An Introduction to the Solid State Drive

Introduction

I thought I would put this thread together to help the NBR community as SSDs are coming upon us so quickly and the interest seems to be going through the roof. Since my first article 'Comparing SSD Performance to Mechanical SSD Performance in a Dell Laptop' and consequently, my follow up to that 'Showdown at Big Sky -- Sandisk 32GB SSD Vs. Seagate 160GB 7200RPM HD', the interest in the SSD has become overwhelming with respect to PMs received, questions and advise given.

What Is a Solid State Drive and how is it Different from a Hard Drive?

To start, lets tackle the question of exactly what is an SSD and what are the benefits. The easiest way to describe this is as an SSD being an array of flash memory modules similar to a flash drive which are controlled in such a way that, once the computer is shut off, it retains its memory unlike normal RAM. The SSD is totally different than RAM, in that it is made of flash memory rather than volative memory, thus bringing into existance the term 'solid state memory'.

There are no moving parts within a solid state drive which is the critical difference between that and the hard drive which must rely on mechanical operation to store and retrieve data. In order to access or store data, the HD relies on a metal disk to spin at a speed of up to 7200 revolutions per minute and an arm that extracts or places the information on the disk.

To assist, I'm going to use some pictures, the first borrowed from Mtron to assist in explaining the differences.



What are Its Advantages?

The advantages of a SSD are numerous. First and foremost the sheer speed of the SSD is the most obvious and overpowering feature. It's reasoning is simple. There is no requirement for the disk to spin and the arm to find the exact position of the information it is retrieving. Lets think of the SSD as a book. One simply has to look at the index and then retrieve the information knowing the proper chapter and page. This alone will allow much quicker boot and access times as shown in this YouTube Video taken at CES2007.

My startup time is steady around 27 seconds, this being on a Dell M1330 with a 2Ghz C2D processor, 4Gb RAM, Sandisk 32Gb SSD and running Vista Ultimate 64 bit. I determine my test results from the push of the button until the internet connection is confirmed and all activity has stopped on my desktop. It is a very healthy jump over my former times of well over a minute as this includes an array of software to start during startup as well.

Initial performance results of the SSD were very good, however, tests conducted by websites such as Tomshardware.com showed the SSD to be lacking in write speeds, some being as low as 14mb/s. Technological advance is already showing companies like Mtron, whos original SSD blew away the competition at 100 MB/s read and 80 MB/s write, to be raving about their new ASIC line which now boasts speeds of 120 MB/s read, 90MB/s write with a burst speed of 150MB/s and quicker access time of .1mb/s. This writer hopes to be testing the validity of these claims soon enough with the expected release date of their newest 32Gb ASIC SATA SSD set to be released in November. These claims are presently being questioned by Engadget, one of the more reputed sources for digital technology on the web.

Also a definite advantage is the sheer silence and lack of heat created through the SSD. I find myself, at times, waiting for the laptop to react, only to find its task complete and staring me in the face. We must also realize that, since there are no moving parts such as the hard disk spinning and being accessed, there is little to no heat generated by the SSD. This also now reduces the amount of time the fan is in use which, on my system, is virtually never. Again another bi-product of these positive attributes is the increased battery life gained through the lower power consumption of the drive long with the lack of fan use. Initial estimates thought these differences would be negligible but a quick glance at my first NBR article will surprise you I think.

To add to these, there are additional benefits of increased reliability as the the SSD is touted as being virtually crash proof as discussed by Samsung and having an unbelievable lifespan as shown here, once again by Mtron:



Am I reading this correct??? 140 years??? Wow!!!

Here are two videos to guide you through all the advantages of the SSD, the first by Samsung followed by Mtron. They are an excellent depiction of why the solid state drive is going to revolutionize consumer data storage alot sooner than we think.

What are Its Disadvantages?

Presently, there are three glaring disadvantages to the SSD, these being price, storage capacity and availability.

While we see prices dropping rapidly, one can still expect to pay upwards around $6-700 for the 32Gb Sandisk if its purchased on its own. You will find this easily doubled for the new Samsung 64Gb SSD and prices havent been released for the fastest SSD on the planet as claimed by Mtron, but its present 32Gb SSD (which is still well ahead of the pack) can be had for $1500US.

