Is now the time to buy SSDs?

P

patrickgerry

Weaksauce
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Aug 20, 2005
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How much more time do you guys think affordable and dependable SSDs will become mainstream? Are we at least a year away? I am torn between upgrading my laptop drive from a 5400rpm 160GB drive to either the 7200rpm scorpio drive or just wait another year for better SSDs.

Thanks in advance
 
I've been holding back... but the recent G.Skill Titan and OCZ Apex drives with dual controllers seem to be doing good.

And if OCZ ever releases it, the Vertex supposedly will improve on those by adding a cache (and supposedly going with better controller chips).

I'm gonna wait for the reviews of course, but I think the OCZ Vertex, which will start at $130 for a 30GB model, might be the first one I'll consider buying, which doesn't cost a king's ransom.
 
I would say SSDs still aren't ready yet, and need about another 6-9 months as products continue rolling out. The current batch of SSDs, from what see, just aren't worth it except to the super-high end enthusiast. You might think, well, these SSDs are way better than a Raptor, which many people advised to get, but there is a key difference:

Hard drive technology moves very slowly. Since it's the bottleneck in I/O operations, you take what you can get, and unfortunately, the Raptor was the best thing you could get. SSD technology moves very quickly. By getting one now, unless you have a lot of money to spend (ie. waste), you're setting yourself up for regret later. Also, currently, SSDs are better but not in all areas and not by much in all cases, so that's another factor.

Personally, I think only the OCZ Vertex and the Fusion IO drive look promising enough to invest in, at this point in time. They also haven't been released, but I'll definitely be waiting until they're ready.
 
In short...NO
Its not always a good idea to be an early adopter / guinea pig.
Read this and you'll understand why i say no.
http://www.pcper.com/article.php?aid=669

Good news is , hard drives are getting CHEAP, while we wait for all the early adopter/beta testers to get the SSD kinks worked out for us. :D
 
my recent experience with an affordable SSD resulted in a product return. I was forced to use some windows steady state program in order to get the thing to stop hickupping and write sequentially, which then resulted in reboot times that were well simply too long for me to deal with...

until these things work flawlessly out of the box with your OS of choice, I'd say the aren't ready, even if they are cheap.
 
SSDs are certainly the wave of the future, but are still high end and cutting edge right now. They have some issues on some systems, particularly with writing.

I am currently playing with an array of 4 X 30 gig OCZ Solid drives plugged into a Perc 5i controller. It is working well, but it cost me about $500 bux for a 120 gig drive. I'm glad I did it though.

Oh, I still have to track down a different rev of firmware for the Perc 5i. The current version on board does not always recover from a warm boot.

Don
 
ssd has a disgustingly low mtbf, very slow write speeds and costs more. *puke*
 
You are incorrect on two out of three of your points.

MLC SSDs have MTBF comparable to enterprise hard drives.
SLC SSDs have MTBF higher than enterprise hard drives.

2nd generation MLC SSDs (apex, etc) have write times similar to a velociraptor, with higher 4k random writes than a velociraptor.
SLC SSDs have never had a problem with 4k random writes being too low, and generally have write speeds similar to a raptor.
 
Apex is more like 1.5 Generation. The vertex with it's new controller (as opposed to the old controller in RAID) is a second gen drive.
 
I'm still waiting for them to drop in price so I can build a carpc.
 
I'm still holding out, SSD's aren't quite yet there for me.
 
Loving my RAID0'd SSDs. Now IS the time for me. Goodbye Velociraptors - it was fun.
 
don't know exactly what u mean by replace..but no, ram is necessary and still will be and operates differently


SSD's are getting tempting...but tempting isn't the point in time to buy, once performance is superior all around and prices are slightly cheaper..that will be the time, 5-12 months probably

and they will only continue to get better and larger until they overtake hdds :) in a few years
 
If my overall computing experience is better with a new technology, and by selling my current storage, nearly making up the difference for the new storage, why not. I am experiencing the benefits from SSD now, today. It's like anything else we buy. Graphics cards etc. You'll pay a little bit of a premium to have the fastest stuff. It's all relative. I have been one to buy every revision of the Raptor and lots of 'em. Fast storage is important to me. Others? Not so much. The same people saying it isn't time to jump on SSDs, quite possibly just dropped $1K+ on Tri-SLi vid cards... it's all about what YOU deem as a priority where you'll spend your money. Some people just refuse to pay more than $x on a hard drive, but they won't even think twice about paying $x for a video card that'll be obsolete in 6 months.....
 
Dozoy said:
Could SSDs (or something similar) possibly replace ram?
Click to expand...
Not SSDs, in any case. Read access time on SSDs is still in the 100-usec range, while RAM is 10k times faster at ~10 nanoseconds.
piako said:
ssd has a disgustingly low mtbf, very slow write speeds and costs more. *puke*
Click to expand...
More like, disk has a ridiculously high MTBF. Stated numbers are usually in the tens of years, while SSD numbers are usually 10k or 100k writes per block.

"Slow write speeds"? Latency, perhaps, but compared to disk transfer rates of the more recent SSDs are pretty good.
 
... SanDisk will be releasing new SSD drives this year.
Click to expand...

c25_3g20ssd_60gb_rightp6uf.jpg


Affordable Third-Generation SSDs Based on Multi-Level Cell (MLC) Flash Technology, Equivalent to a 40,000 rpm Hard Disk Drive (HDD).
Click to expand...

c25_3g20ssd_120gb_top338n.jpg


The G3 SSDs are more than five times faster than the fastest 7,200 RPM HDDs and more than twice as fast as SSDs shipping in 2008, ...
Click to expand...

c25_3g20ssd_240gb_angle6qi.jpg


The G3 SSDs provide a Longterm Data Endurance (LDE) ... sufficient for over 100 years of typical user usage.
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g320ssd20family20photo47nw.jpg


The SanDisk G3 SSDs will be available on sandisk.com for do-it-yourself (DIY) enthusiasts. “An SSD upgrade improves the user experience like nothing else you can do to a computer.”
Click to expand...

