new IdeaPad Y580 owner, worried about heat issues (SSD questions also)

So my new Y580 is supposed to arrive tomorrow. I got it for the i7-3610 and the great screen. It is rather diffuclt to find certain available combinations without getting a strange bump in price. Anyway, my primary concerns are heat related, and my desire to go with an SSD.

1. I don't game. I'll be using full CPU-load type stuff though, i.e. handbrake and makemkv, as I am taking my entire collection of BluRays and DVDs and digitizing them into 2 files - one for viewing on our TVs, the other for viewing on handheld devices.

2. I would like to go with a 256-GB SSD, but I'm unsure what type to buy. I've looked and if I understand things, I have a pair of options:

a) Remove the BluRay drive, install in the BluRay drive bay
b) Buy an mSATA


Ultimately, I'd like to have the 1TB as a storage drive and the 256GB SSD as the boot drive with all apps loaded. I also would prefer to keep the bluRay drive as is, for convenience (and $$$) sakes so I don't have to worry about buying an external BluRay drive. However, I've read a lot about heat issues, and I'm a bit worried, as I just had a brand new HP dv7t-QE die on me due to, what i believe, was heat related issues from the heavy CPU load apps I was running.

Also, what I think I know is that the mSATA are more expensive and only do 3 gb/s instead of 6 or whatever (SATA-2 vs. 3?)

if that is the case, why pay more for a slower HDD?

just trying to get some definitive rcommendations with specific heat concerns since I will run a heavy CPU load almost all the time.

 

I replaced the HD with a Samsung 830 SSD since I wanted to keep the optical drive. My HD temperatures stay reasonable (max is usually 47C) under heavy load (i.e. heavy gaming, video editing, etc.). My coworker on the other hand who also has a Y580, installed a Crucial 128GB mSATA and moved the HD that came with his laptop to the optical drive since he didn't use it very often and wanted the extra storage. He's getting a little bit lower temperatures than I am, and I think this is the best option if you want to avoid high temps.

I owned an HP DV6T QE for a few weeks, but ended up returning it because of the bad build quality and the high temps. Compared to the HP, I believe the Y580 has much better cooling, especially if you replace the HD with an SSD, or move the HD to the optical drive.

 

Buy a SSD (preferably Samsung 830) and place it in the HDD bay. Move the 1 TB over to the ODD bay using a 12.7mm SATA to SATA HDD caddy (find one on ebay).

Buy an enclosure for the Bluray writer ( Newegg.com - BYTECC DVD-100U3 Plastic Black USB 3.0 USB 3.0 External Slim O.D.D. Enclosure for Slim-SATA O.D.D. Devices). This enclosure burns BD-R's just fine for me even though the included USB 3.0 cable was crap (had to get a new cable). Still, read the reviews on the ODD enclosure to see if this is what you want.

Here's another option for an external ODD ( USB 3.0 External Enclosure for Optical Drive (12.7 mm SATA) [slimSATA-USB-C16] - $25.95 : NewmodeUS, Hard Drive Caddys for Notebooks). Both are about the price for a BD-R spindle (~$25).

 

This option will is more convenient than moving the HDD to the ODD bay. And this also keeps your Blue-Ray drive bay.

Buy a 256GB mSATA SSD. On average they're around $40 to $50 more expensive but a lot of mSATA's are less than 1GB/dollar now. Install the mSATA 256GB and you won't need to move either the HDD or Blue Drives at all. You also won't need to buy a caddy so you're barely spending more money on this option than the other option of moving drives around (especially if you end up needing to buy an external blue-ray drive or adapter). Install your OS on the SSD and you can use the 1TB HDD as storage. Go to power management and set the HDD to spin down after a certain amount of time when not in use. (ie. 1 minute). This will stop your HDD from heating up as much since it won't be working at all.

Someone in the Y580 owner's thread does this and his highest HDD temperature is 47 degrees celcius. Then again you're doing CPU intensive applications so it may still get hot. This is just a suggestion though.

 

wow, great suggestions, thanks a ton gents!

now, the mSATA is obviously the most convenient option, and with the lack of need to purchase caddies or external enclosures, price is no longer an issue.

what about mSATA speed? I had read that they only do the 3 GB/s MSATA 2.0 or something, instead of 3.0. or is it perhaps the mSATA connection of the computer itself? Basically, will the mSATA run at the same speed as the regular SSD?

EDIT - ok, so
everything I'm reading now seems to indicate that the mSATA's have the full 6GB/s speeds, so now...

Mushkin Atlas 240GB mSATA SSD Review - Top Performance at an Unbeatable Price - The SSD Review

this looks like a pretty good blend of performance and price, yes?

 

Here's a link for the guy who used this solution from the Owner's Thread. http://forum.notebookreview.com/ideapad-essential/672154-y580-owners-thread-135.html

It's just so you can see what he got. He did it after an hour of Skyrim which puts some load on the CPU. And for him it was only 44 degrees after an hour. I'm just a little worried since the Y580 is set up so that the HDD is in between the GPU and CPU so the heating up of either component heats up the HDD. I'm just wondering what CPU temps do you get? Just to make sure this is the right option for you. But if your applications and OS are all the SSD then I wouldn't even worry about it since the mSATA is a good distance away from these 2 components. Especially if you're mainly going to only use the SSD. And even if something happens to your HDD, you should still have everything since the HDD is just storage. My 2 cents.

And the Mushkin is a really good SSD. The mSATA port in the Y580 is the mSATA III port so the rates are up to 6GB/s. I'd recommend it or the Crucial M4.

 

wow, voozers, that's somethng I hadn't thought of. Perhaps the mSATA is really the best and most reliable option due to the distance and reduced heat issues. The HDD would be used purely for storage, I'd install everything on the SSD, and like I said, I don't game, so the GPU shouldn't really heat up much at all, if ever.

 

Not using the GPU should cut the heat 40% since most of people's heating complaints (haven't seen anyone actually say they've had failures due to heating yet) is due to the HDD being between the CPU and GPU. Not using the GPU, your computer should probably hold up fine.