> whats the very best SSD i can buy 1TB for under or near $500 The problem is that you have already made some kind of decision that $500 is a reasonable thresh

> whats the very best SSD i can buy 1TB for under or near $500 The problem is that you have already made some kind of decision that $500 is a reasonable threshold for getting 1TB of SSD, and some assumption that you stand to gain anything at all by paying extra for the same capacity. That's kinda backwards; you should start by figuring out how much performance and endurance you need out of your 1TB of storage, just like you've apparently already figured out that 1TB is the capacity you need. You might be fine with a $99 1TB SSD, or maybe you need a $320 1TB SSD. But it's pretty odd to expect a purchasing guide to be a useful tool to figure out how best to overpay for your storage.