Are SSDs the new RAM for boosting system performance?

RAM was once the king of the system performance boost. Now, there's a new kid in town that's usurping the throne: SSDs.

SSDs are the new performance panacea. But, when SSDs first hit the scene a few years ago, we hated them. They were small--too small to be useful and too slow for anything but Netbooks. Technology took hold and now SSDs are our new heroes. They are the new RAM. Still a little pricey for widespread consumer use; servers, high-end laptops and ultrabooks come equipped with them. And, they're fast. They're cool. Sure, they're cool in the vernacular sense of the word but they're also cool in the Fahrenheit/Celsius sense too. No moving parts means cooler temps and cooler laps under them. My favorite thing to say about SSDs is that, "They toil not and neither do they spin."

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Are SSDs the new RAM for boosting system performance? | ZDNet

 

[azasadny]

I have 2 PC's with SSD's as the primary drive and they are both incredibly fast and stable! One system is an Intel-D2700MUD Atom-based system with 4GB of RAM and Windows7x86 and my main PC, which is an Intel DG43GT with 4GB of RAM and Windows 7x64. I have Windows tuned to be most efficient with the SSD's and the systems are both noticeably faster than they were with 7200rpm hard drives...

 

[dirtyvu]

I use a Gigabyte S1080 with a Samsung 830 128GB SSD as my mobile unit. The Hitachi SATA III 320GB HDD that came with the tablet, and running Ready Boost, provides much the same overall performance as does the tablet with SSD.

I also have a Dell XPS Studio dual screen desktop, with regular HDDs.

not sure what to say. did you check that SSD typical settings are enabled?

12 SSD tips to optimise your drive's performance | News | TechRadar

of those tips, the ones most needed are:

TRIM and AHCI. Now, the OS has to be installed fresh on the SSD for optimum settings. If you install first on the HDD and then transfer the image to the SSD, the Windows configuration will not be optimal. It'll just install the SSD as a new device without changing Windows configuration much.

also make sure that you update the firmware of your SSD. and don't forget to install the ssd utilities that come from your SSD manufacturer. use this for maintenance of your drive rather than your typical HDD utilities.


but even if you didn't configure optimally for the SSD, you should've still seen a dramatic improvement with the SSD. you should also check if BIOS settings are optimal as well.

 

[Ray8]

I've done all of that. I especially researched all available reviews, guides, etc to ensure that I had the SSD running optimally. All of the issues listed in your link have been addressed. The Samsung SSD magician also provides setup procedures to ensure maximum performance of the SSD and they have been noted as well. From the Windows Experience Index, the SSD gets a score of 7.7, that's probably as good as it can get, but the overall WEI is 3.0.

 

[mwhals]

Would it be worth upgrading to a new ssd on a sata 2 mainboard ? As far as what I see on the net, ssd drives performs slower on sata 2 mainboards.

The reason is because SSDs are faster than SATA II, meaning they are bottlenecked. That is why they seem slower on SATA II when compared to SATA III.

Even with that, an SSD will blow away a spinner on a SATA II controller. The spinner doesn't come close to saturating a SATA II connection.

 

[jbfoster]

SSD drives are great. I have a low end ($350) HP laptop. I didn't like to use it much because it took forever to boot and use once booted. I picked up a 64GB SSD drive off Craigslist for $30 and put it my laptop. Dam, what a difference in both boot time and general use. WinRaR runs a lot faster.

SSD drive are still to pricey so I just got a 120GB for my C: drive and regular drive for my data.

 

[mwhals]

I wouldn't put data on a SSD, because there are no failure warnings. I strictly use then for applications and windows.

 

[dirtyvu]

I've done all of that. I especially researched all available reviews, guides, etc to ensure that I had the SSD running optimally. All of the issues listed in your link have been addressed. The Samsung SSD magician also provides setup procedures to ensure maximum performance of the SSD and they have been noted as well. From the Windows Experience Index, the SSD gets a score of 7.7, that's probably as good as it can get, but the overall WEI is 3.0.

yeah, don't know why your system is misbehaving then.

 

[Ray8]

yeah, don't know why your system is misbehaving then.

The system is not misbehaving, it's working perfectly and quite fast overall. All I'm saying is that I haven't experienced dramatic performance or power savings increases, and from what I've been able to find out, I think that it's reasonably normal for the system that I have. You can put a powerful engine in a car, but if the brakes and suspension don't match the engine performance, then you can't drive the car to its maximum potential.

 

[pparks1]

yeah, don't know why your system is misbehaving then.