Size is then another consideration. We can run out and grab a 128Gb Super Talent SSD as seen here for around $4600 but the 64Gb is just entering the market with many people still fighting to find available 32Gb SSDs just to see if they stand up to their reputation. This brings us to our final point of availability of the solid state drive which is almost non-existant unless purchased through laptop manufacturers as they are presently rushing to get them out or watching Ebay.

On a further note, I have to credit Super Talent for their indepth article that they included above. Get a coffee for the entire 15 pages.

Ease of Transition

I am going to have to stick to personal experience here and limit myself to notebooks as I haven't had the pleasure of playing with a SSD in a powerhouse desktop as of yet (although I am interested hint hint). I have switched my SSD with a Seagate Momentus HD no less than 8 times now for testing. Further, I have had the opportunity to switch one SSD for another and can state that nothing could be easier.

Do you want an SSD? Simply find one, backup your system with a disk imaging program, pull out the HD and replace it with the SSD (both being SATA of course) and restore your system. Similarly, you can do a clean install just as easily as having the HD inside the system. There are no additional cables or carriages to worry about.

Further Reference

Are you interested in reading more about the SSD? You only have to go as far is this article within NBR to learn more. I have already mentioned the detail that companies such as Mtron, Samsung, Sandisk and Super Talent have placed into their own websites along with articles from Tomshardware.com and Anandtech.

Conclusion

The solid state drive has pushed in hard and fast and it's not going away soon. The SSD, muchlike the internet when it first came to light, was originally touted as a passing phase. It has quickly found a position where, if manufacturers can find the lower prices, higher storage capacity and availability, the SSD will threaten the mere existence of the HD. The first obstacle of performance was surpassed long before many knew what SSD stood for.

There appears to be so many benefits that we just cannot ignore the SSD on a business or personal use level. Although it will need to gain a foundation in the spiderweb designs of small and large office networks, the simplicity of the SSD lies in the absolutely lightning speed in which it accomplishes its tasks at the individual user level of both.

Quicker startup, incredible performance, no moving parts, less heat, longer battery life, incredible reliability and durabilty will soon enough conquer the obstacles of price, storage restrictions and availability.

Dont believe me? Look at this IBM 62PC "Piccolo" HDD, circa 1979 - an early 8" disk !!!

 

Doesn't flash memory have a limited number of writes? Somewhere in the range of 100K per memory cell? Doesn't that make your 140 years of use a little far fetched? Under heavy use it might last less than a traditional HDD...

SSD drives are sure to be here to stay in thin and light notebooks, but they are a very immature technology at the moment...

 

Although its not possible to prove these in real life situations, expectations of all manufacturers are similar in that the comparison of write cycles bring the SSD way ahead of the HD for lifespan.

 

Two remarks:

* Please be write Megabytes as MB, not mb, which is generally used for Megabits.
*The reason why flash tech's limited number of writes is no objections is becasuse they use a wear levelling algorithm. Windows writes and reads to the same sectors over and over again and this would kill the drive in weeks if not for the fact that the drive will shift the data around even though the OS will never notice this.

 

Thanks all for the vetting and information. It only adds to the article.

 

Very nice. Looks like a sticky to me. I can't afford one yet, when do you see 100+GB happening?


Edit: I did not write well. When will we see at reasonable prices?

 

Its happening as shown with Super Talent for quite the price. I have also read somewhere of a 320Gb SSD presently being tested.

And further to the question regarding lifespan above, here is Super Talent's take:

"The SLC NAND memory used in the SATA25 is typically good for 100,000 write/erase cycles, and Super Talent quotes drive life at greater than 140 years. Of course, like most mobile drives, the SATA25's warranty runs out in three years.

To help extend drive life, the SATA25 employs wear-leveling algorithms that spread write/erase cycles evenly across the disk to ensure frequently changed memory blocks don't fail before their neighbors. There is no limit on read cycles for SLC NAND Flash memory, so wear leveling isn't necessary for frequently read memory blocks—just those that are changed."

 

Yea I'm just not convinced yet that it would last more than a few years for me, at least... I have standard HDs that have been in active use for over 6 years and are still going fine...

I'm reserving judgement of how long they last until we've seen them in long term usage. Manufacturers have these idealistic reliability projections that rarely translate into real world reliability. So all I'm saying is that long term reliability should be cited as a downside simply because the long term reliability of SSD is still out and there is no empirical information to backup what manufacturers are claiming...

