SSD advice

I'm thinking of buying an SSD but, boy, are they expensive (down here at least). There seem to be 2 - 3 levels of performance and the newer, faster models exceed my doing-this-on-a-whim-because-I-have-spare-cash price point past 120Gb.

120Gb is not very much. But then, 240Gb still isn't much and they are definitely pricey.

If I did it, will I get better results making it my system partition - which means it won't fit many games - or my "games" drive, which is fine but means the system is still relying on the standard HDD for a bunch of stuff?

Or just wait? I don't see any signs they are dropping rapidly in price (here) but perhaps you think big, cheap capacities are just around the corner?

Beyond gaming, what else do you use your PC for?

I got an intel SSD a year back or so and put my OS on it. SSD, if compared to platter drives, are faster mainly for small, non-sequential reads. This sort of access is most common to an OS rather than a media drive, but that's not to say that a game wouldn't load faster.

All in all, I'm not terribly sure whether or not I regret my purchase. Sure, windows 7 boots up in 20 seconds or so, and Photoshop loads up in a couple seconds... but I'm not sure if it was worth it to me. It mostly depends on what you use your PC for.

One thing to keep in mind is to get a tried and tested SSD rather than the latest whizbang product that promises 5% better performance over the previous generation. My first month of the SSD 'experience' was spent contending with random BSOD's with Corsair's Force series, based on the Sandforce controller. Luckily, I had gone with Newegg and was able to get a refund.

I don't use it for anything intensive. I do a lot of writing and modest spreadsheets and presentations, the usual internet use etc. Performance in general is not an issue.

However, since I game on a laptop (yes, shock, horror), I'd like faster load times and maybe even smooth out some of the level streaming from time to time.

An SSD is great for the OS regardless. Easily the most performant upgrade you can do. Just make sure you got an OS that supports the trim function to counter performance degradation in the SSD, and preferably a 64-bit one. Windows 7 for instance should disable certain things automatically when you got an SSD installed, but just in case make sure you've disabled defragmentation tools and the virtual-memory pagefile.

I got a 1st-gen Intel on my laptop. Not the greatest SSD in terms of throughput performance but Windows 7 performance is still ultra responsive after 2 years usage.

Dhruin said:

If I did it, will I get better results making it my system partition - which means it won't fit many games - or my "games" drive, which is fine but means the system is still relying on the standard HDD for a bunch of stuff?

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Other faster boot time, I am not sure you need an SSD as system drive. Once windows is booted up it hardly access the HD to load files. Even if it did they are small files and you don't need the performance of SSD for that. Most of the OS stuff are loaded into memory. So I think making SSD as system drive is waste.

However if you are low on memory it may be worth putting your swap file into an SSD drive and you will definitely see increased performance.

So I think SSD is good for apps that needs lots HD access. Some games access the HD alot and they will definitely benefit. I think make it as your gaming drive.

I have my old (64GB non-TRIM) SSD as the Windows drive, best decision I ever made. No need to set my computer to hibernate or sleep. Turning it on and having it full up in 20 seconds never gets old. I also install there whatever 'game of the month' I'm playing, and frequently used programs like Firefox.
Then I have my 1GB drive for data and other less frequently used programs.

I have also been looking into SSD's more lately. And it seems that indeed the best use cases are:
- as system drive: to increase boot time (which I very much like)
- as swap: to increase overall performance

As an OS doesn't take much space, especially linux. You can get away with a small one, e.g., an SSD of 8gb is 'only' 38 euro (plenty for linux, they say windows need more). Which is nothing for the performance boost you'll get.

As an alternative: get a cheap usb stick and install your OS to that. Cheaper than a SSD and also boots plenty fast I heard.

I've done quite a lot of SSD "research" (well, I've read reviews, forums and stuff ) these past few weeks because even though I already have a nice 160GB Intel X-25 (2nd gen) I kind of want to replace it with a bigger model when I make the switch to a Z68 board and an i5-2500K.

