Is Solid State Drive worth the money?

[Harunatsumi]

I am just wondering whether using solid state drive really worth the money?
I heard that it would make the computer boot, copy, and paste faster.
What else can it do? (Does program run faster as well?)

What is the optimal size of SSD for me to get if I plan to Install windows 7, Office and some game application?
40GB, 64Gb, or 80gb? (I will have 2tb harddrive for other application)

Lastly, i heard that it has lifespan of 10,000+ writes per cell or approximately 40TB worth of data to be written for 40GB.
If i download a file to my 2TB HDD, does it count toward that? (as in does the file pass to SSD before transfer to HDD during download?)
What if i copy and paste between HDD? (sorry i am really new here)

 

[sminlal]

An SSD will make programs start up faster but in most cases it won't make them run any faster once they're loaded. I've heard a lot of people discount the value of of an SSD because of that, but once you've experienced it it's hard to go back.

40GB is probably on the small side, 80GB would probably be more than enough.

None of the activity on the hard drive will affect the lifetime of your SSD. It's only writes to the SSD itself that will affect it's lifetime. My Windows 7 system writes an average of 5GB every day to its SSD, so that means it should last 20 years under Intel's "20GB/day for 5 years" rule.

 

[Harunatsumi]

One more thing regarding the lifetime.
Will you know beforehand that it is almost the end of lifetime of SSD drive?
Or will it just fail?

 

[hell_storm2004]

Performance-wise SSD's are in a different league. The only thing holding them back is the price!

 

[buzznut]

Windows should warn you of any drive that is failing, should being the operative word here. I doubt its any different for SSD, but I could be wrong.
I set an old 80Gb drive as my download drive, it doesn't affect the SSD.
In addition to windows and app startup times, it also speeds up things like loading maps in games. I noticed a big difference in the length of time that autosaves take in my games. Actually everything in windows runs faster.

I have a 40gig drive, I wish I could have afforded larger. I think 80GB is a good size for a boot drive. I wouldn't buy anything less right now.
Win7 is about 20Gig install, but many of us weedle this down by turning off features like system restore and moving the swap file off the SSD. My WIN7 install was 10GB.

To me, it definitely was worth the price, and I was quite a skeptic. I can't imagine I'll ever have a conventional boot disk again. Probably gonna get the momentus XT hybrid drive for my next laptop.

 

[Harunatsumi]

Thank you very much.
I guess i will definitely get an SSD when i build my computer then.

 

[daship]

SSD 4 life!!!!!!!!

 

[drees]

I have been asking myself the same question. My old puter "Betsy2" is on her last legs (Betsy1 died a long time ago), and I want Betsy3 to be a desktop replacement. What I am considering is getting a Sager NP8170 with two drives: an 80gb Intel 320 Series SSD for drive C to hold my programs, and a 750gb Seagate XT 7200RPM NCQ Hybrid to hold my data, with an external (non-Seagate) 750gb drive for backup purposes. That way I thought I would get the best of both worlds. The SSD would be large enough for my programs, would speed up loading programs (and possibly operating some) and wouldn't add too much to the cost of the system, while the Seagate would provide cheaper mass storage.

I would greatly appreciate any thoughts you might have on this.

 

[ScottyComputer]

Thank you very much.
I guess i will definitely get an SSD when i build my computer then.

I was curious how big of an SSD to get? I will mostly do gaming and I wanted something I could load windows on and whatever games I want. Videos, pictures, and that sorta stuff will be on my regular drive.

Any ideas?

 

[JohnnyLucky]

Tom's Hardware recently published the third article in a series that answers questions about real world performance.

The first article was about ssd's and gaming:

http://www.tomshardware.com/reviews/battlefield-rift-ssd,3062-14.html

The second article was about ssd's and productivity applications:

http://www.tomshardware.com/reviews/solid-state-drive-work-tests,3064.html

The third article was about ssd's and entertainment and content creation:

http://www.tomshardware.com/reviews/video-editing-performance-ssd-hdd,3089.html


Here's an article published a few months ago about deciding whether to upgrade to an ssd:

http://www.tomshardware.com/reviews/ssd-upgrade-hdd-performance,3023.html


Finally, here is a technical review that compares several 64GB ssd's which is just about the right capacity for what you want to do:

http://www.tomshardware.com/reviews/tests-ssd-review-solid-state,3103.html

BTW - Your idea of using a small capacity ssd as a boot drive with a few applications and two favorite games plus large capacity hard disk drives for data storage is the most common configuration for gamers and enthusiasts. It represents pretty good value for the money spent.

 

[ScottyComputer]

Thanks JohnnyLucky. SSD is the wave of the future.

 

[erasmo84]

I have a Intel SSD and after 1 year, It like the performance is very poor

 

[ScottyComputer]

I have a Intel SSD and after 1 year, It like the performance is very poor

Are you sure that isn't software related? How big of a drive is it? I'm a big believer of the SSD as a boot drive and then the 2nd drive is what takes all the crap you download. That way it keeps the SSD clear and maintains its speeds.

 

[RetiredChief]

I have 4 systems, two desktops with a pair of SSDs, one Laptop with a pair of 128 Gig M4s, and one laptop with a single 120 gig SSD - Would NOT go back to a HDD for OS + programs. Boot time and program load times have spoiled me.

That said - an SSD will only spped up what is on the SSD. Programs will not run faster. If a file is requested by a program that is on the SSD, that file will load faster, But if the requested file is on the HDD - then it will load at HDD times.

I have 10 SSDs dating bak to the Intel G1 (predates trim support) and all are running fune. As to " so that means it should last 20 years under Intel's "20GB/day for 5 years rule" thats the math, but may not be reality. That is based on each cell being written to the same number of times, may not be the case. But I'm still betting on at least a five to 10 year time frame before noticing any problems.

@ erasmo84. Which Intel SSD?, what driver?, Is Trim functioning - you can check to see if enabled, but that is NOT the samething as WORKING. ect. Bottom line if after a year it is performing poorly, I'd look into why and correct the problem.

 

[Mousemonkey]

This topic has been closed by Mousemonkey