SSD Newbie

andyb350z

andyb350z

andyb350z

Associate
Joined
9 Oct 2013
Posts
3
Hi

I have just purchased a machine which would appear to have a hybrid drive, 2TB with 32GB SSD.

The machine is preinstalled with the OS on the 2TB drive, which i thought initially would have been better running on the SSD ??? or am i wrong, does most of windows load into ram ?

I mainly want Photoshop and video editing peformnance, and sometimes like to play call of duty, MW3, the drive was not big enough to install COD to, so im a bit confused as to what to do with the SSD, i was thinking of doing a fresh install and buying a new 256GB SDD, in which case what would be the best way to install the software, all on the SSD ? or OS on one and other software on the other ? any advice would bemost appreciated

Andy
 
The hybrid drive is a combination of the 2tb and 32gb SSD working as 1 unit. The OS will be installed on the 2tb and the SSD part is being used for fast-caching. OS files will get swapped between the 2 drives for faster startup and loading of regular programmes/files you use most. So there will be OS files on the SSD as well. You need to think of the 2 drives as 1 storage device so 2tb should be plenty for your mentioned games and apps.

Getting a separate 256gb SSD and installing your OS and progs solely on that will give you the biggest speed increase!
 
As alluded by the previous poster, I think the best configuration, is to install the OS/applications/games on the main SSD and store any photos/files to on the HDD drive.
 
It's a difficult call to make for anyone, you can only go on your own experiences. I have used SSD's for windows install and playing some of the latest games but now i use SSD for windows only and larger files (like games) on a standard sata 2 hard drive, i can not tell any difference, but for me windows is more responsive on a SSD.
 
kedge said:
It's a difficult call to make for anyone, you can only go on your own experiences. I have used SSD's for windows install and playing some of the latest games but now i use SSD for windows only and larger files (like games) on a standard sata 2 hard drive, i can not tell any difference, but for me windows is more responsive on a SSD.
Click to expand...

Kedge, you do not find that games load faster on SSD drives?
 
SayWhat? said:
Kedge, you do not find that games load faster on SSD drives?
Click to expand...
Yes SSd's are faster but where can you purchase a 1 terabyte SSD for less than £60?, i have a 1tb sata 2 standard 7200rpm hard disk drive and i can not really tell that much difference when loading a game. I have 2 SSD's in sata3 mode and a single 1tb standard hard drive connected, yes windows is nice and smooth and much more responsive than a standard hard drive but most games i have tested seem about the same to me, there is no doubt that ssd's are quicker/faster but on my system not that much faster, games just seem the same when playing them.
 
Dervious said:
I was wondering the same.

The difference in load time between a HDD and an SSD might not be massive, but it should be noticeable.
Click to expand...
It is but the cost of a large SSD is way too expensive right now, i can not justify the price/cost for me personally. If i had loads of money then yes because then the money is irrelevant. I paid way too much for my ssd's (crucial m4's) quite some time ago, the 64gb and 128gb ssd's are way too small for all my software, i was happier purchasing a 1tb sata2 7200rpm standard hard disk drive than thinking about a 1tb ssd :D
 
the price of 64gb vs 128gb are too close so may aswell get the bigger drive and stick the os onto it

otherwise if you can get a 64gb ssd and use it for caching,then that way is fine also,its just as fast,only difference is you stick the os on the hdd you want to cache not the ssd
 
kedge said:
Yes SSd's are faster but where can you purchase a 1 terabyte SSD for less than £60?, i have a 1tb sata 2 standard 7200rpm hard disk drive and i can not really tell that much difference when loading a game. I have 2 SSD's in sata3 mode and a single 1tb standard hard drive connected, yes windows is nice and smooth and much more responsive than a standard hard drive but most games i have tested seem about the same to me, there is no doubt that ssd's are quicker/faster but on my system not that much faster, games just seem the same when playing them.
Click to expand...

I was purely considering this from an performance perspective. Currently with the way SSD's are currently priced at, most people will be using a combination of a SSD drive (as the boot drive + apps) and a secondary HDD for mass storage purposes.
 
So many companies now seem to realise that people play own more than 5 games. They're always yabbering on about installing your favourite video games onto the SSD. It's something of a pain to constantly uninstall then redownload games to an SSD every other week.

But for now yeah the OS and caching is still a relatively great benefit.
 
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