solid state memory?

[RVcrazy]

We are getting ready to order a new computer to replace hubby's XP. We are considering a Dell 1700 Inspiron. I notice that some of the other computers they offer for more $ have solid state memory as a part of the memory offered. What is it, why do I want it & is it worth the $. In the RV & moving around, we will not be able to stream DVDs. We are looking for it to primarily store pictures & some word & excel files. Your thoughts?

[TheBearAK]

Keeping this simple for the RV crowd...

SSD has 3 main advantages:

1. Faster - transfers happen at near the speed of the SATA interface.
2. Durable - no moving parts
3. Uses less battery

The main disadvantage that everyone knows about, is cost.

Another disadvantage that I am seeing is they rarely warn you when they fail and when they fail it isn't a simple put it on another computer and run a recovery program to try and recover things. Most of the time they die completely, just stop working. This isn't 100%, but in my experience it is pretty close.




Also worth mentioning are hybrid drives. Hybrids are both SSD and spinning disk. They are more durable than a pure spinning drive, but not near as durable as a pure SSD. They are almost as fast as SSD, and offer large capacities for a low cost.

[strollin]

I ended up ordering the Samsung 840 EVO 500G ssd. The cheapest I could find it online was at Amazon for $260. I had a $200 gift card for a different retailer that sells it for $313 so went to the local store to ask them to price match so that the drive would only cost me $60 + tax. I am friendly with the mgr there and after a little price juggling by him, I ended up with the drive on order along with a Square Trade extended warranty for $209.25. After my $200 gift card was applied it cost me a whopping $9.25 out of pocket! Such a deal!

[LarryJM]

What I did was put in a 250GB Samsung SDD and bought a CD Sata Drive Enclosure and put my existing HDD into that so I have both the SDD and a higher capacity (650GB in my case) normal HDD drive for storage. In fact what I do is about every month or two I move all my data files from the 650GB drive to one of my external HDD and make a clone of the SDD onto the 650GB drive and them put the data files back on the 650GB drive. That way I have a clone type back up readily available should the need occur.

Larry

[wintersun]

The SSD removes on of the two devices that consume the most energy on a laptop, the hard drive with its high RPM motor (the other is the LCD display which is dimmable to extend the battery charge).

Windows is an archaic operating system that needs all the help it can get and having it load from a SSD helps a lot if you boot your computer frequently. If not it is a nice upgrade that provides zero benefit while using a word processor or spreadsheet application or while browsing or using email.

My wife bought a new Lenovo netbook and go it with the SSD as she will boot up while we are at an airport or on the road and stopping for food or fuel and it saves time when used in this manner. All she wants to do is check our business related email and then shut the netbook back down.

At home if you boot the computer once a day a SSD buys you very little. For the additional cost you could later buy a replacement hard drive for the laptop. And I have dealt with thousands of users laptops over the years and never had one with a drive failure. Usually the display ribbon or some other part fails that is soldered into the motherboard and it is cheaper now to replace the entire laptop if it is out of the warranty period.

By the way, Dell is the most predatory company you will find in the USA. No electronics company other than Intel has been more aggressive in moving as many jobs outside the USA as possible. If you need help with your laptop you will be talking to someone in India. With Lenovo if you need tech support you will be talking to a former IBM employee in Atlanta, GA. Even if Lenovo products were not better than Dell (and I have dealt with their products and tech support or lack thereof since 1990) I would still choose to support them with my money.

[mlts22]

Good info as well. To boot, the mentioned "dual" drive only comes in one model. If it came with 500 gigs of SSD and 2 TB of HDD, it would be more appealing since the entire OS, applications, and data could go on the SSD, and the HDD part be used solely for backups.

For a laptop, I'd go with a SSD, but I'd also make sure to have a backup program and an external HDD. Unlike a spinning disk that can get data recovered, a SSD, once it dies, it is -dead-. No way of recovering anything, no way, no how. So, it is good to have backups to different media. (On my MacBook, I use an external hard disk for immediate backups. Documents are backed up via Mozy. Sensitive documents get stashed in a Apple Disk Image drive that is stored on Google Drive, so the only thing Google's servers see is a series of 8 megabyte encrypted "bands".)

[OhhWell]

strollin wrote:

mlts22 wrote:
... What I might look into as a drive upgrade on a laptop is the WD Black2, which is a 1TB HDD and a 120 GB SSD, both in one physical unit. This way, the OS and critical applications can go on the SSD, while everything else winds up on the HDD.

I was looking into one of these as well since it sounds intriguing. However, after some reading, I've pretty much decided against it. The ssd part of it is just an average performer (decent read times, slow writes) and the hdd part of it is only a 5400rpm drive. There is only 1 SATA connector that the 2 sides share and the machine will only "see" the ssd until some proprietary WD software is loaded to enable access to the hdd side. Because the 2 sides share a single SATA interface, performance suffers if the machine is attempting to access the ssd and the hdd at the same time.

