500 GB 850 EVO – A fast SSD but not for Linux

I just got this drive two days ago. I use it with Linux and it is very fast: it is about 10 times faster than a WDC Black drive I was using for data processing. So far so good… However, I found out that using TRIM with Linux is a problem since the latest Samsung firmware update (included with the new drive I received). There are long threads on various forms about this and it looks like Samsung does not support queued TRIM while it advertises that it does. Running fstrim thus used to result in a corrupted drive. Linux uses queued trim (which is part of the SATA 3.1 specifications) and since kernel 4.0.5 the drive has been blacklisted and TRIM disabled (alternatively NCQ can be disabled if you feel like tinkering with the kernel). Note that this in not a problem with Mac OS X or Windows, which use sequential TRIM. Samsung has apparently concluded that this was a Linux problem, not related to their SSD. My concern is what will happen to the drive’s performance over time without TRIM… In conclusion: if I had to do it over again, I would get an Intel SSD, which apparently does not have this problem. It is not clear if Samsung will release another firmware update to fix this problem in the near future.