Any SSD users here? Hows your experience with it so far (on Win7)? I've upgraded to an Intel 320 160GB SSD recently. of course, benchmark result is impressive, but in term of real world improvement, it doesn't "feel" like a significant leap from a pair of say, WD black drives in RAID 0 (my previous setup). I understand the fact that SSD is a better upgrade than a CPU these days. I mean, how much CPU power do you need for running web apps? My first encounter with SSD tech was in late 2007 (m2? or was it memeto? can't recall the drive's name sorry). back then, I could tell the difference between these two storage devices. But then again, all tests were done on WinXP. I think the reason behind this is simply because Win7 is so good in utilising the system memory to hide the latency of a mechanical drive (superfetch, prefetch, caching, async I/O etc). It probably has the highest efficiency rate among all the OSes, and my rig is populated with 12GB of memory. 4GB of memory is going for about 30USD (or cheaper?). Let's just say it will cost you < 150 for 16GB of good DDR3 memory. An intel 320 160 goes for 300USD. Why spend more, really? Yes it gives me faster boot time. But I don't shut down my PC. I've always put it into sleep instead. So my boot time, on a pair of RAID 0 array, has always been sub 2secs (yes it's faster than the Lion on my MBA, which ironically, has a SSD!) Sequential read/write is good, but I don't transfer large files every single minute. Random I/O is gold. but just how random can a desktop/workstation get? I'm not serving 10 users. File searching is fast, but I get Win7 to index my entire drive. My file searching time has always been very fast too. The engineering that goes into win7 is really So, shouldn't we buy more system memory then (instead of a SSD)? This is my personal experience, with my personal rig. Every setup is different. please share yours.
Boot up is significantly faster. Launching of software is also noticably faster, but not as obvious as boot up. The key to buying SSD is to buy the cheapest and the most reliable drive. Buying the latest Sandforce drives are really not necessary, especially if they are so much more expensive. I was just like you, I bought the X25-M 120GB, at that time it is one of the cheapest $/GB drive. If your rig is pretty up to date, I doubt you can feel that much difference. But it could be a different story on a notebook.
Ohh yea, forgot to mention an important thing. Although Win7 is the first OS which 'supports' SSD, but it is not as optimised as the HDD. So hopefully Win8 will improve on that front.
I've been intending to migrate to SSD for my notebook but not just yet because of the limited storage capacity. Speaking of improving performance... with so much RAM, have you guys ever thought of using a RAM disk? I know, it's old tech... but with so much RAM... it would be interesting to create a RAM disk using the excess RAM. I just wonder if it's worth the effort.
chai: you are right. setting up an ssd on win 7 can be very confusing. for example, MS claims that superfetch will be automatically disabled when an SSD is detected. It didn't work that way on my setup for unknown reason. I have to manually turn it off using Intel toolbox app, which is really just a beautified registry hack. Again, you are right. Never ever buy a sandforce drive. when it comes to data, never put your trust on a startup, regardless of how fast the drive goes. Intel and marvell have years of validation process in place. OCZ will never be able to reach that kind of sophistication. It's either Intel SSD, or back to conventional drive. But with sandforce now being a division of LSI, the controller will only get better. Still, I will never trust OCZ or adata or patriot etc.. it's a different level altogether. Adrian: you can do that on linux. in fact on certain distro ram disk is created by default. Not quite sure about windows though. you might need 3rd app for that. Unless you have ecc memory, otherwise I don't think you want to use it to store anything other than cache/read data.
Setting up Windows 7 was pretty easy for me. I don't have to change any settings. Hmm... there's a new version of Intel SSD Toolbox. The High IOPs model are getting really pointless, just for bragging rights. You probably won't even notice the SATA 6GBPS transfer rate, unless you are using it to store large data, which is insane. If you are using notebook and has only space for 1 disk, then you might not have much choice. But I would try to use a large cheap grean HDD to compliment the SSD in a desktop environment. What's the point of RAM disk actually? There's even less space to work with, and it won't be much faster than SSD.
Well, that's what I'm wondering... Maybe to store the Temp folder so all our work files reside there, instead of on the disk. This would improve access times for those files. Of course, this works best with a HDD. With an SSD, I think the advantage wouldn't be speed, but rather a reduction in writes to the SSD, which should help improve its lifespan?
