Best SSD for Z68's Smart Response Technology(SSD-Caching)

[Ooooops]

What's the best SSD(price/performance basis) for Z68's SRT(also known as SSD-caching)?

Thanks in advance!

 

[JohnnyLucky]

When Intel first developed Smart Response Technology ssd drives were a lot more expensive than they are now. The target market were Intel clients who could not afford to upgrade to a large capacity ssd. At the time Intel hoped clients would be willing to spend $100.00 for a 10GB or 20GB ssd to be used as a cache for a hard disk drive. Intel hoped once clients saw the small boost in performance they would be induced to purchase larger capacity ssd's and the promise of even better performance with an independent ssd instead of a small ssd used as a cache. You could consider it a marketing gimmick.

Intel also researched different capacity drives all the way up to 512GB and determined that a 60GB ssd was the point of dimishing returns. It made more sense to install the OS and software applications on a 60 GB ssd rather than use it as a cache. That way you could make full use of ssd performance instead of settling for lower performance with a cache. The performance boost will not equal the performance of an independent stand alone ssd.

There have been many lively discussions about the merits of using an ssd as a cache and the actual performance boost that can be expected. I've seen all sorts of claims. It is safe to say that the performance boost will vary depending on the configuration and what a computer is used for.

Think about it - $100.00 for a 10GB or 20GB ssd? What will $100.00 buy you today? A few months ago newegg.com had the Kingston ssdNOW 100V+ 94GB ssd on sale for $99.99 and free shipping. That's quite a change in prices and more than enough capacity for Windows 7 and software applications. Data files can be stored on a hard disk drive.

 

[Ooooops]

So, you're saying that it's better to get a SSD for boot drive rather than using it as a cache?

 

[inzone]

Well the thing is that since SSD'S do outperform regular hdd's , the SSD catch was probably made for the system that would have the OS loaded on a regular hdd and the small SSD to be used as the cache. If you use a small SSD to cache a larger SSD you might not see a performance increase like you would with a regular hdd. So if you got a 120gb or 240gb SSD then you could load your OS on it and be good to go. If you wanted you could still get a 60gb or less SSD to use as a cache. If you did do that I would only get a 20-30gb SSD for the cache.

 

[IntelEnthusiast]

Yes it is. The Intel® SRT (Smart Response Technology) is a means to give you better performance without the larger cost of a bigger SSD. If you can afford to do a SSD Boot drive you will get the best performance from that. Intel SRT is designed for SSDs <64GB. If you can get an SSD bigger then that you should set it up at a boot drive.

Christian Wood
Intel Enthusiast Team

 

[Ooooops]

Hmmm. But there's no 30GB SSD being sold here in our country.

 

[inzone]

What do they have for the sizes to choose from , like what has been said any SSD 64gb or less can be used for SRT. It's just that in this case smaller capacities is better because the SRT only utilizes a certian amount of space and there would be some of the space not utilized. If you can afford it why not get a larger SSD and use it as your boot drive for the OS and a few programs that you use the most and the hdd as storage for everything else.