Reminds me of recordable media... It is supposed to last 100-200 years... But only if kept in a super ideal state

 

The problem with these wear-levelling algorithms is that they rely on data being moved around, and on there being enough free space to perform this wear levelling.

Imagine the disk is, say, 90% full with mostly static data (that never gets written again, just read). That means whenever new data is written, it has to go into the remaining 10%, which means those cells will be written to over and over. Of course, it could decide to move data from the other 90% into the last 10%, but that'd still involve writing to the same sectors.

Basically, I'm not convinced that this is enough to guarantee longevity in all cases. But it's too early to say.
Let's see when SSD's have been in use for a couple more years.

 

A good indication of reliability I guess would be the length of the warranty. Without moving parts any warranty of less than 5 years would be contradictory to their claims of 140 years.

 

If it has a re-write of 50gb per day and like you suggested say every byte can be re-written 10,000 times (i think its more like 100,000 but we can say 10,000)

50GB / 32GB = 1.5625 x 10,000 = 15625 days , then / 365 = 40 years , thats considering 10,000 bytes of data per every single byte of space being re-written , Ive done a few simple calculations that seemed to loo right , anyone wanna proove me wrong but ive worked it out to be

10,000 write/erase per fragment/ sector / whatever its called on SSD'S
50gb write/erase per day
40 years lifetime

Do remember people that they use very advanced algorithms to spread the data properly ect to get a extremly good lifetime , anyhow i think these drives have a much much longer life than hard drives ,

Also , thre is a differnace between Reading the data and writing the data , once youve written the windows files when you boot you only read the files , you wont write them again ,
So that 50gb per day is really impossible on a 32 gb SSD to write.

Edit:
Ive jsut read your post , and that last 10% would be able to be re-written alot of times still , but who actually leaves 10% on a drive and keeps writing and deleting on it over and over again Even with this into consideration do remember hard drives have a short lifetime aswell , especially with the impact damadges and genral wear eventually causing bad sectors ect...

 

Is wrong should be 10,000/1.5625=6400 days or about 17.53 years. Only time will tell but these SSD's look like they will last long enough to compete with traditional HDD's. It also apears that the failure is not likely to cause a complete loss of DATA kind of a nice feature IMOP.

 

Here are the life expectency quotes from Mtron, Samsung and Super Talent in order. Both Mtron and Super Talent state 140 years with Samsung approaching it at a different angle with mean time between failure.

 

Thanks for correcting me , I guessed i would have been wrong somwhere.

By the way , at 100,000 write cycles like earlier suggested that would = 170 years which is close to the 140 prediction , so yeh 140 would be reachable quite easibly , whatever happens they will last longer than hard drives.
Dont forget , if we go back 17 years the biggest hdd was like 50mb , now who would be using a 50mb hard drive in there computer at this day and age , These parts will be replaced way befoer the 140 years is reached lol.

 

SDD's are really only good if you are in a rough environment right? because of the no moving parts...

 

You benefit if you would like your notebook to have a longer battery life, less heat, less noise, less vibration, & more reliability. Not to mention that Mtron's SSD is faster than WD's Raptor and eliminates seek times.

In detail, upgrading to Mtron's SSD has these incentives:
SPEED, SPEED, SPEED!!!
Totally silent (no moving parts).
Fastest access time ever: 0.1m sec (instant seeks, 150MB burst, sustained 100MB writes & 80MB reads)
Vastly superior reliability (no failing mechanical parts)
1000 - 1500g operating shock (no finicky platter head)
1/2 the power consumption of a mechanical HDD (less heat and longer battery life)

If you prefer a slower notebook in all areas, more heat, shorter battery life, noise & vibration, sensitivity to shock, and less relability, then stick with a traditional HDD.

As flamenko said, the greatest deterrents are price, capacity, and availability.

The future is now!

 

Heh, there are way more glaring disadvantages to SSD's than you mention. It's near-impossible to recover lost data, you're screwed with a low to moderate magnetic field or static shock near it, limited writes, and more. Even when SSD's become remotely affordable, I would still go with HDD's.

Beautifully written post, though.

