[est1984]

I want to clear up a few questions I have before I pursue the need for a SSD.

Currently I have so many applications installed on that it takes a while for my software to boot up, so I was wondering how fast would it take me to open up my applications on a SSD.

Can I run an installation of Windows 7 on a SSD, would it significantly improve boot up times?

How do people run their set up, can they install all programs on the SSD, I have a about 4 very large CAD applications that I nearly as big as windows 7 install itself.

Would you recommend the Vertex SSD that everyone has been recently mentioned in threads?

Have people used it as a windows 7 installation drive and installed programs on a seperate hard drive?

I guess the sound would be quieter too right?

 

[Norlig]

<1 second

The performance gain will be astounding, windows will boot quicker than you can dream of, and when it has booted, you dont need to wait and can just start doing whatever you want instantly.

Some have a single SSD, some raid them. Depends on the size

Yes, Any SSD will be a huge improvement because of seek times.

I have mine as a Windows boot drive, and I can install whatever I want on my other 2 drives.

dead silent

 

[est1984]

Damn now thats what i call a reply

 

[Norlig]

 

[est1984]

http://goo.gl/NZSxM

would you recommend the ssd in the link above?

 

[est1984]

Are there any known problems with SSDs?

Do they last as long as HDD?

Surprised to not find any lifetime warranty drives.

 

[Norlig]

$9 more and you get the same SSD as me (C300 128Gb)

the one you linked is a Sandforce drive though, so its good

The Vertex 3 is soon to be, or has already been released (not sure), but that one is even better, though expensive

No idea how long they last

, but they should be solid since they have no moving parts

 

[est1984]

How is it so better?

I was just trying to picture a search winthin windows, now that would be crazy fast.

How about a virus scan?

http://goo.gl/y8DQ5 - I don't know whether it is worth the extra hundred pounds.

C300 Vs Vertex, is there any pros and cons?

 

[Norlig]

read speed is much faster on the Vertex 3 (doubled of Vertex 2 acourding to amazon) and its a Sata3 drive. seek speeds are also faster.

Searching, faster than a regular HDD, seek times comes into play here.

When I am doing Virus scans with Microsoft security essentials, it takes about 1H 15mins for a complete scan

worth it if you got the money, otherwhize nah

 

[est1984]

Am thinking of getting the Vertex 3 now, seeing as though I have had alot of bday money today. However how much faster will that boot windows? I've seen Windows boot in 28 seconds on Vertex 2 on youtube, but for 3 there aren't any videos.

 

[est1984]

http://goo.gl/hmiMl

looking at the item above.

the scan you did was that a full system scan? how big is your hdd? was that including the hdd and the sdd?

im wondering how long would kaspersky or avg take full system scan to complete.

I think my board has about 2 6.5gb/s sata connection too.

 

[est1984]

http://goo.gl/C33vy

performance is crazy!

 

[Jennasis]

If you can afford one and don't mind the smaller capacities, I would recomment an SLC rather than an MLC ssd, you don't need to tinker with them as much as the cells last much much longer (see write endurance). You are looking at £500+ for an established brand though and that's for a 64gb model...

You can get an old Vertex 1 pretty cheap these days and as long as you make sure your writes are to a standard drive and minimised on the ssd, you should apparantely be ok for 3 years+, though rogue writers can cause issues and I've head of drives beginning to corrupt around the 9-10k PE count

 

[est1984]

Are you serious they deteriorate over 3 years that quickly?

 

[Jennasis]

Quote:

Originally Posted by est1984 Are you serious they deteriorate over 3 years that quickly?

Faster sometimes, you do need to play around with them to get the most life out of them so in that respect they are a bit fiddly. A friend of mine got a 60gb vertex and it started corrupting at around 9.5kPE and that was within a year of him getting it so really I'm not a fan of SSDs in their current MLC state. When they start using SLCs of larger capacity on low cost commercial units I think they will be far more reliable and user friendly.

But that is just my personal opinion.

 

[Jennasis]

This is an old article but it still provides really decent info so I would recommend you read through it

http://forum.notebookreview.com/hard...lc-vs-mlc.html

Edit: bear in mind that this talks about SLCs and MLC lifespan at the time was unknown. If you check out some more recent info and calcs on MLC drives you can see that certain writes use up cells faster than others, such as small writes which use a whole block (not sure if that is the correct terminology).

 

[est1984]

whats a duplex? i'm reading the article now. I think I can wait longer for a ssd drive to be honest now. perhaps a vertex one 60gb for about 50 quid is worth it, but i was thinking of paying 200 quid and i really want value for my money. im with you if they can deteriorate that quick i think im definately against them...

 

[Jennasis]

Quote:

Originally Posted by est1984 whats a duplex? i'm reading the article now. I think I can wait longer for a ssd drive to be honest now. perhaps a vertex one 60gb for about 50 quid is worth it, but i was thinking of paying 200 quid and i really want value for my money. im with you if they can deteriorate that quick i think im definately against them...

Duplex basically means the cell is in two parts rather than a single self contained unit. With an SLC, if you lose a Cell, you only lose one bit whereas in an MLC you lose multiples as each cell contains multiple layers to increase the storage capacity on that cell. Think of it like a block of flats; if you have a fire in the bottom flat and it spreads, you lose a load of homes; the same fire in a house and you lose only one home.

SSDs are a great speed boost but the potentially short life spans of the current MLCs is a turnoff for a lot of people; I love mine but I am thinking of changing up to a cheap SLC 64gb which is a bit slower and £160 just to feel a little safer.

 

[Jennasis]

p.s. that's not to say that an MLC will necessarily begin to completely fail, however once the cells cannot be written to any more and are read only (which is what they will apparently become once their individual PE count is reached) you will end up with write errors when using as a boot drive and naturally this isn't great.