Should I get a SSD? - The Vikings Answer

Anybody regular to the forum knows that for the longest time I was adamant about questioning the "need" for SSDs. As it ends up I placed my bet on "not really is it worth it" and nobody really needs them as "they are not as great as people made them out to be."

I was trying to wrap my head around how much there is to gain from a SSD in a logical manner.

If my computer boots 20 seconds faster is that really a big deal? If photoshop opens in 3 seconds instead of 10 seconds is that a big deal?

Shock Protection, Battery Life, Capacity, Cost, and all the other big factors to take to mind.

Now some who owned SSDs on the other side of the argument were just as adamant about how good SSD is, heck there is even an article floating around now called "get an SSD you putz"

So I was ensured that the only reason I could say the things I said was because I had not used one and once I got one I would change my mind.

So I finally got one (actually two) and I wanted to revisit what I had been saying all this time and tell you.... how great a SSD is and is it worth it?
__________________________________________


I told myself I would get a SSD when it was $1 per GB, it has almost reached that point now for some SSD deals, but the ones I ended up purchasing were an Intel 160GB G2 (ebay $200) and a Crucial C300 128GB (Newegg $200) so I bought before the 1/1 ratio mark I wanted but I was impatient and wanted a higher performance SSD not a value one.

I have done a fresh install on both my desktop & laptop using Windows 7 64bit on both, and done all SSD tweaks for max performance. All my tests are giving me the optimal results for best SSD performance.

Things are opening fast, boot time is way faster the laptop especially since it does not have a lot of devices to open like my desktop does. One of my longest to open programs Photoshop CS5 64bit is opening 4 or 5 times faster now.

Things feel more snappy, if I download a file to the SSD and install or extract it its much faster and quite nice.

So these things I knew to expect before I had one via the "logic" I had applied, the question is was this speed boost worth the cost and the loss of capacity?

As of now in the short term I have to honestly say not really.... Why?

When doing a 10 minute photoshop job, waiting 6 seconds longer for the program to open is nothing. When the desktop is never rebooted a faster boot time is nothing. Even the laptops incredibly fast boot is not a big deal, that longer boot time from before gave me just enough time to plug in my mouse and my power cord and put my bag up.

I think a normal logical computer user finds ways to use small delays to their advantage and it does not really put any sizable impact on productivity.

I find the things that I had to wait on the longest, I still have to wait on because they were not HDD limited, its things like waiting on a website server or for youtube to load a video. A SSD does not make everything faster, it only makes some things faster.

I can tell you the loss of capacity is a big deal for me, it may not be so for everybody as some people are very minimalistic in what they install. This is the first time in my life I could not just install all the games I want to play, I could not even install the entire Adobe Suite because my space is so limited and so valuable.

I think something I said before I still say is true.

"You can always wait a bit longer for something to load, but if you do not have enough space to install it, no amount of waiting can fix it"

So space and speed are not the only SSD variables. For some people if you get the right model it can help squeeze some extra battery life out of your system, also shock protection is another. I honestly do not think ether of these benefits are as beneficial as most people make them out to be. Unless your using your laptop on the back of a jeep on safari I think a normal 2.5" hdd has more than enough shock protection.

Battery life is hit or miss depending on the person, but if this is a big deal to you the system you choose has way more impact than the storage medium, get one with a proper IGP, CPU, and Screen. Just lowering the screen brightness can really increase battery life.

I say those of you on the fence "should I buy an SSD" just stick with "no" because if you do not know you want one then your probably not going to be totally impressed with the gains. If your a photographer, a video editor, you guys need capacity way more than the speed of SSD, also you really do not want to use a SSD in the same way as a HDD by constantly putting files on and off of it since that is what wears it out.

It's best reserved to hold files and programs and load them with at little writing as possible.

If you have a dual hdd system thats great use the 2nd drive as a HDD to store files, and if you do not maybe consider seeing if you can take out your optical drive and put a HDD in there.

You know what you guys on the fence should look at? the Seagate Momentus XT, a 500GB HDD with 4GB SSD Hybrid. It will load those programs and boot your computer faster but still give you a full 500GB storage space and the price is quite incredible $90.00 on sale @ Newegg recently, that is not much more than just a regular non hybrid SSD.


