SSD Drives?

[www.oldsnowboards.com]

Prices getting down to where I decided to give a few a try. So far, super quite (silent), fast start up. Hope to

breath new life into a couple of my older puters. Anyone else? So far I have learned not to defrag and best use is not re-writing allot, get some cheap brackets to mount in the 3.5" spaces.

Here are the ones I bought. http://www.ebay.com/itm/150826942791

Edited June 5, 2012 by www.oldsnowboards.com

[kieran]

http://hexus.net/tech/news/storage/39853-ssd-price-war-full-swing/

http://www.tomshardware.co.uk/forum/284942-14-price-heats-256gb

SSDs are a great way to make your computer feel fast. of course linux is an even better way, if you can manage it. ;)

[Michelle]

ok, help out a computer illiterate person. What is this? Does it work in laptops? Because mine is SLOOOOOOWWWWW like the commercial with the turtles. :(

[kieran]

instead of using a drive that has spinning platters like old vinyl records, it uses memory chips that don't lose their bits when you remove the power.

seek times (how long it takes to find the file) and transfer times (how long it takes to load the file) are much reduced.

some of them come with the software to help you transfer your OS install across.

[Michelle]

some of them come with the software to help you transfer your OS install across.

I followed you up until here. Thank you for the info!

[www.oldsnowboards.com]

I followed you up until here. Thank you for the info!

Michelle, most are small and made to fit into a laptop. Just make sure your laptop will accept it.

OS = is the Operating System = like Windows XP or Vista etc. He mentioned this because it saves having to re-install everything already on your computer. Me? I would suggest asking one of your computer savy friends to re-install and start fresh.

For a really slow computer?

Make sure everything is up to date , Windows updates, antivirus etc.

Then scan for bad things, bots, virus, etc

Then max out the RAM / That is the memory that is used most to do processing. Ram is

pretty cheap and it is the fastest way to improve performance if everything else is good.

Bryan

[ExcelsiorTheFathead]

I'm using one right now in my 2008 Acer Aspire One netbook. It used to have a 160 GB HD, and swapped in a SATA II 120 GB SSD that was being closed out because SATA III models are dominant now. But this old netbook only has a SATA II interface anyhow, so it was a good deal. While it is faster than the HD, it isn't Lightning Fast at loading the OS. Part of the problem might be the slower SATA II speeds and the fact that this netbook's BIOS only does SATA in some weird IDE emulation mode rather than a faster AHCI mode. The lower power consumption might be the greater benefit, as I sit here catching up on things in an Ottawa McDonalds.

[Dan]

Cool! I'm looking for one to install my OS on; I'll probably go 128 gigs. Haven't pulled the trigger yet because I was waiting for products with really bulletproof reliability to come out. It sounds like the latest generation or two have been pretty solid, so maybe it's time. I'm still running Win XP if you can believe that, but I just bought Win 7 disc and want to upgrade so I can use more RAM (I actually have 6 GBs of physical RAM now, but XP only recognizes 3).

Not quite sure how to uninstall XP from my HDD (I'll leave it in and use it as a data/apps drive) -- any suggestions on how to do that once I have the machine running Win 7 off the SSD?

[kieran]

Not quite sure how to uninstall XP from my HDD (I'll leave it in and use it as a data/apps drive) -- any suggestions on how to do that once I have the machine running Win 7 off the SSD?

if there's nothing on it you want to keep, you can format it from within windows.

[philw]

http://hexus.net/tech/news/storage/39853-ssd-price-war-full-swing/

...

SSDs are a great way to make your computer feel fast. of course linux is an even better way, if you can manage it. ;)

They should be shot at dawn for drawing charts like that though.

Computers seem to have been pretty fast to me for a fair while. I can't remember which bit of silicon it was that made the difference, possibly truck loads of memory or maybe multi cores, or maybe stonking graphics cards. Whatever, if your machine's not relatively new then that's probably the major issue. SSDs? Sure, you'd be wanting one of those, although I notice them less than having a generous amount of memory and the architecture to use it.

I guess they can't harm old machines, although running 10-year old software (eg XP) on them is... well... if you think of 10 year old snowboards, then software ages way quicker than that. I can't imagine trying to run with a four year old machine - I think Windows was effectively 32-bit back then.

