Help with SSD

ByMRK1

ByMRK1

ByMRK1

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Joined
30 Jul 2011
Posts
422
If I buy a Crucial RealSSD M4 64GB, What do I do so that the SSD loads windows as boot device? And when I download programs will I need to install them to the SSD?
 
Just install Windows 7 to it as you would normally.

Programs will install in exactly the same way as any other drive. Pick where you want it.

Some quick tips:
Do not degrag an SSD
Disable hibernation to save space equal to your RAM
Ensure you plug it in to a 6GBit/Sec SATA-III port. If you do not have SATA -III your best SATA-II
 
And turn off all pre-fetching and indexing on the SSD too, those features cause un-necessary read/writes.

The SSD speeds are quick enough anyway without indexes being built...
 
ByMRK1 said:
I dont under stand any of that Jambo? And whats that thing that z68s work with SSDs?
Click to expand...

The SSD only has a certain amount of lifespan, and defragging, prefetching and indexing all perform unnecessary read/writes. Plus, the SSD is so fast that you don't need any form of defragging or prefetching!

But I wouldn't worry about that. You'd get about 20GB of writes per day, for 5 years straight, before the drive would kick it.

The z68 mobos and caching, is exactly as it sounds. It's just caching. Its similar to when you inserted a memory stick into XP (or Vista?) and it asked you to do that funky TurboBoost, or Speed(something). And it used the flash drive as a cache for applications to speed up your system. This is just like that, but on a larger and more hard-wired scale.

It's almost like a new form of RAIDing, for your normal HD with a SSD drive.

Basically, the firmware on the mobo analyses the most recently used files (called a sweep) and assesses which files are accessed most often. It copies those files across to the SSD, so in stead of the HDD being queried for data, the cache will hold most (if not all) of the (most oftenly used &) required data. Making your load times substantially smaller :)

Say you play WoW, a lot. It would pick that up, and copy those files across, so you get into the game quicker.

Or you use Photoshop on a daily basis, it would copy that across.

You get the idea :)

Although, since it's similar to RAID, it will only show that your system has one main hard-drive.

Edit:

At first the caching thing seems like a good idea, but it's almost redundant. You can just install Windows and games to the SSD and just store stuff on an actual HDD for retrieval or intermittent use.

Saying that, if you use the 'cache' feature, it would optimise the space used, I suppose.. Since SSDs aint cheap, at all!
 
Last edited:
Ok, So will it automatically copy those files across? Is there a way of doing this manually?
And what should I acutally store on my SSD? OS, Top 2 games and a few programs?
 
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