MLC vs SLC, IDE vs SATA ?

[CPLamb]

I want to get an SSD to use for my system drive. Right now I am running Windows XP with a motherboard which doesn't have any SATA support, only IDE. I plan on upgrading the OS within the next few months and the motherboard within the next year. I want to put my swap file on the SSD. Should I get an SLC or MLC SSD? I am concerned that an MLC SSD will wear out in short order. Should I get an IDE or SATA with an adapter? I would prefer a SATA in order to make upgrades easier but am concerned using a adapter will degrade performance.

 

[Pyree]

Wait for the new sata 3 ssd market to mature before getting one. While you are waiting, that will give you enough time for window 7 and new sata 3 mobo. SLC is insanely expensive compare to MLC ssd. MLC ssd should have reasonable life in normal use. Putting an ssd in a mobo with IDE is not really going to help speed things up (judging by the lack of sata port on mobo, the cpu in there is probably ancient).

 

[jamie_1318]

you will never be able to hook up any kind of decent SSD drive if you have only IDE ports on your Motherboard. I would stick to MLC as they are much cheaper than SLC and unless you are in enterprise storage you won't be able to tell the difference in lifespan anyways. SLC does perform much better in writes of any kinds than MLC, but the price is prohibitive.

For your purpose I would recommend you upgrade or replace the existing PC as if it doesn't have Sata ports it would not be worth the speedup

 

[sminlal]

Intel used to make Enterprise-class SSDs that used SLC memory, but they've stopped doing that. I'm not aware of any SLC-based SSDs in the general marketplace right now.

MLC-based drives with decent wear-leveling controllers should last for several years as long as you're not writing more than several GB/day to the drive.

 

[CPLamb]

I think I'll follow Pyree's suggestion and wait for the new SATA 3 SSD to come out. The processors I have now are pretty good, a pair of dual core Xeon 2.4GHz but I'll have to go for a new motherboard just for the periperhal interfaces. Does anyone know how badly the SATA to IDE(ATA) converters affect performance?

 

[sminlal]

They affect performance pretty heavily, given that IDE transfer rates are limited to around 100MByte/sec (depending on version).

 

[Pyree]

They affect performance pretty heavily, given that IDE transfer rates are limited to around 100MByte/sec (depending on version).

Agree, especially you are running server.

 

[CPLamb]

Best answer selected by CPLamb.