np9262 combo ssd (ocz core) and hdd

Hey Everyone,

alright so i'm browsing xoticpc, finetuning and drooling over the np9262, when i notice they now offer the ocz core ssd at 128gb. as soon as i see the price i'm like YAY!

but here's my question... i need a lot of hard drive space, and 3 ssd 128gb would set me back around 1200 bucks, so instead i thought i would get one or two ssds and a 320 gb 7200 rpm (16mb cache). if i do choose this option, would it affect boot times or shutdown times, performance, resistance to shock? basically, since i have 3 hard drive slots, should it be all ssd, or all hdd?

im open to any suggestions or improvements, (maybe leave one empty and upgrade later if they come out with a 256gb?)

but for right now im set to get two ssd 128gb in raid 0, and a 320gb 7200rpm for storing my music, which would occupy 90% of it...

one final note, i use my current laptop to dj, so when i get the np9262 and have my music on the 320gb hard drive, will it degrade any performance or latency when running the program (on the ssd) using the files on the hdd?

thanks a lot guys

 

How soon do you need it? 400gb and 500gb models are coming...

If you really want three HDD's, I'd get one 64gb SSD to store the OS and critical apps on, and the other two HDD's to store music, etc.

That will be the cheapest option that gives almost the max storage (using 128gb ssd would be max, but 200 more).

 

alright i like that option... if i also want to do some gaming, i'll probably want the 128gb to hold games like racedriver:grid, cod4, and crysis right? i mean, i don't want to uninstall games everytime i buy i a new one.

but will the combo ssd and hdd degrade the performance of boot up and performance or is it insignificant of drives that don't hold that information?

finally, the 500gb sounds appealing (do u know if it's 5400rpm or 7200rpm?)... im getting the laptop in aug/sep timeframe, so i have a bit of time to stare at the laptop from user reviews

thanks for your post

 

64gb should be sufficient unless you want a lot of games on there at once (how many do you need, really?) or you have a lot of applications you want high performance out of.

The boot up performance will be based solely on the SSD since that is your OS drive, so the others won't matter.

The 500gb is 5400rpm, and is available now for a little under 300. That should drop as more merchants start to offer it.

 

interesting you know what thanks man you've given me some good advice. thanks

 

A good thing to note is just because these drives exist doesn't mean sager resellers will offer them anytime soon. Also, remember that the np9262 will be like 12 or 13 pounds whereas the 5796 will be around 9. If you are a DJ, I assume you'd want the lighter one. If storage is an issue, get an external USB drive (which you can get up to 1TB last I checked) and you're golden.

 

yea i understand they wont sell them anytime soon, but xoticpc has them set for 25 july, long before the 9800m gtx, so i'm waiting until the gpu is out, although i just researched samsung apparently they're comin out with 256gb ssd, which is an option for the future.

i thought of an external, and i already use a 1tb western digital my book and it runs at 7200rpm. its really good, the only problem is that it falls asleep if not in use for 10 min. and when i load a track, it takes about 4 sec to spool up.

plus, i don't like having to carry it around as it's pretty fragile and needs it's own power cord, and i have all my other movies and tv stuff. i've considered a bus powered drive, firewire connection, but then i'd need a laptop with two firewire connections, cause my ext soundcard is firewire.

plus, the extra weight doesn't really bother me, and i like the longevity factor of quad cores and dual gpu option, even if i'm gettin a single 9800m gtx, and finally, i love the cooling system on the np5962, especially from all the reviews. the np5796 got good reviews about the cooling system, but four fans is an added bonus for me...

thanks

 

sorry i mean i love the cooling system of the np9262... these numbers get confusing

 

Get dual 9800m gt's over a single gtx any day

256gb ssd is coming, but will be really expensive. You also need to pay attention to the type of flash technology (SLC vs MLC). Basically, is the drive made up of single or multiple layers. SLCs are faster and last longer, but are more expensive.

 

I just ordered from xotic a 9262 w/ 2 - 64Gb SSD in RAID 0 (for O/S & program files) and have a Seagate 250Gb Momentus 7200.3 (for data files) on the way from online vendor.

My thinking was this - I don't game, only software architecture/business intelligence work. I have the need for FAST loading operating system and program files with relatively small storage requirements combined with data files with large storage requirements.

Two configs I considered -
(1) two 64Gb SSD drives, no RAID, primary drive for O/S and second drive for Program Files, and a third mechanical drive for data files
(2) two 64Gb SSD drives, in RAID 0, for O/S and Program Files, and a second (logically speaking) mechanical drive for data files.

I went for config (2) because the performance numbers for a single SSD is not that spectacular imo. I see READ numbers between 50 & 100 Mb/s. The RAID 0 seemed the logical choice, if I want O/S & Program File READ numbers above 100Mb/s (and 64Gb is enough total storage space for those files) along with the Seagate 250Gb mechanical drive for low cost and (reasonable) mechanical drive performance for the massive data files.

The (expected) reliability of the two 64Gb SDD drives eases all my already low level concerns about crashing the RAID 0 array (if I had chosen mechanical drives), and even if they do crash, I can always reload O/S and program files from source disk/updates. My data lives on stored on the Seagate and my external backup drive.

 

nice choice, i think i like the comment about the slc vs mlc, i've heard about it before, but haven't seen any info about the difference, ill definately keep that in mind, the one thing i hear that troubles me is all this crashing from ssds. i mean, don't all drives eventually fail? how is the life expectancy of an ssd vs hdd? i've had my laptop for 3 years now and the hdd is still working fine, does the ssd usually not last that long or what?

finally, i also liked the raid 0 comment, i thought that raid was simply a way of combining the two drives into one, but it also improves performance? too cool.

i'm gonna be browsing benchmarks and opinions about the ocz core series and other ssd drives. i want to get the absolute fastest one out there, even if it's not the ocz... cause i can always swap it out. but first i need to touch up on the benchmark names they use like burst speed and all that good stuff.

i have to say i'm not that well-versed in the language of hard drive components and benchmarking but i'm here to learn.

 

RAID 0 (striped disks) distributes data across several disks in a way which gives improved speed and full capacity, but all data on all disks will be lost if any one disk fails. (which mean if you have 2 x 64gb you will see one 128gb and theorically you have twice the speed and twice the chance of a hard drive failure)

RAID 1 (mirrored disks) uses two (possibly more) disks which each store the same data, so that data is not lost so long as one disk survives. Total capacity of the array is just the capacity of a single disk. The failure of one drive, in the event of a hardware or software malfunction, does not increase the chance of a failure or decrease the reliability of the remaining drives (second, third, etc). (if you have 2x64gb you will see only 64gb but you have twice less chance of losing your info but i'm not sure if it affect the performance)

Source wikipedia, correct me if im wrong