Question Advice on upgrading PC storage please ?

Dec 7, 2024
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I have a very old PC and need to upgrade it; as I have budget constraints I need to upgrade the parts one by one. The priority is the HDD because it is very old and might die any moment. i want to upgrade to a 1tb SSD, but my doubt is, can any SSD be compatible with an old motherboard?

My motherboard - Intel DH61WW

The SSDs I am considering -

Crucial BX500 1TB 3D NAND SATA 6.35 cm (2.5-Inch) Internal SSD

WD Blue SN580 NVMe 1TB


Should I be concerned about compatibility ? Can you recommend anything else, Or, should I just update both the motherboard and storage together?

 
Welcome to the forums, newcomer!

I wouldn't invest in the BX. If you got something like the MX550, that would be worthwhile. I won't even touch up on the NVMe drive after noticing your H61 chipset motherboard. Stick to 2.5" SATA SSD's.

Can you recommend anything else,
Where are you located, what is your budget and what is your preferred site for purchase?

Or, should I just update both the motherboard and storage together?
That's a relative question, what can you upgrade to? What sort of parts/brands do you have access to and with that what sort of money can you throw at your upgrade? FYI, if your data on the HDD is valuable, then you get a hold of a brand new HDD. SSD's tend to nuke your data when they fail.
 
You'd better upgrade to a SSD/HDD combi.

For example a 512GB SSD for system and a 1TB HDD for storage.

SSD could die anytime and once it's died there is very little chance to recover the important files. A secondary HDD would be handy to store important files (or at least a copy of them).
 
I have a very old PC and need to upgrade it; as I have budget constraints I need to upgrade the parts one by one. The priority is the HDD because it is very old and might die any moment. i want to upgrade to a 1tb SSD, but my doubt is, can any SSD be compatible with an old motherboard?

My motherboard - Intel DH61WW

The SSDs I am considering -

Crucial BX500 1TB 3D NAND SATA 6.35 cm (2.5-Inch) Internal SSD

WD Blue SN580 NVMe 1TB


Should I be concerned about compatibility ? Can you recommend anything else, Or, should I just update both the motherboard and storage together?

That MB has no M.2 ports so that NVMe SSD is out. Although there are adapters from M.2 to PCIe it's doubtful BIOS would let you BOOT from it.
SATA, 2.5" SSDs are plentiful and all about same performance but for use as OS it would be beneficial to have RAM Cache.
 
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Welcome to the forums, newcomer!

I wouldn't invest in the BX. If you got something like the MX550, that would be worthwhile. I won't even touch up on the NVMe drive after noticing your H61 chipset motherboard. Stick to 2.5" SATA SSD's.

Can you recommend anything else,
Where are you located, what is your budget and what is your preferred site for purchase?

Or, should I just update both the motherboard and storage together?
That's a relative question, what can you upgrade to? What sort of parts/brands do you have access to and with that what sort of money can you throw at your upgrade? FYI, if your data on the HDD is valuable, then you get a hold of a brand new HDD. SSD's tend to nuke your data when they fail.

Thanks for the response!

1. India, and I would probably purchase it on Amazon / Flipkart. These SSDs are around INR 5K so that's my budget.

2. MSI PRO H610M-S - This is a motherboard I consider for upgrading.

I assumed HDDs were gradually becoming obsolete and SSDs are the way to go, is that wrong?
 
You'd better upgrade to a SSD/HDD combi.

For example a 512GB SSD for system and a 1TB HDD for storage.

SSD could die anytime and once it's died there is very little chance to recover the important files. A secondary HDD would be handy to store important files (or at least a copy of them).

Sorry I guess I omitted a necessary bit of info; I already have an SSD for system (240gb one) and it is only the HDD that's very old. Should I just upgrade it to another HDD rather than go for a second SSD? I assumed HDDs are older tech and SSDs are the way to go, for upgrading.
 
For just storage, I'd just get a normal 2.5 inch SATA SSD that is within your budget.

HDDs still are a good choice in some situations, particularly when cost prohibits you from buying large capacity SSDs and when speed isn't a big factor.

In your situation, I'd get an SSD.

What can you find in your budget from these manufacturers:

Western Digital

Samsung

Crucial, preferably something other than the BX model.
 
Sorry I guess I omitted a necessary bit of info; I already have an SSD for system (240gb one) and it is only the HDD that's very old. Should I just upgrade it to another HDD rather than go for a second SSD? I assumed HDDs are older tech and SSDs are the way to go, for upgrading.

HDDs are still good for long term data storage or activities involving frequent writes (SSDs have limited number of writes).

The latest HDDs use SATA-III with specs like 7200rpm, 128MB cache and transfer speed up to 6Gbps. Any serious system should have one or two high-performance HDD, be it internal or external.
 
You can't just swap the motherboard without incurring a penalty with parts compatibility, i.e, you can't migrate the current processor or ram onto the H610 chipsetted motherboard. If you are aware that you will need to replace the motherboard, ram alongside the CPU(and possibly your PSU as well if your current unit is sub par) then you can look into an M.2 SSD.

Again, if it's for retaining mission critical data, I wouldn't have them on an SSD, instead on an HDD.
 
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I have a very old PC and need to upgrade it; as I have budget constraints I need to upgrade the parts one by one. The priority is the HDD because it is very old and might die any moment. i want to upgrade to a 1tb SSD, but my doubt is, can any SSD be compatible with an old motherboard?

My motherboard - Intel DH61WW

The SSDs I am considering -

Crucial BX500 1TB 3D NAND SATA 6.35 cm (2.5-Inch) Internal SSD

WD Blue SN580 NVMe 1TB


Should I be concerned about compatibility ? Can you recommend anything else, Or, should I just update both the motherboard and storage together?

Shop for a 2.5 sata ssd.
Install the ssd and clone hdd to ssd then remove the hdd.

In the future if you get a new mobo you can just move the new ssd over.

If the budget allows change the bx500 to a mx500 ssd.