Should I keep the Velocirap...

yannis76

yannis76

yannis76

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804
Hi,

I had the chance to get a Vertex2 drive and replace my WD Velociraptor (WD3000GLFS). I have another WD 640gb (games) and I am thinking whether to keep the Veloci for games or sell it. What do you think? Is there such a big speed difference?
Space is not really a problem since I have an external disk too.

Thx
 
When I got my first Vertex it replaced a 150GB Raptor. I was blown away. You'll be blown away too... you'll feel your Raptor is pointless.
 
I am not comparing the Veloci with the Vertex. I know the SSD is way faster, but I am thinking of selling the Veloci and staying with the SSD and a normal HD. The other option is to sell the normal disk and put the Veloci for games
 
It really comes down to how much space you need. If you have enough room for everything you need then keep the velociraptor - it should help with load times somewhat.
 
The WD640 isn't especially slow, Idealy I'd keep the Raptor for games, but If the noise was an issue, or someone offered me a decent amount of money for the Raptor I wouldn't be too upset to see it go.

I got rid of my RAID0 raptors when I got my SSD, and picked up a 320GB Samsung F1 for the excess data. I organise things so that games are played from the SSD, there's enough room for a good selection and I just cut and paste game directories that I'm no longer playing to my mechanical drive or NAS when I need to free up space.
 
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I use an SSD for windows and a couple of games and a 2TB drive for all the other games to reside on (including all steam games). I would go for an SSD and a 1TB second drive and dump those old raptors.
 
Pretty much what I had (IE. Velociraptor 150GB boot drive and WD black 640 GB secondary).

Replaced V/Raptor with OCZ Vertex 2E 120GB boot drive, moved games onto the V/Raptor (obviously depends on how many games you have ) and use the WD black as a backup drive.

Got to be totally honest and probably going to fly in the opposite direction to some. But I did not find the SSD the life changing experience that some appear to have. Yes the system "feels" faster / snappier / starts up a bit quicker (so what!) but worth the price premium? Only you can answer that! Possibly also depends on how you are going to use it as well I suppose.

And before anyone asks. Yes my Vertex is running at the advertised speeds. The usual benchmark tools run once (so as not to degrade the drive by writing tons of crap to it) prove this.

I still think it's hard to justify SSD's at the current price / GB. I think it pretty much comes down to whether you fancy trying one and have the cash burning a hole in your pocket. Just don't expect it to change your life.

Only my personal opinion/s. Not wishing to start an argument / flame war. ;)
 
So,

what do you think I should do?
Are there any fast hd benchmarks in order to see the speed difference between the 2 disks (veloci and WD640)?
 
yannis76 said:
So,

what do you think I should do?
Are there any fast hd benchmarks in order to see the speed difference between the 2 disks (veloci and WD640)?
Click to expand...

There are quite a few.

- Crystal Disk Mark
- HD Tune
- ATTO

To be honest. There isn't "that" much difference between the 2 drives. Random access a bit quicker of the VRaptor but not enough in my opinion to give you an OMG moment.

Don't think personally it's worth spending too much time agonising over it. Just go with which ever you fancy. Like a lot of things in life, no clear cut answer.

Good luck.
 
Max3 said:
It's clear cut that the raptor isn't anything special anymore imho.
Click to expand...

Totally agree. It's had it's day. And I have one, there's honesty for you.

SSD boot drive (if you fancy one and can afford).
Decent mechanical drive/s as secondary' s.

Though if you currently have a VRaptor, you might as well use it in some capacity (like I have), as I don't see you getting that much if you try and sell it on.

Though obviously up to the OP what he decides to do. All part of the fun of PC ownership.
 
mikeo said:
Got to be totally honest and probably going to fly in the opposite direction to some. But I did not find the SSD the life changing experience that some appear to have. Yes the system "feels" faster / snappier / starts up a bit quicker (so what!) but worth the price premium? Only you can answer that! Possibly also depends on how you are going to use it as well I suppose.

I still think it's hard to justify SSD's at the current price / GB. I think it pretty much comes down to whether you fancy trying one and have the cash burning a hole in your pocket. Just don't expect it to change your life.

Only my personal opinion/s. Not wishing to start an argument / flame war. ;)
Click to expand...

You're right in that it's totally down to how you use it. I'm a heavy multitasking user, and spend hours every day "on the desktop". My taskbar is always full of running apps and I usually have 30-40 tabs in my browsers. I'm constantly switching between apps, setting things running in the background etc.
SSD's are hands down the best upgrade I made in years, even more noticeable than getting my first Dual Core CPU. If all you do is turn on your computer and use one application like a game or checking your email, there isn't much gain to be had, but if you're a heavy user all the fractions of a second you save on every action really add up ... and are suddenly very noticable when you have to use a comp with a mechanical drive.
I wouldn't swap my Q6600 and SSD setup for SandyBridge and mechanical drives if you paid me.

The best SSD upgrade I've seen was putting a Vertex2 in my mums Macbook, she's not that heavy a user, but things like iphoto really benefit. I was almost tearing my hair out trying to show her how to use it before with annoyances like 20 second delays and laggy scrolling on 'open file ...' dialogue boxes, but now it's smooth as silk.
 
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Zarf

Exactly what I was trying to get at. But much more eloquently put. :)

And this in my opinion is what gets forgotten in the rush to buy the new tech at times.

IE. Will I actually benefit from it?

Though obviously a lot of folk (me included at times) upgrade stuff just because we fancy it.

Also agree with your comment about it being the best upgrade that must laptops etc. could get. As a lot only have "relatively" slow mech. dives (5,400 RPM with loads of "green" features). That's before you consider the power and heat issues.
 
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