Now with that said SSD is much more approachable now than it was a year ago, the price has dropped by a huge amount, they are more reliable, better integrated with the OS (Win 7). It has become something the normal person can use and enjoy without having to be a tech expert and well blessed with money.

I see the era of SSD rapidly approaching, the prices are sure to get better, performance will get better, and more competition on the market will be what breeds most of this, but its not here yet for the normal person. Its still a specialized product reserved for those who need it or feel they need it for a particular reason.

When SSD capacities grow to 300GB+ for the normal model and prices reach about half of what they are now, then SSD can actually start to replace HDD in all ways and be much better, however right now its not a replacement so much as an alternative and this alternative comes with sacrifices and direct trades and compromises in some fashion or another.

SSD is the future but HDD is not dead yet and still has lots of reasons to be whats inside your computer. I hope to see better hybrid HDD/SDD come to market as well as those could be the cushion we need to help transition from one format to another.

So guys, I am enjoying the SSD's but they didnt not change my life, they did not change my computing experience, or make me feel like I had a new computer like I had been hearing all this time from other people, it just made a few things faster and took a lot of my storage away from me.


P.S.
Oh and one thing I looked forward too was faster game loading, seems that really didnt happen for the one game I play right now (starcraft 2) but its ok I also already stated there is no reason to load faster when you still have to wait for the other players to load anyways.

 

Nice, clear concise post.

+Rep.


Over a year and a half ago, when I came here asking for (SSD) advice and giving feedback on my experiences with it I was told:

I'm stupid (not in so many words - but effectively).

My system's are not set up properly.

My choice of SSD(s) were wrong.

My tests were flawed.

My SSD(s) (tested/bought) were flawed.

My requirements were not in line with what SSD's really offer.

My testing was not really showing what SSD's really offer.

... and on it went for ~20 months...


Now, there are enough people on this forum that actually agree with my initial appraisal of SSD's so long ago: (Simply: not worth the money).

For others, it is worth the money and I can appreciate and understand their reasoning too.

What this thread deserves is to be stickied and be visible to all newcomers who are still wondering if an SSD is a true performance 'upgrade'.

Basically - should they 'jump' now?

From not only testing as many SSD's myself, but also reading every single post on this subject for the last 20 months on this forum (not including other posts too elsewhere), this is the most concise list I can offer on this topic:


Reasons to get into an SSD:

1) Durability (shocks, bumps, etc.).

2) You value 'snap' above all else (even $$$$).

3) Limited capacity is not an issue (or, at least you think it's not an issue).

4) You are upgrading from a 4200/5400 RPM drive (even then - still consider the Momentus XT Hybrid or the Scorpio Black 750GB HDD's).

5) You are extra sensitive to vibrations from 7200 RPM HDD's (mostly due to poor system design - not poor/failing HDD's).

6) You are turning on/shutting down the system a few dozen times a day for various reasons (or, alternately: you are rebooting for various reasons).

7) You are picking a very specific SSD to further increase your (already long) battery life.

8) Your storage subsystem is decidedly on the 'light' part of the usage spectrum - 'heavy' or 'industrial strength' is still workstation/enterprise class (SAS) drive territory.

9) You do not fill the SSD to capacity (or, at least don't keep it there).

10) You have more than one drive bay in your (notebook) system (and you fill both: SSD (O/S + Apps), HDD ('long term' Data).

11) You have your own (or some relative's/boss's) money to burn.



Reasons to not get an SSD:

1) You need capacity as much as you need performance (in fact; these two are often inter-related and to 'juggle' with the capacity issue (external HDD) will always be a detriment to performance, overall).

2) You stay in a program (orders of magnitude...) longer than it takes to start it up (whether timing a HDD or an SSD).

3) You boot your system(s) once (or only a few times) a day.

4) You can buy a faster cpu/gpu and/or more RAM for the same (or lower) cost of an SSD ('work' is only performed in the CPU and RAM - only by upgrading these components will you truly get a faster system).

5) You will constantly need to fill the drive to capacity (and keep it close there while still doing storage intensive work - detrimental to performance and drive life).

