SPCR

It appears the this year will see the release of numerous "affordable" SSDs by many different manufacturers. So how many SPC users plan to ditch your mechanical monstrosities to go Solid State (at least on your system drive)?

Myself, I just bought a half terrabyte of Samsung goodness, a HD501LJ to go with my HD321KJ, and don't plan on wasting anymore hard earned cash on an extravogant SSD.

All though I am tempted to see what it would be like to have a large RAID array of these somewhat slower devices.

If I finally upgrade my desktop this year, I'll be looking at them. I want one of the better performing ones (Mtron would be nice...) at 16-32GB for my boot disk, but only if I can get one for around $200 (or $300 for 32GB).

They're still too pricy for me personally. But maybe in 2009.

seraphyn wrote:They're still too pricy for me personally. But maybe in 2009.

QFT, I think HDs are currently massive and cheap as to block SSD from making a whole lot of headway this year.

I'm thinking 2009 as well. I probably won't bite until the 32GB drives get down to about $100, and I don't see that happening in '08. They definitely are getting more affordable, though.

When my WD Scorpio dies it will be replaced with a 32 gig SSD. Might be next week, might be 5 years...

I'm thinking this will be the year for me. The 100GB Hitachi drive in my laptop is getting awfully crowded, and there are a few different 128GB SSD offerings to choose from now. The big question is do I replace my current 3 year old laptop and get a SATA unit, or keep the laptop and go PATA. Still waiting to see what products become available on the AMD Puma platform.

dang dude, 128 GB ssd - what's that gonna set you back, $2500?

it will take some more time before we see affordable 1tb ssd's.

and in the meantime the data-space-hunger will keep growing and the mechanical drive people don't want to be out of business.

so it will not take long before we see 2tb, 4tb even 10tb hdd's

The solution I've been heading towards is using a small NAS box over gigabit ethernet for most storage (with a 3.5" traditional drive in the NAS) and using CF as local hard drive(s) in the computer.

Already moved most data over to the NAS, and am very happy with it so far. Can't hear it from its spot across the room behind a desk, sitting on a carpet. I'm using the Buffalo Linkstation Pro.

Am still working on getting CF hard drives set up as I like, if succeed, will post about it sometime.

Hmm- that sounds interesting-
but real quick, how does the nas work? Do you have to mount network drives? That might get annoying.

In Windows 2000/XP, is pretty easy. Once set up properly, just have to retype password in if reboot, first time use each network drive since rebooted. Probably don't need to do anything if you don't use security. And there might be a way to make user name and passwords for NAS and Windows the same, to avoid retyping--I haven't tried.

Overall the Linkstation Pro has been relatively easy to set up and has just worked well without hassles.

I haven't tried in Linux yet though. Think I saw a comment that this NAS is harder to work with in Linux. But maybe a different brand/model would be easier.

sanse wrote:it will take some more time before we see affordable 1tb ssd's.

and in the meantime the data-space-hunger will keep growing and the mechanical drive people don't want to be out of business.

so it will not take long before we see 2tb, 4tb even 10tb hdd's

I really don't think SSDs are intended for desktop use, they will be targeting the mobile market. We may never see 1TB SSDs because they should be replaced with a better technology before that.

Bring it on, been waiting for 15 years. Can't wait to put one in my laptop (for starters). No more nasty vibration - hooray!

-Evan

In the end this technology or similar will make sure that this merges RAM and harddrives into one. I wish we had that technology already.

When there is an affordable harddrive, faster than my current Raptor, I'm going to switch to that HDD as my primary harddrive, and then have a 2nd drive like one of the the WD Green Power 5400 rpm harddrives for storage of movies, mp3 and so on that doesn't require a fast HDD.

I think I want an SSD which is at least 64 GB, and costs less than $350 USD, while still fast enough to kill a Raptor. Then I'll buy a completely silent (yay!) SSD for sure!

Why is everyone waiting for the larger sizes?

I just upgraded to an 8GB drive that I use for XP, and all of my apps. (See viewtopic.php?t=45763 . I had been using a 2 GB SSD system with 98SE). It runs the system just fine and works well for surfing, working, office, and streaming audio over USB to my sound boxes and stereo.

