twicksistedGame loading times are minimally affected by using an SSD... and in some cases it dosent make a difference atall.

Heres some benchmark reviews/links to look at:

www.anandtech.com/show/2614/14
www.anandtech.com/show/2527/8
www.1up.com/do/blogEntry?bId=8998325

Anyways, if its such an important thing to have your games on an SSD, then get a 128gb SSD solely for your games folder and a 64gb SSD for your OS... thatll cost around £200 for both... You can still use your mechanical drives for Mass storage.

The main visible difference is really with the OS and other programs loaded into the OS on that drive... the difference is phenominal and there really is no waiting around which makes going onto my work PC a real chore thesedays!

Having your OS and pagefile on an SSD with low accesstimes makes a big difference in pretty much everything

lol whatever dude....

All my office apps open instantly, and all my Adobe apps are almost instant. I made a video showing you: www.youtube.com/watch?v=MPtj6xwTv2g

If you can't wait that long, there is a problem, and when I had everything on an SSD the difference was minimal to none existant.

So people spending hundreds on SSD's have it all wrong as it makes minimal to non-existant difference? OK then :)

twicksistedSo people spending hundreds on SSD's have it all wrong as it makes minimal to non-existant difference? OK then :)

From my experience. Yes, they are spending all that money for Windows to boot a few seconds faster, and some programs to load 2-3 seconds faster. They over exagerate the difference to make themselves feel better about thier misguided purchase.

newtekie1From my experience. Yes, they are spending all that money for Windows to boot a few seconds faster, and some programs to load 2-3 seconds faster. They over exagerate the difference to make themselves feel better about thier misguided purchase.

Is it not the same as buying a better CPU, Graphics card or Ram? In most cases a better CPU will only shave off a few seconds here and there in processing times yet the prices are widely different.

Was it not misguided for you to buy your i7 and overclock it to 4ghz when youre only saving a few seconds time when processing something... or your EVGA motherboard instead of an OEM one which does the same job?

newtekie1From my experience. Yes, they are spending all that money for Windows to boot a few seconds faster, and some programs to load 2-3 seconds faster. They over exagerate the difference to make themselves feel better about thier misguided purchase.

While I don't agree they are misguided (just look at how much some of us spend on cpus and gpus for minimal gain (which I am guilty of)), I do agree the difference isn't as noticeable as most would have us believe.

The difference wasn't big enough for me. I think now the speeds may have reached a point where I might be happy with the speed increases, but now I am just waiting for the right size at the right price. Might even go PCIe SSD if I find one that suites my needs.

twicksistedIs it not the same as buying a better CPU, Graphics card or Ram? In most cases a better CPU will only shave off a few seconds here and there in processing times yet the prices are widely different.

Was it not misguided for you to buy your i7 and overclock it to 4ghz when youre only saving a few seconds time when processing something... or your EVGA motherboard instead of an OEM one which does the same job?

Most of those things you mention give way more noticeable increases than the difference between an SSD and HDD. Granted there are also areas with the parts you mention that I would also say isn't worth the money. For instance a GTX580 isn't worth paying nearly twice the price for the minor non-noticeable performance gain over a GTX570. Paying more for an 1366 CPU and Motherboard wasn't worth the next to non-existant non-noticeable performance improvement over an 1156 CPU and Motherboard, which is why I bought 1156 instead of 1366.

Speaking of me, it is interesting you brought me up. Look at my other rigs. A Celeron, an old Athlon X2, and an old C2D E4500. And the only reason I bought the 875K was because I got it when Microcenter screwed up the pricing on it and was selling it for the same price as the 750($200). I had full intentions of buying the 750 when I went 1156, but with the 875k being the same price at the time I was making the switch, it would have been stupid not to get it. The same pretty much goes for the motherboard. I was planning on buying the P55 LE, and actually had bought the P55 LE, when I came accross the P55 FTW 200 for only $10 more. And the only reason I upgraded in the first place is because I encode videos almost daily on my main rig, and the 1156 quad shaves 20-30 minutes of encoding time off a 2 hour video, which is very noticeable. If it wasn't for that, I'd be rocking another Celeron, probably a G1101.