[user]

don't buy an SSD that was recently launched to market, because in many cases the firmware causes problems. better to buy one, with long-term improved firmware like crucial m4 or so. you won't really recognize the less transferspeed to newest ssd's.

and look for ssd-threads, there are many models that are making problems.

[Dan]

They should be shot at dawn for drawing charts like that though.

I guess they can't harm old machines, although running 10-year old software (eg XP) on them is... well... if you think of 10 year old snowboards, then software ages way quicker than that. I can't imagine trying to run with a four year old machine - I think Windows was effectively 32-bit back then.

Actually, I built this machine last year and it's pretty beefy. I had a licensed, legal copy of XP already installed on a HDD, so I just bunged it in there to save time when I was building. It ran fine (smoking, in fact, compared to what I had been using), so I've just been using it. Now it's getting twitchy - I'd need to wipe and reinstall anyway, so time to upgrade to Win 7. Nothing inherently wrong with an old OS though - MS still supports XP, and it is a lot less bloated/hungry than a new OS. Lots of enterprises are still using it as their standard because they never adopted Vista.

[Dan]

if there's nothing on it you want to keep, you can format it from within windows.

I do have data and other applications installed on it that I'd like to keep. The data I could shuttle off and back on, but I'd rather not have to reinstall all the apps.

[www.oldsnowboards.com]

I do have data and other applications installed on it that I'd like to keep. The data I could shuttle off and back on, but I'd rather not have to reinstall all the apps.

Dan, I still have one of the 64m drives (like above photo) you are welcome to experiment with it? Can mirroring / or duplicating the drive image save the applications?

It took better part of a day to do the re-install when I put one in an old desktop. All the updates SP1,SP2,SP3 and all the associated updates. I am going to hold off and see about the new Windows 8. At that point I will build a new 64bit screamer perhaps. I just have a half dozen "so-so" computers that I want to re-use. The SSD seems like a valid option to make them more useable. You know, give one to the folks, neighbors, spare bedroom, garage :) etc.

You are welcome to borrow one Dan, I still have your beer cooler by the way :) , If you want to buy one I paid 69$. I understand it might be too small. With XP PRO and all the basics , mine is at 10gig in the desktop. I prefer to use externals for all the data.

Bryan

Edited June 8, 2012 by www.oldsnowboards.com

[philw]

This may be useful...

http://www.reghardware.com/2012/06/09/review_ten_sata_3_ssds/

[www.oldsnowboards.com]

Now I have really gone and DUNNIT!!!

Installed the Window 8 RPE , so far , so good!!! It seems pretty fast and stable so far.

[John Gilmour]

I bought a Macbook Pro with a 512SSD ..expensive but super fast. When i sold that laptop I swapped the drive with a 1TB HD and swapped the 512SSD into a G-drive Mini enclosure.

I'll likely ebay that to recoup most of the cost of my Macbook Pro's drive

what is cool is that it seems to be very fast...fast enough that when using the firewire 800 G-drive mini as a bootable HD I do not notice any perforamce lag despite not using it as an ESATA.

[Michelle]

couple more questions:

what's the lifespan of a laptop? In other words, how long can you expect it to "keep up" if you are not running crazy RAM sucking programs on it? I was told 2-3 years at most and since mine is almost 5, I was also told to spend no more money on it at all but buy a new computer.

To have someone completely wipe clean your computer and reload the OS back on to it, how much would you expect to pay? Now, how much would you expect to pay from a friend who was helping you out?

[Dan]

couple more questions:

what's the lifespan of a laptop? In other words, how long can you expect it to "keep up" if you are not running crazy RAM sucking programs on it? I was told 2-3 years at most and since mine is almost 5, I was also told to spend no more money on it at all but buy a new computer.

To have someone completely wipe clean your computer and reload the OS back on to it, how much would you expect to pay? Now, how much would you expect to pay from a friend who was helping you out?

I don't have any experience with paid tech support, so I can't speak to that, but if I was to do that for a friend or family member, I would be happy to get beer and/or pizza. If your situation is particularly painful (e.g., you don't have/can't get the install discs) maybe add a bottle of wine/booze to that. If you do have the install discs for your operating system, it's pretty straightforward -- we could talk you through it, no tech support required.

[Michelle]

but if I was to do that for a friend or family member, I would be happy to get beer and/or pizza.

That's what I was expecting, but the "bill" came and it was $200 *discounted* I was told. I wasn't warned about this before he started on my 5 yr old laptop, and the way it was approached was more like "sure, I'll help you out!"