6) You can spend the money on education (or helping others).

7) You are trying to make the stock of your favorite SSD company increase.



Note that even in the 'reasons to get an SSD' list: more than a few are also reasons to not get one (depending on how you (truthfully) answer).


Thanks Viking! I'll be looking forward to this thread each day.

 

ViciousXUSMC, I've had similar experiences with SSDs. It would be interesting if you could go back to a traditional hard drive for a while and then tell us how you feel again.

Fully agreed. The Momentus XT is an excellent alternative for the average user. It's not the most quiet drive though.

The people who said what's in bold were actually right. You write several terabytes of incompressible data each month. That's not a good workload for any SSD, especially a Sandforce SSD.

Consumer SSDs were made to handle ~10GB per day on average. If you consistently write more it's better to get a traditional hard drive.

 

I still think one other thing to consider is multitasking IOPS.

Great posts, btw!

 

I won't argue about whether people bashing me was right or wrong.

I came to get knowledge and instead received something far, far less.

This is already covered in my point 8) above:

I said:

Instead of simply telling me some version of the above - personal attacks and threats of being banned were offered instead.


What is conveniently side-stepped though is the issue that a (new/better) storage subsystem is not able to handle 'high' amounts of its core purpose: manage, serve and store any and all kinds of digital data.

 

Nice post. I think a lot of people that are on the fence about buying a SSD probably don't need one. Personally I like the benefits that they offer and bought a slightly used drive for my new system. As low capacity seems to be the biggest issue for most, I recommend a dual drive setup in every situation where extended battery life and an optical drive are not absolutely necessary. I don't agree with the argument that money for an SSD would be better spent on some other system component.

 

2MNY,

Why can't you agree with that? If (real) performance is what we're after?

 

Most excellent post, OP.

Very concise and I think, very accurate.

In my case I have a laptop that I carry with me as I visit client's office every day and my boot/reboot needs happen about 10 times a day and typically when a very busy client wants something specific while I am sitting in their office.

So the value of the SSD is there in my specific usage pattern. Also I have a Lenovo (older T61 and newer W520) and have put my 500 GB Hitachi 7200 rpm in the drive bay, so I have both speed and capacity.

I do think the PCIe SSD cards for the newer laptops that offer 80 GB of storage in concert with a HDD in the Disk 0 slot will be the perfect answer as we move forward. At least until the price of SSDs come down as they inevitably will.

Again thanks for the post.

Perry

 

Very solid guide, but I have to argue against the MomentusXT. Maybe mine was a dud, but I felt it was no faster than other 7200 rpm drives I had used previously, and it also costs significantly more than a normal 500GB 7200 rpm drive.

Windows 7 boot times with just the basics was around 30 seconds, the same boot time as a 7200 rpm drive, while my SSDs do it ~15-17 seconds.

 

I second 2MNY's assertion-- most users are after a better computing experience, or better "general performance." For general tasks, the HDD is often the bottleneck (ie, boot time, application launch time, general system responsiveness, etc), and so it would make a lot more sense to upgrade to an SSD than to upgrade RAM (rarely the bottleneck, when 4GB is now commonplace) or upgrade the CPU (when even a Core i3 is already far from the bottleneck of most users' general tasks).

 

I agree with a lot of what you wrote down Vicious

 

If it is bang for the bucks, max out the RAM may be a better option(and usually cheaper in absolute dollar term). Of course it is the same old 'boot time' ? use sleep/hiberate. application loading ? only the first time and after that it is from RAM cache and the SSD advantage is lost. Afterall, XT is designed based on the same principle. 4G RAM cache is much faster than 4G SLC and can be used for other computational tasks if needed.

 

Here is a test I did with hdd and ssd. I must say I have dual drives, so I use the ssd for os and some programs, and the hdd for storing data. But this was a real world test, not benchies. Anyway, here is what I found. http://forum.notebookreview.com/har...ssd-actual-performance-increase-over-hdd.html . I also do not believe ssd's are for everyone, but in the time I saved, for my needs, it will has already paid for itself, by a large margin.