There are points in every market segment of computers, be it CPU, GPU, RAM, or Storage where the price simply isn't justfied, and usually that point is right around the same point where gains start to be extremely minimal.

newtekie1Most of those things you mention give way more noticeable increases than the difference between an SSD and HDD. Granted there are also areas with the parts you mention that I would also say isn't worth the money. For instance a GTX580 isn't worth paying nearly twice the price for the minor non-noticeable performance gain over a GTX570. Paying more for an 1366 CPU and Motherboard wasn't worth the next to non-existant non-noticeable performance improvement over an 1156 CPU and Motherboard, which is why I bought 1156 instead of 1366.

Speaking of me, it is interesting you brought me up. Look at my other rigs. A Celeron, an old Athlon X2, and an old C2D E4500. And the only reason I bought the 875K was because I got it when Microcenter screwed up the pricing on it and was selling it for the same price as the 750($200). I had full intentions of buying the 750 when I went 1156, but with the 875k being the same price at the time I was making the switch, it would have been stupid not to get it. The same pretty much goes for the motherboard. I was planning on buying the P55 LE, and actually had bought the P55 LE, when I came accross the P55 FTW 200 for only $10 more. And the only reason I upgraded in the first place is because I encode videos almost daily on my main rig, and the 1156 quad shaves 20-30 minutes of encoding time off a 2 hour video, which is very noticeable. If it wasn't for that, I'd be rocking another Celeron, probably a G1101.

There are points in every market segment of computers, be it CPU, GPU, RAM, or Storage where the price simply isn't justfied, and usually that point is right around the same point where gains start to be extremely minimal.

I totally understand what you are trying to say here, but my point is that the upgrade you get from a standard average mechanical hardrive (50MB/s) to a SATA III SSD (500MB/s) equates up to 10x more performance. that in my opinion is a major boost and ont this minimal boost you are making it sound like.

Anyways, I have an SSD now and am very happy with that purchase, im also glad that I made the jump and even though its only a small 64GB SSD.

I was worried about not being able to fit everything on it, but was able to get Win7 64x along with all my programs and software with only my games having to be installed to a mechanical drive.

twicksistedI totally understand what you are trying to say here, but my point is that the upgrade you get from a standard average mechanical hardrive (50MB/s) to a SATA III SSD (500MB/s) equates up to 10x more performance. that in my opinion is a major boost and ont this minimal boost you are making it sound like.

Anyways, I have an SSD now and am very happy with that purchase, im also glad that I made the jump and even though its only a small 64GB SSD.

I was worried about not being able to fit everything on it, but was able to get Win7 64x along with all my programs and software with only my games having to be installed to a mechanical drive.

Theorectical numbers aren't accurate representations of the actual performance improvement, especially not wrong theorectical numbers...

If theoretical numbers worked 20% overclocks on graphics cards would yeild 20% performance inceases, but they don't.

You even showed it yourself that loading times are minimally affected in games, at the best games load twice as fast. But even assuming other applications load faster than games, even assuming 10x faster on the applications you listed, I showed that they alread load extremely fast. So yeah, they might be 10x faster than an HDD, but when they only take 2 seconds to open from a standard HDD the difference is minimal, and some of the apps were already openning in under 1 second from a standard HDD...

Nice!

Now, fill me up:

newtekie1Theorectical numbers aren't accurate representations of the actual performance improvement, especially not wrong theorectical numbers...

If theoretical numbers worked 20% overclocks on graphics cards would yeild 20% performance inceases, but they don't.

You even showed it yourself that loading times are minimally affected in games, at the best games load twice as fast. But even assuming other applications load faster than games, even assuming 10x faster on the applications you listed, I showed that they alread load extremely fast. So yeah, they might be 10x faster than an HDD, but when they only take 2 seconds to open from a standard HDD the difference is minimal, and some of the apps were already openning in under 1 second from a standard HDD...

no, I have to completely disagree with you, I absolutely cannot understand your thinking, but to each their own.

