Thinking about getting my 1st SSD

Phil2008

Phil2008

Phil2008

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I have my eyes on the "OCZ Vertex 2E Bigfoot 120GB 3.5 SSD" to replace my "320GB Sammy HD322HJ HDD". I just want to know, is the OCZ SSD a good buy and will I see a huge performance boost?

Also do I treat it like having an normal hdd, with formatting, defraging and partitioning? Also instead of reinstaling windows, can i just use true image, as I have only just reinstalled a few weeks ago.
 
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I recently invested in the same SSD as above and not only is it faster but its nice not to have to listen to the noise a mechanical drive makes, i would recommend one.

As far as formatting goes if you are using windows 7 you don't need to format the drive prior to installing you just install and windows will automatically do its thing, if by default it doesn't turn off defrag then you should turn it off as they don't need to be defragged and they have their own system built in to maintain the drives speed (google TRIM).

not sure about using an image to install sure someone more clued up will be able to advise you about that.
 
Have a read of my thread about the issues I had with getting AHCI mode to work from my previous build of Windows, I used True Image also. There was nothing wrong with using TI the problem was, I think, with my build of the OS. The process of using TI was as painless as it has been on any mechanical drive.

Have a read of the official OCZ forums they have a lot of information on what you should and should not do with the drive. Basically I have turned off Defender, Indexer, Search, HD power off options and I did a quick format using the Windows install CD. I read on the OCZ forums not to use a full format on the SSD drive. You do not need to defrag a SSD drive.

I was going to buy the 120GB drive but after chatting with the sales person, and rethinking what I wanted to do with it, I decided for the 60GB. That will do me until the newer drives next year. That has allowed me to install the OS with all my applications and a steam install with the one game I'm playing at the moment. As yet I have 28GB free, but maybe something else might go on when I remember what is missing..!!



Performance wise it is nice but as I do not switch my PC off, I use sleep, I'm not sure if the boot process is quicker. It is useful for my apps like Photoshop Elements to open much faster but, for me, it is the silence that I really enjoy.

Use ATTO to measure the speed and try and not run it too often as that can degrade the drive.
 
I've been playing with the idea of getting the OCZ 240Gb for £350, But i have 2 160Gb Raptors in Raid 0. Win7 boots in 35 seconds and i load up times for app never really take that long. IE is instant and the slowest starting app is Coral PaintShop Pro x3 which takes 15-20 seconds. I'm thinking that i wouldn't notice that much difference and hence a waste of money?
 
robgmun said:
IE is instant and the slowest starting app is Coral PaintShop Pro x3 which takes 15-20 seconds. I'm thinking that i wouldn't notice that much difference and hence a waste of money?
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you'd be suprised.

My photoshop CS5 used to take about 10-15 seconds to open up on my 500gb WD drive - chucked in a 40GB kingston SSD and now opens inside about 3 seconds!!!
 
I might get the 90gb version if the drives do degrade over time. How much space will there be on the ssd after formatting and can I use true image?
 
robgmun said:
I've been playing with the idea of getting the OCZ 240Gb for £350, But i have 2 160Gb Raptors in Raid 0. Win7 boots in 35 seconds and i load up times for app never really take that long. IE is instant and the slowest starting app is Coral PaintShop Pro x3 which takes 15-20 seconds. I'm thinking that i wouldn't notice that much difference and hence a waste of money?
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The best way I can think of to look at it is to look at what speeds you get with your current drives and then look to see what speeds you'll get with a SSD. If we're talking ony a few MB/s difference then fair enough, but if we're talking maybe 100-200MB/s (and then some) then you're seriously going to notice one hell of a difference when using an OS and your normal programs.

As I said in another thread, all of the negative aspects (cost per GB, what drives you currently have, etc) you think about when trying to justify it to yourself in getting a SSD soon vanish pretty sharpish when you switch the ****** on! :D
 
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I have 8gb of mem so it puts most of my progs in to the mem, so they load instantly. So is is still worth me getting a ssd? I heard that it speeds up net browsing, is this true?
 
Phil2008 said:
I have 8gb of mem so it puts most of my progs in to the mem, so they load instantly. So is is still worth me getting a ssd? I heard that it speeds up net browsing, is this true?
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Yes i forgot to mention that, i also have 8Gb of ram. That's why most of my apps load really fast. In fact i think that Paintshop might be loading faster then what i said. i will take my stop watch out a do some timings. I might even get a you tube vid up
 
I'm not sure that's right with regard the RAM tbh, someone else will no doubt explain how that works. At a guess I'm sure it'll be significant if you don't have a lot of RAM but I don't really see how having 8GB RAM would make SSDs performance increase any less noticeable tbh, as the programs still have to get in the RAM in the first place (not sure how win7 prefetch works in this case tbh).

Using a SSD gives improved performance from the moment the system is turned on.

With regard to browsing, well everything happens quicker so I suppose it's natural to see it as a speed increase when surfing. I have ADSL2+ and while I don't see any increase in the ADSL2+ speeds I do see an decrease in how long it takes the PC to render the page. I wouldn't go as far as saying it'll give you faster internet speeds but I would say that everything you do is faster.
 
shoot1st said:
I'm not sure that's right with regard the RAM tbh, someone else will no doubt explain how that works. At a guess I'm sure it'll be significant if you don't have a lot of RAM but I don't really see how having 8GB RAM would make SSDs performance increase any less noticeable tbh, as the programs still have to get in the RAM in the first place (not sure how win7 prefetch works in this case tbh).
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Once windows has booted up, it begins to put all your freq use apps in the memory, also I think windows kick apps from the mem during the day, depending what time you mostly use them. So I cant see if the apps you use are in the memory, how can ssd speed the loading time up any faster

I can see sdd being good for windows boot up and putting your freq used progs in the memory, and with apps you dont use often.
Like a lot of the time my hdd goes to sleep cos it knows my work pattern and stores what I use in the mem.

Also if the SSD is going to degrade quickly overtime, cos I very often use true image to restore my os drive, that will put me off from buying 1?

Anyway wont be ordering 1 till tomorrow, so Ive got plenty of time to think about it.
 
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I love my SSD C300 64gb. Using it as a OS drive it so much faster. Now restarting my computer is no problem before I would not restart it in the day only over night.

I get max of 387mb/s read with a sata 3 6gb/s port.
 
1 second Im thinking yes Im going to get 1.........But then I think how much I depend on acronis true image, because restoring images often dont do the ssd much good. So it would be a bit like going back to the old days, where you dernt mess around with windows or install software, incase you mess up windows.. Ummmmm
 
Ive just found out I prob wont reach the write limit for years cos its about a few hundred thousand times, and the latest version of true image fully supports SSD.. So Im going for it.:cool:
 
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krisab said:
whats the advantages of using sleep? :confused:
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Your system will resume a lot quicker if it's sat sleeping than it would if it was cold booting.

I rarely use it myself though, but a lot of people do, especially if you're back and forth to your PC while you're doing other things. I suppsoe it can be more efficient than waiting for your system to boot up every time.
 
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