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    mSata Cache Drive.

    Discussion in 'Sager and Clevo' started by Bofonic, Apr 24, 2012.

  1. Bofonic

    Bofonic Notebook Consultant

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    I was browsing Mythologic's site and saw they offer mSata drives!

    I just had a few questions (as i've never heard of mSata before that!)

    First of all what exactly is it? and....

    If I were to get the 32GB and use it for a cache drive with a 500GB 7200 RPM Sata would that offer significantly better performance then the Momentus 750GB 8GB Flash Cache?
     
    Bofonic, Apr 24, 2012
    #1
  2. Anthony@MALIBAL

    Anthony@MALIBAL Company Representative

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    Yes, you'll get better performance than a hybrid drive. The mSATA is generally faster, and you'll have more space to work with than the 8GB on the hybrid. However, unlike a regular SSD you're still not going to be able to manually install things to the flash- it's going to be automatic. For that reason, you may also want to consider a larger mSATA drive (80GB or 120GB) and just using that as your primary boot drive with a standard HDD installed as your storage drive. You'll get overall better performance and you can decide what programs are installed on flash or HDD that way.
     
    Anthony@MALIBAL, Apr 24, 2012
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  3. Heihachi_1337

    Heihachi_1337 Notebook Deity

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    The mSATA is just a much smaller drive than the standard 2.5-inch drive. They are made to fit into a mini-PCIe form factor slot that has to be designed specifically for the mSATA drive, but it is the same type of slot as the wireless adapter uses.

    You can see what they look like here http://www.newegg.com/Product/ProductList.aspx?Submit=ENE&DEPA=0&Order=BESTMATCH&N=-1&isNodeId=1&Description=mSATA+SSD&x=0&y=0

    To give you an idea of the size, they are about 2 US Quarters in length and just a little wider than a US Quarter.

    As Anthony has stated, you should see a better speed advantage than the Seagate hybrid drive offers.
     
    Heihachi_1337, Apr 24, 2012
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  4. greenkoopa

    greenkoopa Notebook Enthusiast

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    Hello. I'm a newbie here and I was wondering about mSata drives as well.

    Would there be any benefit to using the hybrid Seagate drive as my primary with an mSata drive as a cache drive? Would that cause any conflict?
     
    greenkoopa, Apr 30, 2012
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  5. A_Grounded_Pilot

    A_Grounded_Pilot Notebook Consultant

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    Related question - if one could swing the cash for an SSD that would be sufficient for all of his wildest storage dreams, would there be any advantage to also having an mSATA on board?
     
    A_Grounded_Pilot, Apr 30, 2012
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  6. Anthony@MALIBAL

    Anthony@MALIBAL Company Representative

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    Not really, unless the small amount of extra space is worthwhile. They're generally quite expensive per gigabyte and limited in size. Even a midrange current 2.5" SSD will blow them out of the water in terms of performance and price/GB.
     
    Anthony@MALIBAL, Apr 30, 2012
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  7. E.Blar

    E.Blar Notebook Deity

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    During Xotic's video review of the P150EM, they said it had a 120GB intel 520 and an 80GB intel mSATA, and it went a lot faster. Maybe you should ask them about this.
     
    E.Blar, Apr 30, 2012
    #7