Storage Solutions Fast HDD/SSD for OS win7 x64

[vivek.krishnan]

Me too planning to move an older laptop to a SSD - just need a screwdriver to remove the HDD casing - lost mine.

I dont understand why people dont understand that the SATA port is backwards compatible - Any SATA HDD will work in any SATA port - at the slower of the two port speeds.

Usage is going to be Windows 7 + YouTube + Chrome + Little to nil office docs.

 

[ranjan2001]

SSD Myth #1 : Buy a slow SSD because I don't have a SATA III port

In my case this was the reason why I dint buy the pro version as I was told that old CPU & 4gb ram wont let me make much use of the faster speeds, to make full use of the non pro version I need to change CPU & make the ram 8gb. I plan to buy a new system sometime next year so this system with old hardware will remain as a backup system

SSD Myth #2 : An SSD's performance is measured only in sequential speeds

Even I couldn't find that answer conclusively but many others I consulted said that yes it does (still not sure)
This is what I read & decided to buy non pro ssd, the views were confirmed from other users too on another forum
http://www.tomshardware.com/reviews/ssd-upgrade-sata-3gbps,3469-4.html

From that review

As expected, the SATA 3Gb/s interface proves to be a significant bottleneck to the 840 Pro’s sequential read and write performance. The SSD is better able to demonstrate its potential on the 6 Gb/s link.

Last page of that review concludes

Almost No Advantages for SATA 6 Gb/s On A Typical Desktop
The 840 Pro soared in our synthetic tests when we had it hooked up to a 6 Gb/s port. It also fell flat several times when we hamstrung it using SATA 3Gb/s. When we specifically targeted sequential reads and writes, along with random I/O at high queue depths, the differences were especially pronounced. But once we started through our handful of real-world tasks, booting up and shutting down Windows 8, and loading a number of applications, the differences shrank to almost nothing. The deltas we did measure wouldn't be perceptible during your day-to-day grind.

Your sequential write speeds are not even half the 300MB/s limit (even an old 64GB 830 is a bit quicker at ~150MB/s). Random speeds will be even lower.

Yes I read 830 is a bit faster but not available in 120gb only 64gb hence I got 840 non pro

Anyway, atleast you still got an SSD, I was when you said you were considering a WD black instead.

I was confused as this is my first ssd & primary reason to add this was that I wanted OS to be on a separate disk, photoshop scratch on another physical disk, I didn't need much space & a 250gb was what I needed at most, WD black were only available in 1TB but adding 7200rpm disk would have added more heat & power consumption hence I was keen on ssd. Now my fans are running cooler once I move all the daily required stuff on ssd the other disk wont be much used for 80% of times as they just store data.
One good thing has been my APC software reports 64 mins of UPS backup time which earlier was only 25 mins, great power saving

I don't know what sort of IO activity photoshop has - maybe you can check on this - but I highly doubt its only sequential read.

I am still searching for this info conclusively I found few threads discussing it but no clear conclusion.
http://www.luminous-landscape.com/forum/index.php?topic=69652.0

 

[bottle]

For a 3k differnce you could have got the 840 pro and it would have been something future proof.

 

[ranjan2001]

For a 3k differnce you could have got the 840 pro and it would have been something future proof.

Yes but future proofing was not in my mind as this computer is nearing its life, once I buy a new computer I will be using this one as a backup system so I wont be needing this ssd in new system.
Most probably my new system would be a ssd RAID along with max cpu power whatever is fastest available next year.

 

[Crazy_Eddy]

Yes but future proofing was not in my mind as this computer is nearing its life, once I buy a new computer I will be using this one as a backup system so I wont be needing this ssd in new system.

Ah, then its fine. Enjoy your new SSD

Just some final points :-

In my case this was the reason why I dint buy the pro version as I was told that old CPU & 4gb ram wont let me make much use of the faster speeds

Run Windows Performance monitor whenever you're using photoshop and chart a graph between CPU Usage and Disk usage. Each time disk usage is high (say above 50%), check how high CPU usage is. A CPU is almost never a bottleneck for the storage subsystem.

This is what I read & decided to buy non pro ssd, the views were confirmed from other users too on another forum
http://www.tomshardware.com/reviews/ssd-upgrade-sata-3gbps,3469-4.html

Here's what your THG review says, and what I have been saying :-

However, those same tests aren't very good at conveying the "feel" of a machine recently upgraded from conventional to solid-state storage. Moreover, they make it look like you really need a modern platform to take advantage of a modern SSD. Our real-world metrics demonstrate that those theoretical differences aren't always practical, though.

In the real world, a 3 Gb/s interface doesn't bottleneck common applications.