 

I will use the tilleroftheearth post to show some hidden costs of not getting a ssd
110% subjectivity

Reasons to get into an SSD:

1) Durability (shocks, bumps, etc.).
how much money and time spent to replace a damaged hdd as I broke 2 hdds during the same period of time as my current ssd one?
-time to look for a new one :around 10 hours (It took me at least 3 days to
look for informations regarding a new drive as I took advantage of this situation to find a better one - my current ssd)
-time to buy a new drive: a few minutes on internet
-time to get rid of the old one: garbage - a few seconds, recycle center
around 10-15 minutes at my shopping time (organize it, go there etc)
-money spent in gas or else to go to the recycle center
-time to install back the data onto the drive: from new install - more than
15 hours to install and tweek everything + several hours during the next
months (it took me this time to install an OS for a friend)
from a disk image - a few hours
-time to redo the work lost due to the hdd failure
-money spent to buy 2 hdds+1 and only one ssd during the same period of
time
-money spent to multiply by the number of hdds inside the laptop at the
time the shock occur

5) You are extra sensitive to vibrations from 7200 RPM HDD's (mostly due to poor system design - not poor/failing HDD's)
-time saved with the ssd on the next visit to the doctor at not worrying
about vibrations
-time saved with the ssd on extra care (adding extra cushion, slow motion,
avoiding risky situations etc)

6) You are turning on/shutting down the system a few dozen times a day for various reasons (or, alternately: you are rebooting for various reasons).
-time lost with the hdd because you missed the bus, the metro
-money spent with the hdd because the parking time was over
-opportunities missed with the hdd to get hit by a bus or to talk to the
boss about a promotion because of a few seconds spent more waiting etc -
deeply subjective the contrary could be true as well
-time gained with the hdd missing the traffic
-opportunities with the hdd to find 1000 $ in the street etc

9) You do not fill the SSD to capacity (or, at least don't keep it there).
a murphy law - whatever the size of the drive is It will always be filled
closer to the limit (don't know if it is true but I have a few examples for it)
-as a result : time lost with the ssd organizing more frequently a smaller
drive
-time saved with the ssd at antivirus scan due to a smaller garbage
presence
-money saved with the ssd at the electricity bill due to a shorter
antivirus scan and a shorter work period

11) You have your own (or some relative's/boss's) money to burn.
-burning money produce greenhouse gas emissions

 

Thanks for the useful insights Viking!

 

Alternatively:

1.) 2.5" drives are super durable these days, when not on they even lock themselves to prevent damage like a turtle going into its shell. Theo only time its really vulnerable is while its in operation. If your using your laptop while playing tackle football that is your own fault.

Seen 2.5" externals fall to the hard floor and live to tell the tale many times. I hope you never subject your full laptop to a fall like that, and if you do the laptop will take a lot of the shock for the drive anyways so the external had the least chance of living.

5.) Seems to be more of a faulty drive thing or just certain drive models, but possibly design of the laptop. I have owned 6 laptops and none of them have ever had a hdd I can hear or feel in use. I have had a 2.5" drive hooked up externally and I had to put it up to my ear to hear it on and know it was working properly because I was transferring files when changing hdd's and though the drive was dead because it was so dead silent and making no vibrations.

6.) My friend please go read up on sleep and hibernate features, these are even faster than booting from a SSD and much more appropriate if you are having to "shut down" and "restart" dozens of times a day.

9.) Your right Murphy's law "What can go wrong will go wrong" - Get a SSD and lose storage and you very well can have a file or program you need to store and you wont be able too because there is no space. My brand new fresh 128GB C300 is already half full and I have not even installed half of my programs I use for work. Just updating my Adobe programs was a 1GB update! I still have not put my video editor, my video encoder, my Voip Server and tons of other stuff on there. Im affraid all the points you made about energy, virus scan, etc are totally bogus. A virus scan on a full HDD takes no time and the power draw when its happening is incredibly small. You could run virus scan for 24 hours and only probably use $0.50 in energy additional over just letting the system idle. Im the guy that owns a power draw meter and benchmarks laptops with it so yes I know I am not guessing.

11.) SSD is definitely a way to "burn" some money if you want, or you can invest it and do something better with it.

