Small or large SSD

[andyl49]

I'm considering changing for a SSD drive and looking at the Samsung 850 evo's. What i wanted to know is am i better off having a smaller SSD for just my operating system then a separate one for my steam games either keep my HDD or a new SSD or shall i just get a 500GB and put everything onto that?

 

[Dark Lord of Tech]

1 - 250GB for OS and frequently use programs and 500GB SSD or HDD for the rest.

 

[captaincharisma]

its a good idea to have an SSD and HDD combo. this way if your operating system gets corrupted you will not lose any important files because they would all be on the other HDD. also in this case all you would need to do is reinstall your OS and programs and the SSD.

 

[Colif]

How small were you getting? anything below 250 is getting a little squishy now. Better too have too much than not enough

I would do C, Get 500gb ssd and use hdd as well as it takes same amount of space in PC as the 1st option and gives space to grow. Then you can put games on it if you want to and not worry about running out of space as fast.

 

[andyl49]

I literally don't do anything other than game on my PC so no other programs will be running, hence why i was thinking smaller than a 250GB SSD. I suppose i could get a 250GB SSD then just put the OS and a couple of games on it which have long load times. Then everything else from steam, origin and uplay on separate SSD or stick with the 1tb HDD i have already.

 

[Colif]

i only have win 10 on my ssd + a few applications, use 52gb, have 187gb free. I prefer to have too much than not enough. I may one day have a use for it but with ssd, its good to leave empty space so they stay fast. 250 is just the right size.

your idea of using 1tb as everything else is what I do even put documents and music and stuff like that on and it makes it easier if/when windows needs a reisntall. don't lose it all then.

 

[captaincharisma]

i only have win 10 on my ssd + a few applications, use 52gb, have 187gb free. I prefer to have too much than not enough. I may one day have a use for it but with ssd, its good to leave empty space so they stay fast. 250 is just the right size.

your idea of using 1tb as everything else is what I do even put documents and music and stuff like that on and it makes it easier if/when windows needs a reisntall. don't lose it all then.

i have a 250GB samsung evo and never run into space issues and i installed windows and all my programs on it and have everything else spread out over 2 1TB HDD's. if you want to install a lot of games though i would try for a 500GB SSD

 

[andyl49]

i only have win 10 on my ssd + a few applications, use 52gb, have 187gb free. I prefer to have too much than not enough. I may one day have a use for it but with ssd, its good to leave empty space so they stay fast. 250 is just the right size.

your idea of using 1tb as everything else is what I do even put documents and music and stuff like that on and it makes it easier if/when windows needs a reisntall. don't lose it all then.

I think that's what i will do then and get a 250GB Samsung 850 evo for WIN10 and leave everything else on my HDD. I take it i just do a straight clone of the OS onto the SSD and then go into set up when the computer boots up and change it to boot from the SSD (this is the first time will be doing this). If not best i get moving on making a boot USB stick otherwise I'm screwed if it messes up!!

 

[Colif]

i only have win 10 on my ssd + a few applications, use 52gb, have 187gb free. I prefer to have too much than not enough. I may one day have a use for it but with ssd, its good to leave empty space so they stay fast. 250 is just the right size.

your idea of using 1tb as everything else is what I do even put documents and music and stuff like that on and it makes it easier if/when windows needs a reisntall. don't lose it all then.

i have a 250GB samsung evo and never run into space issues and i installed windows and all my programs on it and have everything else spread out over 2 1TB HDD's. if you want to install a lot of games though i would try for a 500GB SSD

thats my set up except i have 1 2tb drive, not 2 1tb drives. its about same though yours slightly safer only as there more.

if you follow samsung tool, its pretty good at moving

some tips i got from someone on here about cloning:
Verify the actual used space on the current drive is significantly below the size of the new SSD
Download and install Macrium Reflect (or Samsung Data Migration, if a Samsung SSD)
Power off
Disconnect ALL drives except the current C and the new SSD
Power up
Run the Macrium Reflect (or Samsung Data Migration)
Select ALL the partitions on the existing C drive
Click the 'Clone' button
Wait until it is done
When it finishes, power off
Disconnect ALL drives except for the new SSD
Swap the SATA cables around so that the new drive is connected to the same SATA port as the old drive
Power up, and verify the BIOS boot order
If good, continue the power up

It should boot from the new drive, just like the old drive.
Maybe reboot a time or two, just to make sure.

If it works, and it should, all is good.