I've owned 3 SSD's so far, I bought one for every rig I built for myself since SSD became available, and I have to say the difference is night and day, especially when used in something such as a laptop, because most laptops come with 5400rpm harddrives, the advantage of an SSD really shines in small files (as soon in random 4k scores). this isnt theorectical, this isnt gimmick, I can testify that I've saved loads of time from just installing programs alone.

It doesn't matter how fast your CPU is, or how great your graphic card is, the fact is that these days, the hard drive is the slowest denominator in your system, it creates bottleneck in an otherwise decent setup, this is also the reason why any machine with mechanical drive cannot obtain a Windows Index score higher than 5.9, Microsoft understood this very well, they have good reasons. I cannot tell the difference between computers with Core2 or i7 Sandybridge when performing hard drive intensive work, adding a fast SSD dramatically changed that. When building a well-rounded computer, it is important to remove the bottleneck of the system, in this case, the mechanical drive. Games are not the most harddrive intensive application, (and please, photoshop is only 500MB, so I can understand if you don't notice too much difference). so if you only use your computer for gaming, well then, thats great, but people have many different uses for them.

I own computers with mechanical drives, and I sometimes use them side by side with my SSD rigs, the mechanical drive is just unbearable, it takes forever to install windows update, takes forever to install something like adobe suite or autodesk software, takes forever to open up professional software I use to make a living. autocad2011 and 3dsmax2011 takes more than 15 seconds to open on a mechanical drive where it opens in 3 seconds on my vertex 3. I use these software around the clock, and my work needs requires me to multitask between several programs, the amount of time I save from just opening software is well worth the money.

many of my co-workers can also testify that using an SSD has been life changing, they never thought their computer was that fast, even on old rigs, putting in an SSD breathed new life into their machine, I just recently installed an SSD in my boss' rig, he was just speechless on how much faster it is than the old mechanical, there is pretty much 0 wait time on anything.For many people I know, they pretty much all agree buying an SSD was the best investment they've made in a long time. if you don't use your computer for heavy tasks, I can understand its not that much difference than the mechanical, but there people who uses 3+gig softwares (with many small files) on a regular basis, and SSD can really make a difference.

Lastly, OK so for some people who tried an SSD before, but thought it didn't make any difference - I doubt you've tried a fast SSD, there are many slow SSD's out there for a cheap price, but before you've used something like a vertex 3, don't hit the nail on that coffin yet. I sometimes wonder why I'm wasting so much time typing all this crap, the stubborn people are always going to be stubborn, in the end tho, it doesn't really affect me in anyway, because really, I don't really care if they don't want to buy an SSD, because it's their loss. and me? well, for the time being I have 3 SSDs and going to get a 4th soon, and enjoying the living crap out of it.

arterius2no, I have to completely disagree with you, I absolutely cannot understand your thinking, but to each their own.

I've owned 3 SSD's so far, I bought one for every rig I built for myself since SSD became available, and I have to say the difference is night and day, especially when used in something such as a laptop, because most laptops come with 5400rpm harddrives, the advantage of an SSD really shines in small files (as soon in random 4k scores). this isnt theorectical, this isnt gimmick, I can testify that I've saved loads of time from just installing programs alone.

It doesn't matter how fast your CPU is, or how great your graphic card is, the fact is that these days, the hard drive is the slowest denominator in your system, it creates bottleneck in an otherwise decent setup, this is also the reason why any machine with mechanical drive cannot obtain a Windows Index score higher than 5.9, Microsoft understood this very well, they have good reasons. I cannot tell the difference between computers with Core2 or i7 Sandybridge when performing hard drive intensive work, adding a fast SSD dramatically changed that. When building a well-rounded computer, it is important to remove the bottleneck of the system, in this case, the mechanical drive. Games are not the most harddrive intensive application, (and please, photoshop is only 500MB, so I can understand if you don't notice too much difference). so if you only use your computer for gaming, well then, thats great, but people have many different uses for them.

