote from pdp76 : There is no physical difference between SATA2 cables and SATA3 cables, SATA is SATA when it comes to cables. You probably just had some cables that were worse quality than the one that worked for you because SATA3 is a bit more suceptible to bad quality cables.

The BIOS didn't detect the drive at all most of the time, actually only once with the SATA2 cable. Would think it would have detected it but would have thrown an error or complained about the SATA3 speed being flakey, or throttled back to SATA2 speeds vs not seeing it at all.

Tried another SATA2 cable too with similar results. (Both were the red ones that came with the motherboard)

Glad I tried the SATA3 cable I had or I would have sent back the drive.

Did any of you see this post:
http://slickdeals.net/f/4267860-F...al-Edition

I think it's still available until midnight PST>

I just used it to upgrade my laptop to the Sandisk SSD.

It was amazingly easy. It copied everything very quickly using an external USB 2.0 docking station. Plus it does it all in Windows. No need to make a boot disk or flash drive.

Once the copy was done I just removed the hard drive from my laptop and installed the SSD. The laptop booted up perfectly. (I did have to re-activate Windows 7 64-bit though.) Other than that all my programs and files are working fine.

Quote from rs01 : Even newegg ships it in a bubble envelope if this is the only item in the order. And the drive has it's own packaging and protection... so don't worry.

What protection? Have you even looked at the Sandisk box itself? It's only a very thin paper box outside the SSD itself!!! The SSD can easily be crushed if not being gently handled (and trust me, the USPS mail courier would be careless what's inside the package. He/she just stuffed your SSD package somewhere in his/her mail stack.

If I were you and received the SSD via USPS, double/tripple check whether the SSD is still operational.

Quote from G37 : The drive is rated at 1500 G's. Probably more than that, that's the max test on the lab equipment. If that envelope fell out of a plane, hit the ground and got ran over by the UPS truck, it would still be OK SSD flight recorders survive catastrophic aerospace and aircraft accidents. I'm sure your drive will work without problems, unless the SF controller decides to puke one day.

If it's YOUR SSD drive, I don't mind/care. I just don't want that kinda abuse/physical torture on my SSD.

When I buy banana at a local grocery store, there're always plenty of crappy looking banana. I wonder if I don't buy them, who else would?

Does the supermarket give me a discount for buying those crapping, crushed banana?

You get my point? or you just work for buy.com?

Quote from DQue : If it's YOUR SSD drive, I don't mind/care. I just don't want that kinda abuse/physical torture on my SSD. When I buy banana at a local grocery store, there're always plenty of crappy looking banana. I wonder if I don't buy them, who else would? Does the supermarket give me a discount for buying those crapping, crushed banana? You get my point? or you just work for buy.com?

They always sell those crappy bananas cheaper

Quote from G37 : The drive is rated at 1500 G's. Probably more than that, that's the max test on the lab equipment. If that envelope fell out of a plane, hit the ground and got ran over by the UPS truck, it would still be OK SSD flight recorders survive catastrophic aerospace and aircraft accidents. I'm sure your drive will work without problems, unless the SF controller decides to puke one day.

Quote from DQue : If it's YOUR SSD drive, I don't mind/care. I just don't want that kinda abuse/physical torture on my SSD. When I buy banana at a local grocery store, there're always plenty of crappy looking banana. I wonder if I don't buy them, who else would? Does the supermarket give me a discount for buying those crapping, crushed banana? You get my point? or you just work for buy.com?

I can understand why someone would be concerned about the packaging, but I'm going to have to go with G37 on this one. These SSDs are very sturdy... you will literally have to spike it on concrete or put hundreds to thousands of pounds of force on it to break it... and that would likely only bust the casing and/or SATA connectors... the PCB and memory modules will likely still be intact. Sure there will be a poorly manufactured one off the assembly line here and there, but they're designed and tested to take a big beating. And I'm not saying this out of speculation, I know what kind of stress tests that are done on our drives here at SanDisk (believe me if you want, I don't care)

TL;DR, A bubble wrapped envelope may seem flimsy, but it is sufficient for shipping an SSD because all it really needs to do is keep the SSD from getting scratched.. you don't need to be overly concerned. And it's not just buy.com that does it, so does newegg... and maybe others as well.

p.s. it was kind of funny comparing an SSD to a banana by the way