Later, reconnect the old drive and wipe as necessary.
Delete the original boot partitions, here:
https://social.technet.microsoft.com/Forums/windows/en-US/4f1b84ac-b193-40e3-943a-f45d52e23685/cant-delete-extra-healthy-recovery-partitions-and-healthy-efi-system-partition?forum=w8itproinstall

 

[game junky]

It's all preferential - 250GB is usually a good size for OS + applications (with the exception of games). Putting your games on a separate SSD will allow you to have quick load times (though it won't improve FPS and in multiplayer you'll just sit in the waiting screen longer). The strategy depends on how much space you are currently using and how much growth you want before you have to triage files.

Since I am a media hoarder (rip all music in a lossless format and rip all my blurays to file) so I went with a combination of a 500GB SSD for my OS, 500GB SSD for my game files and a 4TB HDD for my music/video files. I also backup my media to an external drive - better to have to copy things a few times than have to deal with data loss

 

[andyl49]

i only have win 10 on my ssd + a few applications, use 52gb, have 187gb free. I prefer to have too much than not enough. I may one day have a use for it but with ssd, its good to leave empty space so they stay fast. 250 is just the right size.

your idea of using 1tb as everything else is what I do even put documents and music and stuff like that on and it makes it easier if/when windows needs a reisntall. don't lose it all then.

i have a 250GB samsung evo and never run into space issues and i installed windows and all my programs on it and have everything else spread out over 2 1TB HDD's. if you want to install a lot of games though i would try for a 500GB SSD

thats my set up except i have 1 2tb drive, not 2 1tb drives. its about same though yours slightly safer only as there more.

if you follow samsung tool, its pretty good at moving

some tips i got from someone on here about cloning:
Verify the actual used space on the current drive is significantly below the size of the new SSD
Download and install Macrium Reflect (or Samsung Data Migration, if a Samsung SSD)
Power off
Disconnect ALL drives except the current C and the new SSD
Power up
Run the Macrium Reflect (or Samsung Data Migration)
Select ALL the partitions on the existing C drive
Click the 'Clone' button
Wait until it is done
When it finishes, power off
Disconnect ALL drives except for the new SSD
Swap the SATA cables around so that the new drive is connected to the same SATA port as the old drive
Power up, and verify the BIOS boot order
If good, continue the power up

It should boot from the new drive, just like the old drive.
Maybe reboot a time or two, just to make sure.

If it works, and it should, all is good.

Later, reconnect the old drive and wipe as necessary.
Delete the original boot partitions, here:
https://social.technet.microsoft.com/Forums/windows/en-US/4f1b84ac-b193-40e3-943a-f45d52e23685/cant-delete-extra-healthy-recovery-partitions-and-healthy-efi-system-partition?forum=w8itproinstall

Thanks for the help, I'll give it a go. I'm using over half the 1TB storage currently but windows 10 is already partitioned off so i take it with the Macrium software i can just select that partition to be cloned and leave everything else alone as the rest is just games? Is it ok to leave windows 10 on the HDD so i can still use it to boot in the future if anything goes wrong with the SSD?

 

[robert600]

i only have win 10 on my ssd + a few applications, use 52gb, have 187gb free. I prefer to have too much than not enough. I may one day have a use for it but with ssd, its good to leave empty space so they stay fast. 250 is just the right size.

your idea of using 1tb as everything else is what I do even put documents and music and stuff like that on and it makes it easier if/when windows needs a reisntall. don't lose it all then.

Can someone explain the bit about "its good to leave empty space so they stay fast". I wasn't aware of this - how much empty space is considered enough?

 

[Colif]

judging by this you can choose which partitions you want to copy as otherwise, if it just blindly copies sectors it may try to write 1tb of data onto 250gb ssd - http://knowledgebase.macrium.com/display/KNOW/Cloning+a+disk

Drive size, many new ssd use over provisioning which makes sure ssd keeps a certain percentage of free space for error correction and to let it shuffle the data around to keep its speed high.. Good chance I have too much free space but the less you use an ssd, the more likely it won't wear out before it gets too small for you to use.

i think 10% is considered enough.

 

[Colif]

All SSDs reserve some amount of space for these extra write operations, as well as for the controller firmware, failed block replacements, and other unique features that vary by SSD controller manufacturer. The minimum reserve is simply the difference between binary and decimal naming conventions. Many people are blissfully unaware that one gigabyte (GB) is precisely 1,000,000,000 bytes, and one gibibyte (GiB) is precisely 2^30 = 1,073,741,824 bytes, or about 7.37% more than a GB. Many people are also blissfully unaware that storage is properly measured in gigabytes, whereas memory is properly measured in gibibytes. Even though SSDs are built from NAND flash memory chips, they are marketed as storage devices, and SSD manufacturers reserve the extra 7.37% of memory space as a provision for background activities such as garbage collection. For example, a 128GB SSD will inherently include 128 * 73,741,824 = 94.4 million bytes of built-in over-provisioning.