 

Actually, there us discussion in two of the manufacturers websites that the SSD is much safer as it handles a crash in a different fashion. In a disk, a crash is a crash is a crash whereas, the controller in a SSD, should it find a bad sector, moves information from that area and the user, for the most part, will not even know it. (Im sure I would with a 32Gb SSD lol).

I can't address the magnetic field issue and, infact, myself and Trebuin were wondering if they are airport proof. As for write, there is no question of superiority any further if my tests in a few weeks show, as Mtron claims, that their new SSD pushes out 120MB/s read, 90MB/s write with a 150MB/s burst.

And thank you for the compliment.

Would I pay alot for new technology that, as of yet, cannot really be obtained much less proven successful in the long run? Absolutely not. Im just a boy fm a steel mill town that no longer has its mills.

 

I can not refute this either but highly doubt. Why, well HDD use magnetism and they are fine (shielded) 2nd USB sticks do fine right? So with out any support of original comment I feel it is just a "red herring".

 

I like fishing...but don't quite understand that.

 

A red herring is a metaphor for a diversion or distraction from an original objective. An example can be found in academic examinations, particularly in mathematics and physical sciences. In some questions, information may be provided which is not necessary to solve the given problem. The presence of extraneous data often causes those taking the exam to spend too much time on the question, reducing the time given to other problems and potentially lowering the resulting score. Red herrings are frequently used in literature and cinema mysteries, where a character is presented to make the reader/viewer believe he/she is the perpetrator, when in reality it is someone far less suspect.

Wikipeadia

 

Ok now...for the Laymen...How does that apply to his? lol

 

It means that they are talking about magnetic interference affecting the SSD, when in reality the problem may not even be present at all.

"A red herring is a metaphor for a diversion or distraction from an original objective."

 

Ok. Im more into walleye, bass, brook and speckled trout....oh and I have fly fished for Cod in Northern labrador if you would believe it.

 

Once SSD becomes more mainstream will there be varying degree's of performance & speed? In the same sense as HDD's 5400, 7200 etc

 

Flamenko put the cap back on the glue and open up some windows I'm worried about you. If SSD are not airport proof big problem. That would make them unusable for a large segment of the market. I have a doubts they have waited till this late in the game to explore so obvious.

 

I dont know if mainstream will be determined by a set speed or, rather the price range. Mtron spent the last few months creating a circuit board that will guarantee them top spot on the performance stage (120 read/90 write) while the others (Samsung/SuperTalent) seem to be tackling size.

Now earlier we learn of transcend coming out with a under 500 32GB SATA SSD...It has terrible read/write though.

 

millibars.

NEVER USE "m" for Mega. It is for milli.

 

is it a good ideal if some1 opted for a notebook with only 32GB SSD but then used a mobile external hard drive like 160gb to connect and dump all the datas and files into that?

 

No prblem with that and the system still will run very fast.

 

flamenko, i just did a configuration on ur m1330 and man its like 2400. I think dells are so overpriced even with the starting 1299 xps. any other 13.3" that offer SSD configuration? other than dell, i dont know of any other vendors that allow low SSD configuration

 

Yes...at least Dell, as expensive as the 64Gb SSD is, now has made it possible for those that can afford it to include it. Im not sure of the others but I have heard Sony may now. Heads up however as a friend just got a Mtron for around 8-900 only to find its somehow not compatible in the 2.5" version SATA.

The good thing is, if you are a good barter and find the right person with Dell, you can bring your final price with a SSD down signficantly.

 

Alienware also offers SSD as an optional upgrade for their top end notebook.

 

I don't believe for a second that SSD has anywhere near the reliability of a Hard Drive.

Hard Drives have been around forever, and they've been working on making them better and better with each generation of drives. The HDD on my laptop from 5 years ago still works perfectly and it's been on 24/7, basically.

You think an SSD can do that once you fill up those 64 GB, with Windows always swapping to the HDD no matter how much RAM you have. Wear-leveling mechanisms on the SSD will not help, at that point.

When the technology matures, it might be worth looking into. For now, HDDs have much faster write speeds, don't need to worry about wear-leveling, and have quite decently fast read speeds, at a much better cost, with a longer expected life than SSD. If that works for you and you have the money to burn, why not get an SSD so Word starts in .5 seconds instead of 1 second? For those who want a more cost-effective and, in some ways, a superior investment, HDD is the way to go.