Ok, didn't expect it for free, but just wanted a little clarification that $200 is a bit high to "help out a friend".

Should have come to you first Dan!

[Dan]

That's what I was expecting, but the "bill" came and it was $200 *discounted* I was told. I wasn't warned about this before he started on my 5 yr old laptop, and the way it was approached was more like "sure, I'll help you out!"

Ok, didn't expect it for free, but just wanted a little clarification that $200 is a bit high to "help out a friend".

Should have come to you first Dan!

Yikes, I bet $200 is more than/similar to what you'd pay at Best Buy etc. Doesn't sound like a very good friend -- if you were going to put $200 into it, you might as well have considered a new laptop. How long did it take him? For background, my old roommate used to work as a freelance software developer for $75/hour. That was about 10 years ago, but stilll...hard to see that you would pay more than $75/hour for support, and less for a friend.

Sounds like the friendship is burned at this point? If so, haggle!

And next time, definitely ask the BOL brain trust. There's enough tech workers and gear junkies here to get you sorted out.

[Michelle]

I did haggle a bit, and he says he charges $95/hr. WOW! I am in the wrong business.

I was going to do this myself, because i think between Fin and I and a few other computer gurus that we have out there I could have easily done it, but he approached it as "of course I can help you! yeah, no problem just bring it over and I can have it done in a few days". Even when he said it was ready he never said anything until I went to pick it up. I really thougth he was going to say "eh, a bottle of wine" or "dinner" or something but instead he said "how would you like to pay?". Ok, I should have asked but I never expected it to be that much, especially after he lectured me for 15 min about how I shouldn't spend any more money on this computer.

Eh boy, lesson learned. If you are doing something for a friend and plan to charge them full price, talk about it before. It is not nearly as uncomfortable before the work is done as it is after.

If you are getting work done by a "friend", ask how much it will cost before. See above.

Anyway, he also said that because it has Vista the machine and the software are "married in time" and I shouldn't upgrade to windows 7. he said that it will slow down my computer even more, and make it quirky. I have been told by someone else that it's not a problem, and you can upgrade any computer to run a newer operating system (as long as all the necessary parameters are there).

any thoughts from the you guys about this?

[Dan]

I did haggle a bit, and he says he charges $95/hr. WOW! I am in the wrong business.

Me too! Heck, I'll tell my programmer friend he should switch to doing tech support...

Anyway, he also said that because it has Vista the machine and the software are "married in time" and I shouldn't upgrade to windows 7. he said that it will slow down my computer even more, and make it quirky. I have been told by someone else that it's not a problem, and you can upgrade any computer to run a newer operating system (as long as all the necessary parameters are there).

any thoughts from the you guys about this?

I'm not 100% certain on this one, but I would tend to agree more than not. Usually each new OS is substantially more demanding than the one that came before, but it sounds like that's not the case for Win 7 - comments online indicate that Microsoft has similar minimum specs as for Vista. However, I'd still be hesitant to upgrade a laptop of that vintage to Windows 7 because laptops tend to have some dedicated software (battery management, sleep/hibernate controls, etc.), and there's no guarantee on how all that stuff will work if you get a new version of Windows off the shelf.

My suggested upgrade would be more RAM, which is pretty cheap now. Win 7 is $100-ish, so if you're going to buy a boxed copy of Win 7, might as well just get a new computer.

[Michelle]

Ah true....i guess it'll all have to wait now since I have to fork out the $$ to "fix" the computer before I can get a new one. This one will have to do for a while!

Thanks for the input!

[philw]

Well, yes, hmm, let's see. That's an outrageous price, not sure what was done for it or who took the risk. I fix/ ressurect/ advise on my mates' machines for free.

The thing is, "Vista" was slow on some computers - I never had a problem myself, but lots of people with low power computers whined about it. Vista is a significant architectural step forward from XP (read: a good thing), but Windows Seven is also known as "Vista Service Pack 2": it's architecturally the same faster in general. Bear in mind that Win 8 is just around the corner.

I would agree that it's usually a bad idea to upgrade laptops, for the reasons stated. However... in this case Windows 7 may well run faster, because of the above. Age of computers is interesting. Recently there's not much that most people would need. I have a two year old laptop (i7, Sandy bridge) which is still comfortable running the most intensive programs; it will trivially run rings around the consumer toys the media make a fuss of. So the upgrade cycle isn't what it was.