 

How does an SSD improve performance? Let's look at some facts.

Comparing a fast 120GB SSD with a fast 500GB 7200rpm drive, both connected on SATA II*

• Booting is 44% faster
• Opening applications is 163% faster
• Opening applications under stress is 400% faster
• Installing programs is 20% faster
• Disk intensive multi tasking is 36% to 79% faster
• Copying files is 169% faster
• Zipping and unzipping is 22% faster

Depending on how often you do these tasks, an SSD can be a worthwhile investment.

When a notebook has a SATA III connection and SSD, the differences become bigger.

* sources: 1, 2, 3

 

Using % to stress SSD speed can be misleading.

An application takes 2 seconds to open, and a SSD opens it in 1 second. One second is NOTHING not even if you did it 60 times in a full day. But it would be said 200% faster.

I say only with super large applications like say Photoshop is it really matter where 10 seconds can get cut to like 4 seconds. However you only deal with that probably once a day, even on HDD after that its loaded into the RAM and opens basically instantly for the rest of the day, or even more probably is that your keeping it open for the rest of the day until you are done with it.

 

Personally I find it pretty annoying to wait 5 seconds for Firefox to start up. An SSD does it in 1 second.

If you prefer the numbers in time: Intel did that, added up all the seconds over a year and came to 27 hours per year.

Pretty significant if you ask me, even if it's only half of it.

 

5 seconds? I have never had firefox not open instantly for me on any system. I know I said that before and I was told "it just because you do not have an SSD you think its instant" but hey now I have 2, and it opens the same speed, and I still have to wait for websites to load no matter how fast my drive is.

 

Firefox can take pretty long when it's opened cold from a hard drive. The 5 seconds was taken from the Laptopmag review.

 

If you are discouraging people to buy SSDs just because they can "only" open up programs 3 seconds faster, you could might as well tell them to not upgrade their CPUs either. SSDs are one of the components in computers that users will have most boost from. And like Phil`s links said, Ziping files or copying files, you get several minutes faster time with SSDs.

And i think you all forget one important aspect: Money. If money is no issue i don`t understand why people shouldn`t buy SSD instead of harddrives.
Some of the examples you listed up Vicious involved people constantly putting files on and off the SSD. While i do agree that HDDs are better this way, the majority of users will be people who won`t be doing this anyway. For the average joe, SSD will have enough life expentacy to last them 5+ years. That is the life expectancy of the HDDs too.

 

Nice post, Vicious. I agree with you

Yes, pretty much.

I recently purchased an SSD for my notebook b/c I knew I was going to be rebooting it a few times a day and didn't want to wait. As my laptop isn't my main computer, I only keep the necessary programs on it and don't need much storage. My current 200GB HDD is only filled 1/3 with those necessary programs and files.

Now would I buy an SSD for my desktop? Nope.

• My desktop stays on most of the time. I do put it to sleep but the wake up time is only a few seconds.
• Main program I use is Chrome and that usually stays up, and if I do close it it's really quick to open.
• Games I play...i could benefit from the initial loading like in SC, but I would be playing for a couple hours at a time, so waiting an extra 10-15secs isn't a big deal in the long run.
• Don't really install or unzip huge files anything on a regular basis

 

Not sure which firefox you are running. It(firefox 4) loads in 2s or so on my T2350/Scorpio black. That is the first time. the second time onward is 1s or so.

 

The 5 seconds cold boot is from Laptopmag, they used Firefox 3.63 on a Hitachi 7K500.

I use Chrome with SSD. I don't know how fast it starts but it seems instantaneous, the only way I like it.

 

ah ok. older firefox is notoriously slow to load. It does indicate the laptopmag number is a bit outdated(if not already irrelavent).

My firefox/chrome also load close to instantaneous on the black(once they have been used once). The first time is only slightly slower, this also include office and other heavy things like visual studio, expression 4 or netbean.

 

I wouldn't call it irrelevant because Adobe reader and Excel take 8.5 and 7.6 seconds to load on the same 7200rpm hard drive. These are just examples of commonly used programs. That's why I took averages when I said SSDs load programs three times quicker than hard drives.