 

I would guess you have to experience it to understand. Its much more than starting Word. Consider the complete silence, lack of any moving parts, lack of heat, less fan use, increased battery life, incredible shock resiliency and now we are reaching almost double performance results compared to the typical HD. It seems the only factor of negativity that many have left to use that is an unknown is the life expectancy.

The life span of the SSD is estimated at 140 years by all manufacturers but at very least under the worst conditions, maybe one can agree that it will double the life span of an HD. The trade off, in itself is a great step up.

One just has to look at the HDTune tests of an HD under continuous use to see where the HD fails. Its performance drops significantly after less than a minute of continuous use. This does not occur with the SSD.

Want a negative though that hasn't been tackled yet? You cannot reduce the size of flash ram and therefore, can only fit so much into each unit. At present all manufacturers are saddled with the fact that they cant get any more than 64Gb into a 2.5" SSD. This is a huge problem which hasn't been tackled yet. The only solution would be to find a way to fit a 3.5" which can then be as large as 128Gb.

 

I have no concern about SSD's lasting long enough. MFG's say 140 years, even if I don't believe them I Know you will get more than 10 years no matter what you do. And if anybody looks back at a ten year old computer no way you need anything from it as it is outdated. I just need the price to come down. I could make 64GB's work if I could run with HDD for storage. Best of both worlds.

 

And how do you know that? Nobody knows that yet. I format on a regular basis, and I just can't trust that it would last so long. But I'm still very interested in getting one in the near future to try it out.
I'm just very concerned, because flash memory having a limited number of writes per cell, that eventually with enough writing, you'll start to get "bad sectors" on the drive.

 

I hear ya there. Put your OS's on the SSD, maybe long term installs of games that you intend to play for a long time. And the switch the page file off on it. (Yes, you CAN do this... sheeesh.) And have a nice, oh, 250gb 4200/5400 rpm other drive for storeage... Yeah. Thatd be nice.

That said, right now i think SSD shine in one place. Which is small systems that need to be extra power efficient, and neigh-invalnerible to g forces in common envrioments.

That said, price needs to go down, down, down. And when it does, all will be awesome.

 

Yes I don't know that for certain as no one knows the future. That said I do have some faith in science and engineers. I used the 10 year figure as I hoped it would be so low as to solidify my example. If limited write cycles are your reason for uncertainty on their longevity then that is a mathematical equation that has been done and the answer is 147 years so even with any real world situation you could throw at it I feel very comfortable that it will last 10 years. Having no moving parts and the fact that the materials used in constructing these have been around in excess of ten years makes me very comfortable with that aspect of longevity. I do not believe the physical components that make up SSD or any computer component will last 147 years in working order for that matter. As far as defragmenting goes I posed that question in a post about a month ago when I knew nothing where as know I know nothing + a little. My conclusion now is defragmenting is unnecessary on a SSD because of the fundamental characteristics of the technology. For example the HDD relies on the speed at which the disk rotates say @7200rpm the SSD is doing this at the speed of light less the inefficiency's of resistance and such (way complicated but for our purposes I think valid). So fragmentation does not come into play. I have not seen whether defragmenting is a no-no because of limited write cycles but I have read defragmenting does not matter. With 147 years I don't think it would fall under 10 years even if you did it every week.

PS I just Googled “defragment SSD” much to read, I didn't bother. One on the results page said fine if it makes you feel better but not needed.

 

Only time will tell. So I'll just say "we'll see".

 

The thing is that the chips can get smaller , currently they use rather large chips that are specifically designed for arrays so therefore they are not the fastest ones you can get because they work together to increase the speed , currently the highest space available on a signle flash chip is aroung about 8GB , thats on a single 1 cm x 2cm x 0.3cm sized chip.
obviously the pcb ect is involved , I think there are prototype 16gb chips coming soon but i cannot recall if that was just a new structure concept or was actualy a standard chip.

Think about it , Micro SD cards are tiny , and you can get them in up to 2GB of storage space , yes they are the slowest things in the world but having say 2MBPS max connection rate , But when you get 100 of the chips call crammed inside @ 2gb each with the speed rate @ 200MBPS (which i dont think sata can cope with) thats a 200gb drive , sure it would cost a fortune , but flash prices have dropped so much ,
These SSD's are the way of the future , and they have so much room to improve on. Im sure well see faster speed results of 200MBPS plus in the future

 

The price is high until that is addressed widespread acceptance is unlikely. But if your main issue is longevity then, well you are not a person of observation. I mean come on, do you you want to defrag your RAM? I know you do. This technology could die on the vine I agree but not because of longevity. That is all I am saying, and I took the time to write a response more than 6 words would of been nice.

