Question about Sager SSD options

Hi, I got a question about choosing a SSD drive for my Sager laptop. I don't know much about these stuff so can somebody explain to me what is the difference between choosing a primary hard drive for SSD versus choosing a SSD drive as mSATA?

If I want Windows to run on SSD do I choose "mSATA SSD Drive configured as an OS Drive ( Primary Drive C: )?"

If so, what is the purpose of a primary hard drive?

Also, if I choose a SSD for my primary hard drive and choose a regular HDD as as secondary hard drive, will they automatically install windows on the SSD? If so, what is the purpose of choosing "mSATA SSD Drive configured as an OS Drive ( Primary Drive C: )?"

Lastly, do Sager pre-install Windows or do they just send you the disk for you to install?

Thanks a lot.

 

hi
if you order a operating system with your build then its good to go out of the box with OS and drivers all loaded.

i just ordered a 512 ssd and its plenty of space and the prices have now dropped.
12 second boot up compared to roughly 30 seconds for a spindle drive.

havnt got a msata as when i ordered it was only sataII so i cant advise on that.

 

If you're going to get a SSD its best to not get a mSATA because of the different SATA port speeds. The mSATA is SATA II and primary hard drive bay SATA III so you'll get faster speeds going with just a SSD. The mSATA option is nice if you were to get a regular HDD in the primary bay.

If you get a SSD in primary and HDD in secondary and no mSATA yes the OS will be install on the SSD.

If you add Windows to your build it will be installed and a disc included.

 

If you want to keep your CD-Rom Drive, get the Msata which will give you many of the benefits of an SSD. (MSata is limited to SATA II Speeds) if you dont care about a CD-Drive then get an SSD and HDD combo.

You would install Windows and applications you want on the SSD drive, and put non essential programs and data (Movies, music, documents..) on the Hard Drive.


From Best to Worst, SSD > Msata > HDD

I dont reccomend putting windows on an HDD any more, get the SSD or MSATA its world better than a normal Hard Drive it would be dumb to still use one these days with SSD/MSATA drives so cheap now.

 

mSATA is basically a solid state drive on a stick that somewhat resembles a RAM DIMM. For my NP9170 build, I opted to go for mSATA just for the OS so the boot times and loading programs will be fast, and then I got two spinning 750GB drives in RAID1 for all my files and what not. You can check out speed comparisons of the individual devices on various websites, and I'd highly recommend getting a SDD one way or another. The benefit of going with mSATA is you still have one (or two) slots open for other HDDs if you choose to upgrade later.

 

Quick mSATA SSD is good to use as transparent cache for Intel Smart Response (SRT), it will automatically keep most frequently used data from your hard drive(s) on the SSD for max access speed, and its entirely transparent - as you will see everything as being on HDD. Works with HDD raid too.

 

Msata is going to have a big impact (or rather it's successor) on small systems in the next generation I think, certainly as the drives cost and speeds become more reasonable.

 

Once Haswell comes out which can support more the 2 SATA III ports they will be really nice.

 

Aye, and to second Hutsady, I agree as well that Haswell will contribute the biggest leaps for netbooks with added energy efficiency, and then some for notebooks with greater sATA III support.

 

Wait, can you explain what you mean when you say "if you want to keep your CD-Rom Drive?"

Are you saying if I get a SSD primary and HDD secondary combo, I can't have a CD-Rom Drive? So no blu-ray/DVD media tray?

Thanks!

 

it depends on the machine u have in mind to buy. the 15" model would support a regular ssd/hdd and one msata drive with an option to swap the optical drive with a second regular sized hdd/ssd. compared to that, the 17" model sports two ports for regular sized hdds/ssds and a msata port, so u can keep the optical drive and run two 2.5" regular ssds/hdds

edit: was talking about the p150em and p170em models here. other models may differ.

Sent from my Galaxy Nexus using Tapatalk 2

 

It depends. Some models only have one dedicated storage drive bay, so some people will purchase a caddy that they can fit another drive into, and install that in the optical drive bay (thus removing the optical drive).

If you go that route but still want your optical drive, you can purchase a slimline sATA to USB adapter/cable to continue to use the drive as an external peripheral.

Edit: jaybee beat me to it by a nose hair.

 

and thats why i went for a 512gb ssd on my P150EM. msataII was slightly slower and didnt want to lose my drive. with a boot up of 12 seconds who could complain. i would of got the samsung (holy crap its fast) drive but when i bought it was only a 256gb available.

 

I did the same, but some people prefer more space for lot less cost.

 

270MB/sec with high small file transfer rates, is going to be more than fine for most people, I ran just an mSATA drive for some time and it was fine, windows loads fast, while it does not benchmark as well, its perfectly fine.

We get a little too hung up on the highest numbers in this case IMO which is a lot like CPU frequency.

I would rather have a fast for small file drive like the intel 525 in a SATA II mSATA than a 2.5" drive with slower small file speeds but higher straight line speed in a SATA III bay.

 

Thanks for all the answers.

So can I say the consensus is that if the laptop supports multiple drives and money is not an issue, the best option for fast performance is SSD primary and HDD secondary but if the laptop doesn't support that, the best option is SSD mSATA, HDD primary?

 

if money is not an issue, go all out SSD in RAID plus mSATA for the heck of it

but right, u summed it up fine

 

If you only have one hard drive bay and dont need a lot of storage space i'd skip the mSATA totally and get just a SSD. I will be faster then the mSATA. Or if you dont need the optical drive put a HDD in there for storage.

 

If you absolutely want the most space and money was not an issue I would have a 500GB M500 mSATA housing my OS and then two 960GB SSDs, one in the primary bay and one in the secondary (optical) bay, the primary bay would hold data that needs to be accessed the most and the secondary bay would be a support with the Msata holding some of the other programs you may need.

 

You could also have an external disk drive perpetually tethered to your system, but even the USB 3 drives don't perform at USB 3 data transfer speeds due to mechanical drive limitations. So yeah, I agree with Hutsady in terms of practical purpose, and agree with Meaker if you want a system that will take over the world.

 

Depends if you put an SSD in a USB 3 caddy, but that does get a little silly.