For slightly more money, I've pretty much decided to go with a Samsung EVO 500G ssd instead. I don't really need 1TB+ of storage in my laptop, 500G is plenty and the Samsung will provide higher performance than the WD hybrid.

Good info and good choice. I have been more than happy with my 250G EVO so far.

[strollin]

mlts22 wrote:
... What I might look into as a drive upgrade on a laptop is the WD Black2, which is a 1TB HDD and a 120 GB SSD, both in one physical unit. This way, the OS and critical applications can go on the SSD, while everything else winds up on the HDD.

I was looking into one of these as well since it sounds intriguing. However, after some reading, I've pretty much decided against it. The ssd part of it is just an average performer (decent read times, slow writes) and the hdd part of it is only a 5400rpm drive. There is only 1 SATA connector that the 2 sides share and the machine will only "see" the ssd until some proprietary WD software is loaded to enable access to the hdd side. Because the 2 sides share a single SATA interface, performance suffers if the machine is attempting to access the ssd and the hdd at the same time.

For slightly more money, I've pretty much decided to go with a Samsung EVO 500G ssd instead. I don't really need 1TB+ of storage in my laptop, 500G is plenty and the Samsung will provide higher performance than the WD hybrid.

[mlts22]

I'm using a S3500 SSD from Intel, and it is one of the few that handle a power failure/interrupted write test done about six months ago without major data loss. So, I have nothing but positive things to say about Intel drives.

What I might look into as a drive upgrade on a laptop is the WD Black2, which is a 1TB HDD and a 120 GB SSD, both in one physical unit. This way, the OS and critical applications can go on the SSD, while everything else winds up on the HDD.

[RayJayco]

mileshuff wrote:
What is the life expectancy of a heavily used SSD compared with a quality conventional drive? A low end consumer grade platter drive seems to last 2-4 years for me, usually the bearing goes out. A high end server class platter drive rarely has failed after 5+ years of heavy use. What about SSD's, such as R/W cycle life expectancy etc?

Some links that may interest you...
SSD Endurance Experiment


SSDs in AnandTech's Server Environment

My current SSD's of choice are Intel and Micron for business and have put a few of the Crucial M550's(Micron)and Samsung 840 Pro's in friends' laptops and haven't heard of problems... I have seen high failure rates in most other brands...

I am using quite of few of these and like them;
Intel® Solid-State Drive 730 Series

[camperpaul]

strollin wrote:

MrWizard wrote:
SSD is basically Erom memory , just like a u s b stick Flash drive

But the basic principles are the same:
Apply a charge write the data, data stays until you deliberately change it.

Do you mean EPROM? (from what I know, EROM is an older term for EPROM). EPROMs can't be erased on a cell by cell basis, the whole thing is erased at once (requires exposure to UV light).

IIRC the correct term is EAROM (Electrically Alterable Read Only Memory).

[strollin]

MrWizard wrote:
SSD is basically Erom memory , just like a u s b stick Flash drive

Ok there are electrical difference between old style Erom and newer Flash
But the basic principles are the same
Apply a charge write the data, data stays until you deliberately change it

Failure time is like the RAM in your pc, it lasts a lot longer than the mechanical hard drive, there is no physical wear, the only contributing factors are voltage and Heat, keep it cool, it will last longer than you care to keep it

Do you mean EPROM? (from what I know, EROM is an older term for EPROM). EPROMs can't be erased on a cell by cell basis, the whole thing is erased at once (requires exposure to UV light).

FLASH memory used by USB thumb drives and SSDs evolved from EPROMs but differ in the ability for individual cells to be electrically erased and rewritten. Hence, it's not referred to as ROM (Read Only Memory).

There are other parts of an SSD that can fail other than the memory. The controller software/hardware can fail and make it so the data in the memory cells of the drive is not accessible. Some early controller software was buggy but it seems that the various mfrs have gotten the software pretty stable nowadays.

[fj12ryder]

I run a 250 gig SSD, a 120 gig, and a 90 gig. I play a lot of games, and SSD's are great for games. I don't have any hard drives installed, but have 3 USB hard drives of varying sizes.

[OhhWell]

RVcrazy wrote:
What ratio of SSD to regular storage would you suggest? We want to be able to store our pictures & various word & excel documents. We are thinking that we don't need the top of the line like we are used to, but maybe we are wrong... Thanks!

I guess that would depend on how many pictures and if you shoot RAW and video. If its just average picture taking, you might be just fine with a 256GB drive. Even though they are exceptionally reliable, backing up your personal files is always a good idea.

[MrWizard]

SSD is mainly used for the PC's operating system

for data storage the cost is prohibitive, use a normal external HHD
in what ever GB/TB you need

you can get 2~3 TB for $99
OR
a $60 128 GB flash drive will store thousands of pictures