Products SanDisk

Press Release
 
Twice as fast as SSDs shipping in 2008? So it does 500mb/s? Lets see: "anticipated sequential performance of 200MB/s read and 140MB/s write"...I guess not. Late to the game and Intel is still beating them. I'm personally sticking with my SLC SSD that I got last year.
 
If you're waiting for the technology to plateau, similar to the relatively slow increases in performance we've seen in mechanical drives the last 5 years, then you'll be waiting a while. Like I heard somebody say, If you want the performance of SSD, buy today, knowing you're buying on obsolete product as soon as UPS drops it off on your doorstep. I'm ok with that. I't just like every other component I buy then sell, it's just happening a little faster with SSD.
 
SSDs aren't "ready" in my opinion until they can beat raptors on price/GB *AND* performance across the board.
 
Sabrewulf165 said:
SSDs aren't "ready" in my opinion until they can beat raptors on price/GB *AND* performance across the board.
Click to expand...

I second that. I'm gonna wait till I can see what kinda reliability they really have though. No test you can do in a lab can truly compare the test of time spent being used by the average user imho. I'd also like to see how they fare under high load. I use my drives pretty heavily and keep them almost completely full.
 
Sabrewulf165 said:
SSDs aren't "ready" in my opinion until they can beat raptors on price/GB *AND* performance across the board.
Click to expand...

That will never happen- If that happens, then Raptors will never sell. The price will always be ahead of SSD, no matter how cheap SSDs get.
 
Griff805 said:
That will never happen- If that happens, then Raptors will never sell. The price will always be ahead of SSD, no matter how cheap SSDs get.
Click to expand...

In theory SSDs should be cheaper than mechanical hard drives - fewer moving parts and less complicated design should translate to lower development and manufacturing costs. Eventually we'll get there, we're just at the beginning of the curve right now.
 
Syntax Error said:
Come back to us in five years. ;)
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Lol, I understand what you're saying- but what I meant was that by time SSD is at the price that Sabrewulf165 wants it, the raptors will not be produced anymore...

I know that the prices are going to drop drastically in the next year... duh... ::D
 
I'll be one of the first ones to adopt SSD once they become price-competitive with platter-based media for sure.

Of course, manufacturing processes and marginal cost-per-unit has to come down on par with the already established and very large multi-billion dollar hard disk drive industry in order to be price-competiive...after all, no sane company wants to sell at a loss (unless of course, you're Nvidia ;))

I suspect that as flash NAND memory and transistors get smaller and smaller prices will eventually slope down, but we'll see how the market reacts and whether or not the platter-based hard disk companies have any tricks up their sleeves regarding overall raw data capacity and appealing price-per-GB...it could very well be that hard disks are going to be around for a long time, relegated to massive storage needs under RAID or whatever's out there in the future for redundant storage (some have talked about storage matrices and such...that's a nice idea), but only time will tell whether or not SSD will become an enthusiast part geared towards the market of those who previously bought 10,000RPM/15,000RPM disks and for laptop use, due to its lower heat, power usage, and durability.

Though I certainly won't mind a $100 1TB SSD...dream on. :p
 
I am very happy with my SSD's but can't say it was a cheap setup. I'm sure in less then a year one drive will out perform my two in RAID 0 but not a big deal because I have two laptops to shove my Intel SSD's in to. Even a single SSD killed my V-Raptor. Yes the write speed is slower but the small 4k writes were faster on the SSD by far. Overall my system boots faster and feels very snappy. If this is just a glimpse of what SSD has to offer I can't wait to see whats next.

INTELRAID0.jpg


INTELRAID0CDM.jpg
 
Copyright said:
I am very happy with my SSD's but can't say it was a cheap setup. I'm sure in less then a year one drive will out perform my two in RAID 0 but not a big deal because I have two laptops to shove my Intel SSD's in to. Even a single SSD killed my V-Raptor. Yes the write speed is slower but the small 4k writes were faster on the SSD by far. Overall my system boots faster and feels very snappy. If this is just a glimpse of what SSD has to offer I can't wait to see whats next.

INTELRAID0.jpg


INTELRAID0CDM.jpg
Click to expand...

I'm on a dell laptop at the moment, i get 25mb/s average read. That's not a typo, 25mb/s read. Just thought i'd make you feel better about your super fast setup.
 
I got a 64gb gskill ssd for a game only drive and am really happy with it... I am not sure I would want to put my OS on an SSD quite yet.. but very soon, yes.. :)
 
I am getting close to getting one for my laptop. I don't use much storage on it, and the speed is attractive. I am looking at the intel drive hard. That Corsair drive looks nice too. The theoretical #'s look slower on it, but I have read that it gives a very consistent performance as it uses the samsung controller.

The OCZ Vertex is on my list too, but I have an uneasy feeling about that company because of all the complaints made on their other ssd's.
 
just a question, is it true that SSD's have a limited number of writes? Therefore, making them have much shorter life-span than conventional HDDs?
 
fe_918 said:
just a question, is it true that SSD's have a limited number of writes? Therefore, making them have much shorter life-span than conventional HDDs?
Click to expand...

Intel states that worst case would be 5 years. I personally have never owned any drive for that long. The drives I have state the MTBF to be 1,200,000 hours.
 
Tomson said:
I'm on a dell laptop at the moment, i get 25mb/s average read. That's not a typo, 25mb/s read. Just thought i'd make you feel better about your super fast setup.
Click to expand...

lol, well you probably have more $ in the bank then I do right now! :D
 
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