The system is not misbehaving, it's working perfectly and quite fast overall. All I'm saying is that I haven't experienced dramatic performance or power savings increases, and from what I've been able to find out, I think that it's reasonably normal for the system that I have. You can put a powerful engine in a car, but if the brakes and suspension don't match the engine performance, then you can't drive the car to its maximum potential.

I never noticed any quantifiable power savings with SSD drives.

 

[gazz9496]

got an ssd, will never go back to a spinner as my main os drive, the performance difference was noticable right away and i don't mean boot times.

obvious read write speed improvments
applications load in next to no time at all.

oh and don't be so hasty to discount ssd's as being more reliable than spinners, check some of the warranty's on new spinning disks and there power on time before failure, seagate 3tb drive has a 1 year warranty and 100 days max of power on before failure can occur opened 5 in the last month 3 dead on arrival, that's not much use and many other spinners are coming out with similar low warranty periods which makes you question how reliable the new ones are.

i've got some mech drives that have been working for the last 6+ years with no faults and i've seen my fair share of broken mech drives from completly shattered platters to unreadable because it fell 6 inches and bounced while turned on.

mech drives have almost flawless reliability as long as you never ever move it...which i'd love to say is true but my netbook get's tossed about no end every day and still works fine after a few years...always confused me that has.

 

[dirtyvu]

I never noticed any quantifiable power savings with SSD drives.

I agree. I don't know anyone that says SSDs have power savings. In fact, on one of my laptops, the battery drains faster while asleep with the SSD than the HDD.

@ray8... you can argue til you're blue in the face. your experience is not what most people are seeing. to say that your experience is the typical experience is just not matching the anectdotal evidence.

 

[Ray8]

@ray8... you can argue til you're blue in the face. your experience is not what most people are seeing. to say that your experience is the typical experience is just not matching the anectdotal evidence.

I'm not suggesting or arguing that others are not experiencing, or cannot experience, performance improvements. All I'm saying is that with my specific tablet, I haven't experienced dramatic improvements.

 

[mcnulty]

I can only say I invested quite a bit of money on a Samsung 830 256GB and I don't want to touch any laptop using a mechanical drive anymore. Ever.

As for reliability, you're supposed to have backups anyway if you value your data, no matter how reliable you think your current drive is.

 

[jbfoster]

People will perceive the same thing differently. I encode movies and work with rar files . I have noticed a big difference in the amount of time it takes to get things done. If all I do is open up Firefox and browse then I don't see much difference. Anything that is hard drive intensive you should see a good boost in performance.

 

[Ray8]

People will perceive the same thing differently. I encode movies and work with rar files . I have noticed a big difference in the amount of time it takes to get things done. If all I do is open up Firefox and browse then I don't see much difference. Anything that is hard drive intensive you should see a good boost in performance.

I use such things as Photoshop, Word, Excel etc (though not intensively) and I haven't noticed significant performance differences. There has most definitely not been a quantum leap in performance. Without a doubt, if I installed the SSD in my PC, then I'd expect a major improvement.

 

[jbfoster]

People will perceive the same thing differently. I encode movies and work with rar files . I have noticed a big difference in the amount of time it takes to get things done. If all I do is open up Firefox and browse then I don't see much difference. Anything that is hard drive intensive you should see a good boost in performance.

I use such things as Photoshop, Word, Excel etc (though not intensively) and I haven't noticed significant performance differences. There has most definitely not been a quantum leap in performance. Without a doubt, if I installed the SSD in my PC, then I'd expect a major improvement.

I don't think you would notice much difference with those apps.

 

[jbfoster]

I bought a 120GB SSD drive for 85 on sale from newegg.com for my desktop. I also got a 64GB off Craigslist for $40 for my laptop. I have noticed a difference in both of them. For me it was well worth the money. I can't see anyone putting one of these drives in and not noticing a difference. If not something must be wrong......

 

[Ray8]

People will perceive the same thing differently. I encode movies and work with rar files . I have noticed a big difference in the amount of time it takes to get things done. If all I do is open up Firefox and browse then I don't see much difference. Anything that is hard drive intensive you should see a good boost in performance.

I use such things as Photoshop, Word, Excel etc (though not intensively) and I haven't noticed significant performance differences. There has most definitely not been a quantum leap in performance. Without a doubt, if I installed the SSD in my PC, then I'd expect a major improvement.

I don't think you would notice much difference with those apps.

My understanding was that such programs should run faster, but as I said, my guess is that the overall system capability must be there as well. There's certainly nothing wrong with the drive, the setup or the system.

 

[jbfoster]

All read time are faster so software should load up and start faster. How much faster not sure.

 

[Kat]

When (if) I can get a terabyte of RELIABLE storage for under $50, I'll consider.

NOT until.

This whole SSD deal is a RORT.

Bit like Win 8....