I was really interested in the new SandForce models because of the top performance of these drives but it seems like the various manufacturers (OCZ leading the bunch) are having significant quality issues. For example, OCZ shipped the Vertex 3 with firmware 2.02. Then they released three(!) new firmwares in short order which were 2.06, 2.08 and 2.09 and now they are rolling back to 2.08 because in addition to BSODing, 2.09 introduced a freezing issue to make matters even worse. They claim it's just a veeery low percentage of drives that are affected but what else would they say?

Anyway, to cut it short, I've come to the conclusion that unless you play benchmarks (which I don't think anyone of us does) there is very little difference in the real world performance of SSDs and any SSD is always miles better and faster than a HDD. Level load times in games, for example, are usually only a second or so apart from the fastest to the slowest drive in any given test. Same for application start-up times. There is usually only a very minor difference in real world scenarios.
That's why I would always choose a big, reliable drive over a (theoretically) faster but potentially less reliable drive. I mean we are talking about a drive where you install your OS. It better be 100% reliable and stable, right?

So.... *drum roll*... I have personally decided to buy an Intel 320 300GB SSD. Yes, it is based on the "ancient" Intel controller that has already been powering the X-25 drives. Yes, it "only" has a SATA2 interface. Yes, the PC Mark Vantage score is quite a bit lower than the latest SandForce offerings.
But it is extremely reliable (Intel claims that the return ratio for these drives is ~0.6%). Intel has also just generously extended the warranty for the 320 series from three years to five years so it gives their claim some credibility. It is also nice to have ~50 - 60GB more than other SSDs in the same price range. It offers more than enough space for the OS and just about every app and game you might want to install.
So for any average/enthusiast desktop user or gamer, it seems to me like this is the perfect drive for the next couple of years. Thanks to the extended warranty, it should also have a good resale value if one should decide to get rid of it in two or three years.

If I did it, will I get better results making it my system partition - which means it won't fit many games - or my "games" drive, which is fine but means the system is still relying on the standard HDD for a bunch of stuff?

Click to expand...

I have my OS and all of my apps (Office 2010 and lots of the general desktop utilities that probably most people have) and all of my games (incl. Steam) on my Intel SSD. All of my "junk data" like pictures, photos, movies and mp3s is on a separate HDD (an internal one and an external for backup).
I wouldn't separate the OS and applications/games unless you are on an extremely tight budget and can only afford a small system SSD. The number 1 reason you want an SSD is to take advantage of its "smoothness" and the fast (and silent) start-up times and loading operations etc. - Definitely put everything that involves an executable on the SSD. It really makes a big difference. I know I will not ever go back to a spinning hard drive.

Finally, as with most hardware-related stuff, I'd recommend checking out some of these excellent Anandtech articles:

OCZ Vertex 3 MAX IOPS & Patriot Wildfire SSDs Reviewed
The 2011 Mid-Range SSD Roundup: 120GB Agility 3, Intel 510 and More Compared
The Intel SSD 320 Review: 25nm G3 is Finally Here

I have an OCZ SSD 60gb to run the OS. W7 does say it only needs 24gb but with a 32gb that doesn't leave a lot of room for virtual memory and caching so you want to give yourself a higher ceiling. In addition, I also only put the games I play on it.

Never defrag an SSD! It does nothing and puts wear on it. In fact, you'll want to reduce activity on it as much as possible. Make sure TRIM is enabled either from the manufacturer or you have an OS that has it enabled - Windows 7 does.

Finally, Windows and a lot of programs like things to install on the C: drive exclusively and sometimes do it when you tell it not to (I find that start menu shortcuts are the worst). I went through the registry looking for default directories and switched them to my D: drive.

PS - Also, be mindful of older SSD's on sale. The earliest ones didn't have xfer rates much better than USB drives so a lot of retailers are trying to foist them off on unsuspecting public.

hishadow said:

...but just in case make sure you've disabled defragmentation tools and the virtual-memory pagefile.