I own computers with mechanical drives, and I sometimes use them side by side with my SSD rigs, the mechanical drive is just unbearable, it takes forever to install windows update, takes forever to install something like adobe suite or autodesk software, takes forever to open up professional software I use to make a living. autocad2011 and 3dsmax2011 takes more than 15 seconds to open on a mechanical drive where it opens in 3 seconds on my vertex 3. I use these software around the clock, and my work needs requires me to multitask between several programs, the amount of time I save from just opening software is well worth the money.

many of my co-workers can also testify that using an SSD has been life changing, they never thought their computer was that fast, even on old rigs, putting in an SSD breathed new life into their machine, I just recently installed an SSD in my boss' rig, he was just speechless on how much faster it is than the old mechanical, there is pretty much 0 wait time on anything.For many people I know, they pretty much all agree buying an SSD was the best investment they've made in a long time. if you don't use your computer for heavy tasks, I can understand its not that much difference than the mechanical, but there people who uses 3+gig softwares (with many small files) on a regular basis, and SSD can really make a difference.

Lastly, OK so for some people who tried an SSD before, but thought it didn't make any difference - I doubt you've tried a fast SSD, there are many slow SSD's out there for a cheap price, but before you've used something like a vertex 3, don't hit the nail on that coffin yet. I sometimes wonder why I'm wasting so much time typing all this crap, the stubborn people are always going to be stubborn, in the end tho, it doesn't really affect me in anyway, because really, I don't really care if they don't want to buy an SSD, because it's their loss. and me? well, for the time being I have 3 SSDs and going to get a 4th soon, and enjoying the living crap out of it.

I used an Intel 80GB X25M SSD. I didn't say it didn't make any difference, I said the difference wasn't big enough because I couldn't get all of my games on it. Aside from games, I mostly open my encoding software, media players or browsers. None of these take very long top open, and none of them benefit from high transfer speeds during use. Once they're open, SSD did me no good. The only thing it made a huge difference on was boot up time, but with as much uptime as my computer has, it doesn't really benefit me. Small SSDs don't do me enough good. I need a bigger one.

Wile EI used an Intel 80GB X25M SSD. I didn't say it didn't make any difference, I said the difference wasn't big enough because I couldn't get all of my games on it. Aside from games, I mostly open my encoding software, media players or browsers. None of these take very long top open, and none of them benefit from high transfer speeds during use. Once they're open, SSD did me no good. The only thing it made a huge difference on was boot up time, but with as much uptime as my computer has, it doesn't really benefit me. Small SSDs don't do me enough good. I need a bigger one.

Exactly, the software that most of use open takes next to no time to open. And the really large pieces of software I open once and leave them open. The money for a 60GB SSD is better spent on 16GB of RAM that will let you leave all your programs open. The minor performance difference of an SSD doesn't justify the cost. Saving even 10 seconds the first time I open a program isn't worth it, and every time after that Windows has the program cached so even large programs like AudoCAD2011 open in under 2 seconds after the first time they've been openned. So saving a whole 10 seconds a day isn't worth paying more than $2/GB.

I bet there are people out there that will go on about how awesomely powerful their GTX580 is, and how huge the difference is over the GTX570, even though the difference is under 10% and not noticeable at all. They either suffer from the placebo effect, or are just plain stubborn and are lying to themselves to justify paying ridiculous amounts of money for something that really makes no difference.

newtekie1Exactly, the software that most of use open takes next to no time to open. And the really large pieces of software I open once and leave them open. The money for a 60GB SSD is better spent on 16GB of RAM that will let you leave all your programs open. The minor performance difference of an SSD doesn't justify the cost. Saving even 10 seconds the first time I open a program isn't worth it, and every time after that Windows has the program cached so even large programs like AudoCAD2011 open in under 2 seconds after the first time they've been openned. So saving a whole 10 seconds a day isn't worth paying more than $2/GB.

I bet there are people out there that will go on about how awesomely powerful their GTX580 is, and how huge the difference is over the GTX570, even though the difference is under 10% and not noticeable at all. They either suffer from the placebo effect, or are just plain stubborn and are lying to themselves to justify paying ridiculous amounts of money for something that really makes no difference.

Thankfully my 580 only cost me $400 shipped. :D

SSD's are still a good deal in laptops though. The only place where i'd invest into SSD's right now.
But when SSD's will reach current HDD price/capacity ratio, i sure will use SSD in my main system as well.