I plug in USB storage when I need to deal with vido, large music libraries, photos etc...

Why do some folks need 32 GB or more just to run their system?

Depends on what you plan to do with the system, 8GB wouldn't cut it for modern gaming. I have a few games I play so I'd want at least 32GB to make sure I have enough room for them and then a bit more. I agree though, for a web browsing box 8GB should be very adequate. But I use my PC for a bit more than that.

ist.martin wrote:Why do some folks need 32 GB or more just to run their system?

16GB would be fine for my system drive on my home system. My work laptop would need at least a 32GB drive, though (winxp+office+msdn suite+adobe suite... 13GB in program files; 5GB in windows folder; 2GB for page file; 2GB for hibernate file; 1GB in ms help/adobe folders hidden away in documents-and-settings).

I run an SSD. It's compact flash, only 4gb in size, but who cares. I run linux, plenty of space for me. I still have my hard drive for space that may become necessary.

The other thing that can very quickly add up is temp files. I do audio editing and it's amazing how quickly gigabytes at a time can get eaten up... 32 gb would be needed for my system as a minimum.

Also, for wear levelling to work properly I assume you'd want to have lots of free space on the drive anyway?

They are a little too pricey for my tastes... I'd buy a 2,5" WD Scorpio instead (p.s. it would be nice to compare it to them!).

http://www.nextlevelhardware.com/storage/mobi/



I'm giving some serious thought to buying one of these. $725 for 32GB of silent, super fast storage goodness. With the ridiculously cheap $US it almost seems like a bargain. Almost.

You might check out the MTron MSD 6000 series instead. Exactly the same as the MOBI series drive, only difference is the packaging and price. MSD 6000 32GB is $600.

Thanks for the info. I was wondering why the CONSUMER MOBI 3000 was more expensive than the PRO MSD 6000 since their specs are identical. The answer I received from the person selling them was that the MOBI had slightly better RAID compatiblity and newer firmware revisions. Hardly worth $125. Unfortunately I found a European supplier that only sells the MOBI drives.

Probably going to place an order for either a 16 or 32GB MOBI soon.

ist.martin wrote:Why is everyone waiting for the larger sizes?

I just upgraded to an 8GB drive that I use for XP, and all of my apps. (See viewtopic.php?t=45763 . I had been using a 2 GB SSD system with 98SE). It runs the system just fine and works well for surfing, working, office, and streaming audio over USB to my sound boxes and stereo.

I plug in USB storage when I need to deal with vido, large music libraries, photos etc...

Why do some folks need 32 GB or more just to run their system?

How about dual or trippelboot ? XP+Vista+Linux, do you think you get them on 8 gb ? think again

I just got a 32GB Mtron 6000 series, and the performance is definitely breathtaking. I also have the Sandisk 5000 SATA, and there's no comparison. I'll try to put up a mini-review. Short answer: expensive, but it will do more for your every day computing experience than just about anything else.

Moogles wrote:Thanks for the info. I was wondering why the CONSUMER MOBI 3000 was more expensive than the PRO MSD 6000 since their specs are identical. The answer I received from the person selling them was that the MOBI had slightly better RAID compatiblity and newer firmware revisions. Hardly worth $125. Unfortunately I found a European supplier that only sells the MOBI drives.

Probably going to place an order for either a 16 or 32GB MOBI soon.

I didn't realize this, thanks for letting us know. I thought I had read the only difference between the two was that MOBI came in a retail package, whereas MSD 6000 is OEM. I guess this was incorrect, though.

hmsrolst: I'd very much like to read about your thoughts on the drive.

frostedflakes wrote: hmsrolst: I'd very much like to read about your thoughts on the drive.

Posted a mini-review here: viewtopic.php?p=390505#390505

Unless prices drop in half, no.

64GB is the minimum size needed for useable space with Vista. 32GB is just too small.

When Mtron releases a 64GB model for around $500 I'll definitely consider it.

Otherwise I don't expect SSD's to be in the mainstream until 2009at the earliest.

-Ed