PS. Photoshop took 42 sec. on their Toshiba Qosmio X505-Q890 with Hitachi 7K500.

 

Chrome is super fast. Probably a second to load on my 7200 RPM. Reason why I left firefox. Haven't looked back

 

I think a lot of people left Firefox for that reason.

Good to hear they finally fixed it. I'm quite happy with Chrome now so don't really see a reason to go back.

 

When I said irrelevant, I mean the program used(programs have improvement as well). My Excel loads in no more than 3 seconds one first run, and instantly second time. This is 2010. 2007 was slightly slower(but not much, no way in 8.5 seconds). 2003 is similar with 2007. I haven't used photoshop for years but only occasionally using GIMP which is slow(and even on SSD it is slow).

No one is disputing that SSD loads faster but as mentioned by Viking/me etc. That only happens for the first time(when it is not in cache). I use sleep/resume so my RAM is not flushed(unlike hibernate/shutdown) and all my frequently used programs are loaded from cache and my last reboot is in Feb(the last Windows update of SP1).

 

The info is in the review: Excel 2010 opening to a 6.5MB spreadsheet filled with 65,000 names and addresses

7200rpm HDD 7.6 sec.
Crucial C300 3.2 sec.

 

I think most users prefer to shut down their computers when they are done with it for the day

 

I know. Though personally I wonder why. Again I am not saying they are doing the wrong thing as different people have different preferences. I hate reboot/shutdown as I lost all my context that no super fast loading can help.

how representative is this kind of spreadsheet ? Being in the financial industry, I deal with Excel in a daily basis and none of the spreadsheet I have seen is used for this kind of thing. Usually they contain complex formulas.

I would say the benchmark is something used to measure how slow(fast) the HDD/SSD is, not something used to measure productivity. Which is understandable but whether it is relavent depends on who look at it.

 

Seems like you keep downplaying the numbers... oh well. To me the numbers show the way it is, without all the personal bias I see here in this thread.

I use hibernate for that. I don't like standby because it causes small wear on the battery.

 

Same here. I use standby during the day and if I need to have it on the go for a longer time, I use hibernate(which does flush my RAM cache which needs to be rebuilt).

And no I am not downplaying the number, I meant the number bears no meaning to me. It is a bit like I can show you how my SSD improve my productivity when I need heavy Visual Studio builds during the day. But for people who is not in my field, it means nothing.

Why I mentioned in other threads as well that these number have to be 'read' and see if they are relavent, each person is different.

 

Vicious, well composed post, and I think conveys most of what many of us who have used SSD's for a while have also thought. Very concise and organized. I made a similar post a while ago, but I won't go into details about where the thread went (south).

Anyhow, I really don't think strictly using a single SSD is an answer for most users since we've all been living with growing storage and hundreds of GB of available storage for cheap. However, an SSD as a boot/common apps drive plus a second fast hard drive for storage and games seems to have the largest benefit for a regular user.

60-64GB drives are affordable now. Still expensive compared with hard drives but under $100 now regularly, some even close to $1/GB. This makes it more realistic, and 60GB is more than adequate for OS and common apps. It will give you a lot better performance than the Momentus XT for not a whole lot more money, and still have a large amount of storage (60GB ~ $100 + 500GB ~ $70).

I use a single SSD in my M11x because I don't carry all my crap on there, but on my main machine, large amounts of storage is a more or less a requirement IMHO.

I will have to say, however, that going from an SSD to a system with a hard drive can be a little painful at times. Kind of like going from high speed 10Mbps internet to 768k DSL. It still works but things don't get done as fast as expected. It's just a matter of habit and usage.

As far as battery life, regular laptops are power hungry. If your machine consumes more than 10-12W, then you will get minimal returns on battery life from an SSD. In the case of a compact notebook or netbook, it can add hours literally to its life.

But SSD's certainly aren't for everyone, and the price is still pretty prohibitive for most people still.