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This is one of the most common outdated tips regarding SSDs. The pagefile is perfect for how an SSD operates since the pagefile mostly contains small chunks of random data. This is exactly the area where an SSD excels as you rightfully pointed out. No matter how much RAM you have, the OS and some applications still always try to write some data to the pagefile and the OS and/or some programs might start acting up if the pagefile is not found. Since affordable SSDs have become big enough to easily fit Windows and just about all of one's applications and games on them there is no longer a need to consider where to put the pagefile. It's best to keep it enabled and on the SSD. If you must absolutely tamper with the pagefile at all then you might consider reducing its size but it's not recommendable to disable it or to move it to a HDD.

lostforever said:

Other faster boot time, I am not sure you need an SSD as system drive. Once windows is booted up it hardly access the HD to load files. Even if it did they are small files and you don't need the performance of SSD for that. Most of the OS stuff are loaded into memory. So I think making SSD as system drive is waste.

However if you are low on memory it may be worth putting your swap file into an SSD drive and you will definitely see increased performance.

So I think SSD is good for apps that needs lots HD access. Some games access the HD alot and they will definitely benefit. I think make it as your gaming drive.

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Sorry to put it that bluntly but pretty much all of the above is 100% incorrect .
It's the exact opposite almost. The OS (and it's not only the boot time!) will benefit very much from an SSD because of the extremely low access times and high transfer speeds when reading small random chunks of data. Same goes for any application that is run from an SSD.
The vast majority of games on the other hand will only benefit from faster loading times and that's it. Most games load the level or the world into memory (RAM) at the start of the game or at the start of a level within the game and then the hard drive is barely ever accessed again while you play (other than to load the next level, of course). Only a few games stream data (e.g. Oblivion, Gothic 3, Risen) but they are the rare exception. Those games might benefit a little more from using an SSD beyond just faster load times, but games with streaming engines are few and far between.

Moriendor said:

This is one of the most common outdated tips regarding SSDs. The pagefile is perfect for how an SSD operates since the pagefile mostly contains small chunks of random data. This is exactly the area where an SSD excels as you rightfully pointed out. No matter how much RAM you have, the OS and some applications still always try to write some data to the pagefile and the OS and/or some programs might start acting up if the pagefile is not found. Since affordable SSDs have become big enough to easily fit Windows and just about all of one's applications and games on them there is no longer a need to consider where to put the pagefile. It's best to keep it enabled and on the SSD. If you must absolutely tamper with the pagefile at all then you might consider reducing its size but it's not recommendable to disable it or to move it to a HDD.

Click to expand...

Never had issues with disabled pagefile on both XP and Windows 7 on my systems with 3GB memory though I only run one game at a time. I've seen some references that it's important for memory mapped files, but with enough system memory I've never seen the need for it, so if you keep your memory usage with the total (- memory reserved for system) you should be fine. For SSDs I do it to avoid needless writes, as with hibernate and indexing. I might be a little over-protective of my SSD.

No, there's no point in having a pagefile active once you go above 4GB of memory unless you do some heavy-duty video editing or similar. That's bullshit. I haven't encountered an application demanding a pagefile in a long, long time. Believe me, I use a lot of applications.

Still, I don't think the pagefile will be an issue whether it's active or not - when you have adequate memory available.

LOTS of games load data during levels, and even if they don't - the actual load time of the level means A LOT in many games. Many games stream data without telling the player, so some players don't appreciate how much help an SSD would be in those cases.

So, an SSD is fantastic for the impatient gamer.

Other than that, I agree with Moriendor that the OS will benefit LOTS from being installed on an SSD drive.

About the only advice I will give is to go for a larger drive. Don't limit yourself to 64GB or even 128GB if you like to have more than a handful of games installed.

Contrary to most people, I don't like even my less-played games being slow if I can avoid it - and I HATE having to uninstall and install frequently.

I'd recommend a 250GB+ SSD.

I don't have too much experience with the differences between drives, though, so I can't actually say whether the "fastest" drives give worthwhile performance. I'm EXTREMELY impatient, though, so I'd most likely appreciate even a second or two faster whereever I could get it.