I feel slightly ripped off but its being used to my advantage so I will let them live

 

[captaincharisma]

All SSDs reserve some amount of space for these extra write operations, as well as for the controller firmware, failed block replacements, and other unique features that vary by SSD controller manufacturer. The minimum reserve is simply the difference between binary and decimal naming conventions. Many people are blissfully unaware that one gigabyte (GB) is precisely 1,000,000,000 bytes, and one gibibyte (GiB) is precisely 2^30 = 1,073,741,824 bytes, or about 7.37% more than a GB. Many people are also blissfully unaware that storage is properly measured in gigabytes, whereas memory is properly measured in gibibytes. Even though SSDs are built from NAND flash memory chips, they are marketed as storage devices, and SSD manufacturers reserve the extra 7.37% of memory space as a provision for background activities such as garbage collection. For example, a 128GB SSD will inherently include 128 * 73,741,824 = 94.4 million bytes of built-in over-provisioning.

I feel slightly ripped off but its being used to my advantage so I will let them live

well then try not to think about the space you will lose from formatting it too lol

 

[andyl49]

All SSDs reserve some amount of space for these extra write operations, as well as for the controller firmware, failed block replacements, and other unique features that vary by SSD controller manufacturer. The minimum reserve is simply the difference between binary and decimal naming conventions. Many people are blissfully unaware that one gigabyte (GB) is precisely 1,000,000,000 bytes, and one gibibyte (GiB) is precisely 2^30 = 1,073,741,824 bytes, or about 7.37% more than a GB. Many people are also blissfully unaware that storage is properly measured in gigabytes, whereas memory is properly measured in gibibytes. Even though SSDs are built from NAND flash memory chips, they are marketed as storage devices, and SSD manufacturers reserve the extra 7.37% of memory space as a provision for background activities such as garbage collection. For example, a 128GB SSD will inherently include 128 * 73,741,824 = 94.4 million bytes of built-in over-provisioning.

I feel slightly ripped off but its being used to my advantage so I will let them live

That's gone well over my head haha

 

[Colif]

it just means that if you have a 250gb ssd, about 15% of your ssd storage is hidden from you but its used for good causes that will keep SSD alive longer. Its space most people don't even know was there.

 

[4745454b]

The absolute max I'd load up an SSD is 80%. Due to a bugged cache file with Firefox my OS SSD did fill up, and by fill up I mean 1MB free. I didn't notice too much slow down over all, but I wouldn't recommend it. I eventually got rid of my cache folders and FF made new ones and I'm back to ~50% free. I'm on a 120GB drive with about 55GB used/55GB free. Works great.

My steam folder sits on a larger 256GB SSD. That is filling up and would be over 100% filled if I could download all my bought games onto it. Some black friday/Cmas I'm going to get a 1TB SSD and move my steam folder over to it, and move my OS onto my 256GB 840Pro. I generally buy a new drive every year or two and move things around so I have more space. I should have done that last year but I had just moved in with my GF and we had other needs. My mass storage needs are being handled by two 4TB drives. Music and what not doesn't need speed, so any drive is good.

Get the OS on a SSD, get your steam folder onto another SSD. Keep slowly but surely upgrading until you get your drives where you need them to be.

 

[robert600]

Colif ... thanks for the link to 'over provisioning' as I said ...I was totally ignorant this. As usual with these things, I couldn't quite get my head around all of it but the following paragraph jumped out at me:

"Some SSD manufacturers provide software tools to allow for over-provisioning of drives by the user. Actually, even without special software, any user can set aside a portion of the SSD when first setting it up in the system by creating a partition that does not use the drive’s full capacity. This unclaimed space will automatically be used by the controller as dynamic over-provisioning."

Does this mean that having empty space on the SSD is not actually good enough ... rather that the empty space MUST be in a separate partition???

 

[Solandri]

Can someone explain the bit about "its good to leave empty space so they stay fast". I wasn't aware of this - how much empty space is considered enough?

A hard drive "deletes" a file just by changing its first byte into a value which the filesystem recognizes as "this file is deleted". Since it can overwrite a 1 with a 0 (or a 0 with a 1), it doesn't need to actually erase the file to free up the space the file used to take.

A SSD can't overwrite a 1 with a 0 (or a 0 with a 1). It needs to first put the flash memory into an erased state before it can write a new value to it. 0 -> erased -> 1, or 1 -> erased -> 0. If you're into electronics and remember the old EEPROMs, basically the same thing.

The erased -> 1 or erased -> 0 step is blazing fast. The 0 -> erased or 1 -> erased step is really slow, sometimes even slower than writing data to a HDD. So what SSDs do is search for deleted files, and erase the space in the background while the SSD is not being used. That way there's always lots of space prepped and erased ready for blazing fast writes.

