# Solid State Drive (SSD) for Workstation Experience



## Nevada (Sep 9, 2004)

Lost the hard drive in my laptop recently and replaced it with a Solid State Drive (SSD). Basically we're talking about a bed of memory here. Sort of like an SD chip for a digital camera, only much larger capacity and in the shape of a hard drive. I got an Intel brand, 240 GB, with a SATA interface in the configuration of a 2.5" laptop hard drive.

It was more pricey than a hard drive. A new hard drive of that size would be about $35, while the SSD was closer to $100. But performance was supposed to be far superior. It promised to boot and open applications in a fraction of the time that it takes with a traditional hard drive.

The drive arrived yesterday. Installation and Windows loading was the same as a hard drive. No problems.

I have to admit that the booting and application opening is much faster with SSD than with a hard drive. Instead of it taking 2 minutes, it boots in closer to 30 seconds. Likewise, applications that used to take 15 to 20 seconds to load now take closer to 5 seconds. The SSD delivered on it's promise.

As for boosting productivity for a workstation, I don't think it does by much. If all I did was boot and load applications that would be true, but most of the time I use applications. Once an application is open a SSD isn't going to speed things up. Cutting 15 seconds from the time it takes to load an applications is miniscule compared to the time I'll be using the application. While I suppose anything that makes computer operation less frustrating is a good thing, I don't think SSD drives are a good investment if you're looking to boost productivity.

I think SSD drives are in our future, and they're a good thing, but a traditional hard drive is entirely satisfactory for a workstation. They'll get as inexpensive as hard drive someday and we'll all have one.


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## Shrek (May 1, 2002)

I remember 30 years ago watching line operators using microscopes to weave thousands of miniature ferrite magnetic cores on spider web fine mag wire to make a SSD on a 8 by 12 inch circuit card. Now flash drives and SD cards have more memory and faster access.


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## arabian knight (Dec 19, 2005)

How about this just for people that want something real simple and real cheap running either Linux or Windows 8.1 crammed in a quad-core Atom CPU, 32GB of storage and 2GB of RAM, plugs into a USB port on your TV.
Intel's Compute Stick puts Windows 8.1 on your TV for $149 or a 1GB RAM/8GB memory Linux version is priced at $89


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## Kung (Jan 19, 2004)

Nevada - my experience mirrors your own. I bought a Samsung 850 EVO a few months back (512Gb). Boot time and startup time for apps is FAR faster, but actual 'operating' speed isn't ridiculously faster.

My wife has a 'different' drive - a Western Digital Dual (120GB SSD, 1TB HD). It's not quite as fast as the pure SSD is, but it also cost $120 to the $200 I paid for my SSD.


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## Nevada (Sep 9, 2004)

arabian knight said:


> How about this just for people that want something real simple and real cheap running either Linux or Windows 8.1 crammed in a quad-core Atom CPU, 32GB of storage and 2GB of RAM, plugs into a USB port on your TV.


32 GB of storage? Doesn't Windows 8.1 with updates take more than that?


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## Nevada (Sep 9, 2004)

Kung said:


> My wife has a 'different' drive - a Western Digital Dual (120GB SSD, 1TB HD). It's not quite as fast as the pure SSD is, but it also cost $120 to the $200 I paid for my SSD.


I looked at hybrid drives, where the most often used files are migrated to a small internal SSD. Those are priced much better than pure SSD drives. I think I looked at a 1 TB hybrid with 16 GB SSD for around $75.

I've also seen gaming computers that have a slot for both a hard drive and a SSD drive, and they work together similar to a hybrid drive.


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## Shin (Mar 25, 2014)

I use an SSD for my main drive, and a hybrid for storage. SSDs are improving in price, so it won't be long before it makes sense to use them period for most everything besides tremendous bulk storage.


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## arabian knight (Dec 19, 2005)

Nevada said:


> 32 GB of storage? Doesn't Windows 8.1 with updates take more than that?


 System Requirements for Windows 8.1
Hard disk space: 16 GB (32-bit) or 20 GB (64-bit)

I would think this version of 8.1 is not full of other carp that would be present on a PC with Windows 8.1, I am sure it is just a basic Plain Jane 8.1 on a stick like that.


http://www.intel.com/content/www/us/en/compute-stick/intel-compute-stick.html


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## Nevada (Sep 9, 2004)

arabian knight said:


> System Requirements for Windows 8.1
> Hard disk space: 16 GB (32-bit) or 20 GB (64-bit)
> 
> I would think this version of 8.1 is not full of other carp that would be present on a PC with Windows 8.1, I am sure it is just a basic Plain Jane 8.1 on a stick like that.
> ...


There is an abbreviated version of Windows 8.1, called RT I think, but the tablet I got for the kid had the full version.

I'm posting back because I just loaded Windows in a laptop, finishing this morning. I didn't load Windows 8.1, but I loaded Windows 7. Here are the total disk usages after various stages. Note that Microsoft recommends 20 GB of disk space for Windows 7 64-bit.

Clean install Win7 Ultimate, 64-bit, SP1 *25GB*
Applied all updates *36GB*
Installed Office 2013 Pro, 64-bit *40GB*
Applied all updates *50GB*

32 GB of disk space wouldn't have given me enough room for a safe install of Windows 7, even without Office. And that's despite Microsoft's recommendation of 20 GB disk space.


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