Getting a SSD disk. Suggestions?

zetas

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Well, as the title says, I'm thinking 'bout getting a SSD disk to avoid that horrible boot time on Windows 7.
The only problem is, which one should I get?

At the moment, I'm only thinking about getting a SSD for the boot time reduction and to put my most frequently used games into it (would probably need around 50-60GB).

I also have no idea which brand is the best and what I'm supposed to look for in a SSD, and that's where I hope you guys can help me out.

Also throwing in some system specs for no obvious reason, but someone will probably be interested.

Hopefully..


ASUS Crosshair IV Formula
AMD Phenom II 1090T BE
Corsair Dominator DDR3 1600MHz (4x2GB)
2x HIS Radeon HD4870
With a 1TB and a 500GB HDD.

Thanks in advance : )
 
OCZ Vertex 2 60gb. It's amazing, plain and simple, the sandforce are the fastest right now pretty much.

My Vertex 2 boots up windows in like 10 secs after POST and then anything is instantly usable right when it loads. Like opening up Chrome or something, it loads up instantly right after booting.

Any SSD with the sandforce drivers will be good, but i have the Vertex 2 and its amazing. It has faster random IOPS or something though than the more basic sandforce drivers.
 
I've got the 120GB version of the drive PewPewBangBang suggested, and it's a wonderful drive. I like having the extra space for putting a few more games on it. If you're only looking to put your OS and primary programs on it, 60GB will be plenty.
 
I too have been pondering the idea about an SSD.

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16820227551

The Vertex 2 120GB is $199 with rebate. I'm tempted to wait because Vertex 3 is coming out soon.

A couple of questions: First, does the drive performance start to degrade after multiple writes? I like to reformat once or twice a year to clean the junk off it and all the old games I don't play.

Second, DO NOT defrag right?

Lastly, if I get a small SSD as a boot drive and run TF2 and other games from a different Raid 1 setup, how will my performance be?

Thanks.
 
No it doesn't degrade that fast.......get TRIM through with windows 7

I used SSDlife checker and after like a month its still at 100% health

Yes don't defrag
 
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Remember that you want to keep about a 1/3 of the drive space free to slow the degradation of the drive over time. A 80-90gb drive might be your best bet. There is a 90gb vertex 2. Intel has an 80gb version of the x25-m. Beyond that, waiting for next gen ssds might be another option though I am unsure of release dates as well as availability always being a fun factor.
 
Lots of info here. Gotta chew on some of this.

Was looking at the force series from Corsair. A 60GB disk with decent read/write speeds at about $175 (norwegian prices. They're alot higher than US prices) Also, a 120GB Corsair Force costs $320 here.
Thoughts?

Anyways, few shops here in norway that sells OCZ, and the biggest one doesn't even have any SSDs from OCZ : (
 
OCZ Vertex 2 60gb. It's amazing, plain and simple, the sandforce are the fastest right now pretty much.

My Vertex 2 boots up windows in like 10 secs after POST and then anything is instantly usable right when it loads. Like opening up Chrome or something, it loads up instantly right after booting.

Any SSD with the sandforce drivers will be good, but i have the Vertex 2 and its amazing. It has faster random IOPS or something though than the more basic sandforce drivers.

Would you look at that. The Vertex has the same r/w speed as Force from Corsair. Oh well, gotta have a closer look at reviews etc. tomorrow.
 
Its cuz a lot of the companies are just using the same sandforce drivers. Intel is using their own. Prices is basically wats differentiating most of them
 
^True, if you have SATA 6, definitely go with the C300 since it does perform better when on SATA 6 than the other drives
 
I have a Corsair Force 40 gig and a 120 gig and they are really great drives. I have had no issues with them at all. Reflex and PewPew are right about the C300 being the fastest on the market right now but if you compare a Sandforce (corsair force) or marvell (C300) SSD performance side by side, you probably wouldnt be able to tell a difference. Both are smokin fast compared to what you will be coming from.
 
OCZ Vertex 2 60gb. It's amazing, plain and simple, the sandforce are the fastest right now pretty much.

My Vertex 2 boots up windows in like 10 secs after POST and then anything is instantly usable right when it loads. Like opening up Chrome or something, it loads up instantly right after booting.

Any SSD with the sandforce drivers will be good, but i have the Vertex 2 and its amazing. It has faster random IOPS or something though than the more basic sandforce drivers.

Ive been having a tough time Getting my firmware to update to the 1.24V with the included installer from download. Have you also done this or no?
 
Ooh, nice. Do you guys think a 64GB C300 will do for WoW and Windows 7 then? If so, I'll definitely go for it.

Also, the price difference between the sandforce and C300 is next to nothing (C300 costs like $10 more)
 
Unless you have money to blow, I'd just suggest getting some hard drives into Raid0.
I have 2 AALS and load into Windows ready to go in 25-30 secs max.

But if you must have the shorter boot time, a couple buddies of mine swear by the Corsair drives, even after using a couple other SSDs.
 
WHAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAT?!

Anyways, don't most SSDs not come close to hitting the SATA 6GB/s limit?

Absolutely, they've just begun making SATA III drives within the past year so of course the limits of SATA III have yet to be pushed.

But in the same respect, there's already SSDs in PCI-e that have r/w spds of 1.4GB/s. I don't know what the threshold for SATA III but seeing what PCI-e can already produce, I'm wondering if SATA III can beat it.
 
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