If you don't keep about 15% of the drive empty, the drive may not have enough pre-erased space when you try to write a new file. It will be forced to erase deleted data in the foreground before it can write the new file, forcing the computer to wait, and file writes will become as slow or slower than a HDD.

15% is a general guideline. On a 128 GB SSD, 20%-25% is better, though newer SSDs this small keep some reserve space hidden to mitigate this effect. On a 1 TB SSD, you may be able to go as low as 5%. Just keep an eye out for this slowdown, and clear a bunch of space off the SSD if you begin experiencing it. Or if you know you're going to need to write a bunch of data (e.g. you'll be recording a game stream), clear up a bunch of space ahead of time and give the SSD time to erase the space in the background.

Also, try to avoid anything smaller than a 250 GB SSD. SSDs are a bunch of flash drives (like a SD card) operating in parallel (like RAID 0). It's the parallelism which gives them their speed. The SSDs smaller than 250 GB have fewer flash dies, and so are slower. 250 GB and larger SSDs are pretty much the same speed on SATA (they saturate SATA 3, so adding more flash dies doesn't improve speed).

 

[Colif]

All SSDs reserve some amount of space for these extra write operations, as well as for the controller firmware, failed block replacements, and other unique features that vary by SSD controller manufacturer. The minimum reserve is simply the difference between binary and decimal naming conventions. Many people are blissfully unaware that one gigabyte (GB) is precisely 1,000,000,000 bytes, and one gibibyte (GiB) is precisely 2^30 = 1,073,741,824 bytes, or about 7.37% more than a GB. Many people are also blissfully unaware that storage is properly measured in gigabytes, whereas memory is properly measured in gibibytes. Even though SSDs are built from NAND flash memory chips, they are marketed as storage devices, and SSD manufacturers reserve the extra 7.37% of memory space as a provision for background activities such as garbage collection. For example, a 128GB SSD will inherently include 128 * 73,741,824 = 94.4 million bytes of built-in over-provisioning.

I feel slightly ripped off but its being used to my advantage so I will let them live

well then try not to think about the space you will lose from formatting it too lol

I had thought about that, we get something that is A size but get sold its B size but then software takes this B and says it should be formatted as A so we lose twice to size changes.

curious, how much extra space is hidden from a 1tb ssd?

I don't think partitioning it makes any difference on an ssd

 

[4745454b]

I have yet to partition an SSD, though that's mostly because I use an SSD for only one reason. OS or steam folder. If I was trying to use an SSD for more than one purpose I might partition it. I don't think it would make any real difference in terms of speed though. When I used a spinning drive for my OS I always made an OS partition on it first and used that for the OS seeing as it's on the faster outer edge.

 

[Colif]

i misinterpreted the difference, it will always be 7.3% bigger than advertised, so you actually get more than you pay for but you can't use it directly. Some ssd let you add more to the amount to act as extra security. Still lose out to formatting once an OS is added.

 

[robert600]

I get confused easily so I’m not sure if Colif’s response of “I don't think partitioning it makes any difference on an ssd” or 474545b’s response of “If I was trying to use an SSD for more than one purpose I might partition it. I don't think it would make any real difference in terms of speed though.” Were to my question of “Does this mean that having empty space on the SSD is not actually good enough ... rather that the empty space MUST be in a separate partition???”?

I’ll assume they are responding to me and that they are saying – NO, the empty space does not have to be in a partition as that article either says or strongly implies it does for it to use the space for over-provisioning. That makes me wonder why the article says that? The only positive reason I can think of for the partition they mention is that it would guaranty that the space is kept free and that it would never be filled by new programs, program cache folders etc. etc.
However, if I’m thinking about this correctly …a huge negative that occurs to me is that this partition (“automatically used by the controller as dynamic over-provisioning” – according to the article) would be doing all these “writes” it has to do to the same part of the disk thereby wearing them out relatively quickly. This is in contrast to having no partition set up – in this case, the ‘writes’ would be randomly spread over the entire unused portion of the disk – resulting in much longer disk life. When I look at it this way and then think of Colif’s SSD where he is using 52 GB and has 187 GB free …. Wow … it would last a very, very long time.

Am I thinking about this correctly?

 

[4745454b]

NO, the empty space does not have to be in a partition as that article either says or strongly implies it does for it to use the space for over-provisioning.

Most SSDs come with extra room you don't see that they use for the purpose of speeding up erasing files. It's called over provisioning. There are some newer cheaper drives that don't offer any over provisioning. You don't really have any option to use it. Though I know my Samsung SSDs allow me to change the %. Each SSD is different and you'll need to see how yours handles it.