DArtagnan said:

No, there's no point in having a pagefile active once you go above 4GB of memory unless you do some heavy-duty video editing or similar. That's bullshit. I haven't encountered an application demanding a pagefile in a long, long time. Believe me, I use a lot of applications.

Still, I don't think the pagefile will be an issue whether it's active or not - when you have adequate memory available.

LOTS of games load data during levels, and even if they don't - the actual load time of the level means A LOT in many games. Many games stream data without telling the player, so some players don't appreciate how much help an SSD would be in those cases.

So, an SSD is fantastic for the impatient gamer.

Other than that, I agree with Moriendor that the OS will benefit LOTS from being installed on an SSD drive.

About the only advice I will give is to go for a larger drive. Don't limit yourself to 64GB or even 128GB if you like to have more than a handful of games installed.

Contrary to most people, I don't like even my less-played games being slow if I can avoid it - and I HATE having to uninstall and install frequently.

I'd recommend a 250GB+ SSD.

I don't have too much experience with the differences between drives, though, so I can't actually say whether the "fastest" drives give worthwhile performance. I'm EXTREMELY impatient, though, so I'd most likely appreciate even a second or two faster whereever I could get it.

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Well, depends on the budget. I bought my 64GB SSD for like $90. A 250GB SSD is probably more than $350

Well, depends on the budget. I bought my 64GB SSD for like $90. A 250GB SSD is probably more than $350

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Definitely, and it's only based on my subjective experiences.

All things considered, though, an SSD is a luxury item - and I like to go the whole route if I decide on such a thing

I bought an SSD last year shortly after doing a big performance update on most of my computer components, with the reasoning being that I was using all these pretty fast components elsewhere, but still relying on slow mechanical disk for I/O, so I was hoping it'd give me at least a performance update equal to some of the other updates.

And it did.

I bought a 120gb corsair force drive, and I use it primarily for OS, pagefile (deliberately - don't forget the page file isn't primarily used for out of memory swapping these days, but instead is nearly constantly accessed in small amounts regardless of RAM size), photo editing (+cache files), frequently used apps and my favourite games.

Boot time is quicker, but it's IMHO pointless to by an SSD for that - boot time for desktops isn't really time I mind waiting, and the increase is speed is only equivalent to the difference between modern UEFI and older BIOS boots. However the difference once booted is the real clincher for me. Applications on the SSD load incredibly quickly, and background windows operations now are completely transparent. You don't realise how much I/O goes on in the background or when you're opening applications or web-browsing - even with a cached up windows 7 install on a machine with 6gb RAM. Opening new windows and web browser tabs is now instant.

It's also made a big difference to image editing for me, as I'm basically using it as another memory cache layer and disk operations now have a more RAM like behaviour.

There's a fairly noticeable effect when you start using one. But you really notice when you go back to not using one.. and you'll realise how much you miss it.
The random read/write and access times are mostly responsible for that, and ALL SSDs have a huge benefit in that area over HDDs, I don't think I could tell the difference between SSDs (even for different generations).

So yes, they are totally a luxury, non-essential upgrade. But if you're upgrading your computer, it's one of the biggest improvements in day-to-day speed IMHO.

Thanks for the comments.

So, I pulled the trigger on a 120Gb Vertex 2. My laptop only has SATA2, so the latest tech is a waste. I'd have bought an Intel - I agree with Moriendor about the performance vs reliability but for some reason they aren't so common here and I was able to get a really good price on the Vertex 2, which made it a pretty safe bet.

I installed it as a secondary drive and transferred Steam (58Gb) and a couple of other games. I appreciate the OS might be the best use but that partition currently runs to 200Gb (not including Steam) and I didn't feel like doing a new installation and stuffing around.

Pretty happy with the result. Games are loading in half the time or less. I had a minor issue with The Witcher 2 where textures would sometimes lag loading in and that seems gone.

I think I might leave this setup and buy a 240Gb next year for the OS.