 

It is definitively personal because everyone here probably use his system in a different way. Some people will prefer a hdd and others won't.
You can consider only a few objective figures like opening, closing excel, turning on, shutting down your laptop. It's like looking only to the price you pay to buy a car without looking at what it costs to use it.
But like I've shown in my post, there are hidden cost to own a hdd vs a ssd and the contrary could be true as well. Hidden cost will certainly be different for each one but they will be. It's certainly very difficult to put real figures on these hidden cost like I have tried to do. And even though I succeed it will be deeply personal. I'm sure it must exists a scientific study somewhere on it but then it will certainly be general and won't probably apply to anyone personally (the law of large numbers)

i will resume this law like this : the more general you become (and then more scientific) the less specific you are and then the results tends to apply to no one in particular

an example of this law: you can have one chance over 16 millions of people to win the lottery but if you win this probability has no purpose to u anymore

 

Intel has been trying to put numbers to all the costs, from a business perspective.

 

And personally I find it hard to sell to the CEO/CFOs etc on this 'minutes saved' ground even with Intel's help

Usually, it is easier to sell the SSD if they can be convinced that it is more reliable so a reduced IT support cost becomes real.

The question is usually 'show me the money' and showing that the last disk crash of XXX's notebook took 1 day to restore will usually do it.

 

Good to have some data
I'm wondering how many people have their main drive half full. My intel x25E-60GB has definitively only 20% space left

 

50G on my 80G x-25m. This is a work machine so no games, no video, no music, no picture but VM, database, outlook, Excel etc.

I never outrun my stock HDD(which is usually quite small).

 

what is your secret?

 

I believe it is just that I am not using the computer for entertainment purpose(games, video, picture)

Used to be quite serious about photography but that was the day when I was still using film and scanner so each photo cost a lot(and have to be treated very seriously before pressing the button), unlike nowadays where one can snap 1000 shots(no direct cost consequence) and keep one.

I think my personal matters(i.e. created by me, photos exlcuded) can easily be fit into a 256MB flash. 90%+ of the stuff are grabbed from some where else(which overtime would lose its value and can be deleted).

 

256MB? Or GB?

 

256MB. Truly valuable things to me are mostly text based and take not much space(and response nicely to zip). The mentioned photos have been archived I believe on one or two DVD.

EDIT:
That is also why I don't look at SSD in the $/GB matrix as I know I would never exceed the size I can get. A 150 bucks 80G SSD vs 60 bucks 500G HDD is only 90 dollars different and if it is for a new machine, I would definitely pay for it.

 

Reliability

And what happens when you get so disgusted with waiting for your old-school hard drive to boot that you just plotz, throwing your notebook on the floor and stomping on it? Your data disappears, all your work is lost, and you’re left looking like the putz you are.

Now, if you had an SSD, this wouldn’t happen for two reasons. First, you wouldn’t be tempted to throw your notebook on the floor and stomp on it. And, even if someone else stomped on the computer and smashed it to pieces, the drive would probably survive.

I'm not so sure if what they say is correct here from the link above. I even suspect the opposite.

If I look at some studies,
Drivers tend to have more accident in a closer range of their home
Drivers tend to take more risk in a more secure car.

From that I would say that there are chances that ssd owners feeling more secure about the reliability of their drive will take more risk with their laptop which is not more shock-proof only the drive inside is.
But sure I have no proof of that

 

^ nice observation.

 

But SSD which is just chips is very unlikely to be damaged by shock or physical activities. that is, the notebook may have been completely busted, the data should be intact.

I thought there are 'tests'(i.e. youtube style, not scentific) that one can drive pass an USB flash and it is still usable ?

Water however is a completely different thing so you may be right that by giving people the sense that their SSD is invincible, they may drop it into the lake and expecting it to survive.

 

The only numbers I am aware of are the ones in the Intel study. Intel published a study of SSD deployments in thousands of laptops. Turned out the failure rate for HDDs was something like 4,5%, for SSDs it was 0.6%.

I tried finding the study online but couldn't.

 

I'm wondering if we could find the number of laptops with a ssd inside sent for repair or at least compare the number of laptops sent for repair during the last let's say 3 years (more chance to have a ssd inside) and compare it with the number of laptops sent for repair between 6 and 3 years ago. It would be a basic approximation but could give us an idea

I'm wondering what causes are behind this 0.6% ssd failure rate