After using it for close to 1/2 year, my Host Write has just exceeded 1TB. Most of the temp files still reside on the SSD drive. But I did move the temp files of the Photoshop to HDD. If we move all the files to HDD, what is the point of having SSD?
a week here and my total write has reached 300GB already! I did a full win 7 system backup (data on my HD, not system partition) a few days ago. I didn't know the backup service uses VSS. so all the compression was done on my SSD before the data got pushed over to my backup drive. damn it!
To reduce the SSD usage, I install games on the HDD. Some of the non-critical temp files are also moved to the HDD, like Photoshop, WinRAR. They perform extremely large disk operations, especially if you decompress really huge files like *ahem* ISO. I have also reduce the SSD usage by using the HDD as default download folder. Desktop is kept to minimal usage (shortcuts only).
I too am starting to be very interested in getting an SSD for my MBP. Question: any difference in a SATA II vs SATA III SSD on a SATA II interface on my MBP? Don't know if I want/need to get a SATA III disk to future proof myself if I get a new notebook in the future? Any point at all? I'm looking at the CORSAIR F120 FORCE 3 240GB - RM1199 and the likes of MUSHKIN CHRONOS 240GB - RM1499, OCZ VERTEX 2 - 240G - RM1199 and VERTEX 3 - 240GB - RM1639. How the Corsair so much cheaper?
Well, if you follow our posts earlier, none of the drives that you mentioned are recommended by us. Sandforce drives are not known for their reliability. SATA III is useless unless you are doing tons of file transfers, which I highly doubt you will on such expensive SSD.
LOL. True. I suppose it shall be an Intel SSD then Know anywhere I can find an Intel 320 Series 300GB Intel drive? Compuzone price list seems to have a 600GB SSD on the price only. Hmmm
Most other shops should sell the 320 300GB model, like Viewnet. However, don't expect miracles from SSD, especially if you have not used SSD before. You will only see major gains when doing multitasking.
I *think* know what to expect from the SSD. Primarily running virtual machines where HDD would usually get trashed. Which is also a problem since VMs are usually huge in size. Otherwise, I'd be ok with a 160GB drive. Bah Wife's MacBook Air's on SSD. So I roughly understands the performance improvements. There's no way I'd expect the machine to be magically faster. Only perhaps certain cases. Photo management (and sometimes editing) seems a lot faster on my wife's machine. Especially when loading up the iPhoto library during it's scanning of the library. Which again is my problem with SSD's rather small size and my need to use a 2nd HDD to store all these data. If they are not on the SSD, then there's no real point. Maybe I'll just skip the SSD dream and spend on a 2nd HDD and RAID 0 my notebook machine instead.
Yeah, that's the major problem with using SSD on notebooks. Although they have all the right attributes to be an excellent choice for notebook storage, BUT cost and size of SSD does not favour them at all. They are either too expensive or too small. This is one of the reason why SSD is still an excellent choice for desktop usage, since we can easily pair with a gigantic 3TB drive for data storage. There's no power consumption advantage as well, since most drives are about equal to normal 2.5" HDD.
if you are on the newer MBP, maybe you can consider moving your large data to an external storage via thunderbolt. I did the same to my desktop and notebooks recently. I've moved all my stuff to a storage server via iscsi, and leave only the recent months of data on my SSD. All the 6 drives can be put into sleep now, instead of spinning 24/7 in my main rig, and I only LAN wake the storage server up when I need to access my old data. 300GB intel 320 is about 700SGD i think. that's out of my budget. So I bought the 160GB version instead, and I keep a 7.2k drive in my main rig just for virtualbox VHDs. If you want to get the Intel 320, I would suggest you to buy it in SG. why? because in case the drive kaput, Intel will send their service guy over You don't have to go down to the shop. Song boh? Also, if you want to get an SSD, Intel is the brand to get. I'm sure you know well the level of sophistication Intel has, as compared OCZ. One is selling CPU to businesses, the other is selling memory to overclockers. When it comes to data storage, no play play.
I'm on the older MBP. No Thunderbird. I'm planning to replace the DVD drive with a 2nd HDD caddy and get a 750GB 7200 HDD on it with the SSD as the primary HDD. that's the plan. but the SSD price is just not making it easy to do so. haha. Yeah, looks like its the Intel drive for sure. but dont they have international warranty? seems a little cheaper in KL and definitely so in US. found one at USD510 on ebay. Newegg is selling it for US529 now.
As far as notebooks are concerned, I would go either HDD or SSD but not both because pairing HDD with SSD nullifies one of SSD's greatest advantage in mobile computing - its ability to survive shock and vibration. I would love to migrate to an SSD for my notebook but I cannot survive with less than 256 GB of storage. Argghhhh!