 

I use an 8GB Transcend in my Latitude D400 and love it. At ~20MB/s read it's noticably slower than the HDD it replaced, but now using my laptop is like using a calculator. No noise and no vibration.

With models out that perform even better than an HDD all I can say is; How sweet it is!

 

And this is an absolutely huge step up that one never realizes until they experienced it in person.

 

I agree. Once you have it it's really hard to go back. My first experience with SSD was in a my old desktop with Gigabyte's iRAM. It is small at only 4GB but it was lighning fast and silent. The difference in a laptop is even more pronounced where the hard drive vibration can be felt as the laptop is being used. I notice it even when the drive is just spinning, let alone seeks.

When I recently got my first laptop the HDD was the first thing I noticed, and the first and only thing to go.

 

I didn't know this thread was getting so personal for you.
What else can I say but the obvious? Is that more than 6 words? Ok.
Until price comes down significantly, and the reliability has been proven, then I will purchase one.
At this time, with so few consumers actually getting this new tech, we only have the manufacturers to rely on for data, and anyone should know, that they can, well, exaggerate claims. On paper, sure >140 some years is great, but until it's proven in the real world, I wont bite.
EDIT: And I wont wait 140 years to purchase one.

 

Actually...Dell right now is sold out of their solid state drives and they are awaiting more. Once the 64Gb became available, sales of these went through the roof even at that price.

 

Nice article. Like everyone else has stated I would say another disadvantage is that any new technology is inherently "untested" for long term reliability. If SSD technology had been on the market for 5-years and nobody has had problems with long term storage, then we could be more assured there's no chance of data corruption issues over time.

Another disadvantage is that, as we experienced here at NBR, manufacturers such as Sony have had issues with SSD. Our VAIO TZ crapped out after 3-days. While playing Half Life 1 on the TZ it simply crashed and never came back to life, the SSD was the culprit. That might be a Sony issue related to SSDs, but it is an example of how the early adopter sometimes gets to unwillingly "test" new technologies for these MFRs so they can get it right on version 2.

Other than that, I agree, in the long term assuming the data algorithms for making sure writes are not done over and over again in the same spot, this technology will be the future for mobile devices such as laptops.

And yeah, price has to fall a lot.

 

I think there's some serious misconceptions about reliability in this thread, on both the HDD and SSD sides.

To start with HDDs. They are naturally prone to failure. In the past 17 years, I've had die on me personally, all within 2 years of purchase:
80 MB drive.
6 GB drive.
13 GB drive.
60 GB drive.
120 GB drive.

That's about 40% of the all the drives I've used in my personal systems. Now, I also do PC support on the side, for the last 12 years now, and I can assure you that very few things die as often as hard drives, though fans and CD/DVD drives might be comparable in failure rates. That is to say, things with moving parts die far more often than anything else. If you understand the physical aspect of it, it makes perfect sense too. No matter how advanced hard drive technology becomes, they essentially operate like a 60 mph drive through book store, where you have to read the menu, pay for your order, and pick it up in a fraction of a second. Obviously the potential for failure in this kind of situation would be much greater than just downloading the book directly from Amazon, which is kind of like how SSDs work.

To contrast, recall that even though SSDs as hard drive replacements are new, the underlying technology has been in use for decades. Both NAND and NOR flash memory were invented in 1984, and they are currently in use in billions of devices, including iPODs, digital cameras, cell phones, video game consoles, cash registers, ATMs, etc. What's more, in most computers, the most critical software, that would be the most sensitive to errors (the bios), is stored in flash memory.

Now, it's true that the majority of applications of flash memory have been preferenced towards read-heavy usage. However, just because this is the case doesn't mean write-heavy usage is an unknown. As I mentioned, they have had decades to understand the details of this technology, which is why we have so much information on the decay rates of write-heavy flash media.

 

Wow!!!! Excellent first post Passive. Let me the first to send you a Rep. It's good to see an article, as such, can attract someone with your knowledge.