Short-Stroking - Would I gain Anything?

liquidfluidity

liquidfluidity

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I'm getting ready to upgrade my 150 RaptorX to a 80Gb Velociraptor. The drive is only used for the OS , some apps , and 1-2 games. Would I gain anything by short-stroking and only using - say - 50Gb? I may use the other space for storage but I don't need to as I have another drive dedicated for that purpose.
 
Instead of short stroking a velociraptor to 50GBs, why not just get a 60 or 80 gigabyte SSD? A quick price check shows that it's not much more expensive.
 
Not sure I'm ready for that commitment yet. I've started reading on them and it seems that there are still a few quirks along with the drastic price difference. I suppose if I could find a small ssd(Intel) for under $200 , I'd think about it a little more especially with tax time here. I'm also going to be migrating my current drive to it as it took me forever to get it tweaked to my liking. I have heard that migration from a HDD to a SSD doesn't work real well.

Only paid $80 shipped for the VR new. Have any links to an Intel SSD in that price range - new?
 
The 40GB Intel X25-V is only $120 (with free shipping), the 30GB OCZ Vertex is down to $85 (tonight only) at Newegg, and the 60GB version is down to $180. 80GB Intel X25-M are still kinda scarce so everyone still seems to have the price hiked up on 'em ($230+). I'd recommend any of those easily over any VRaptor, the difference is gonna be vast and most if not all quirks have been worked out.

Yeah there's been firmware issues, but we've seen that happen even w/regular HDs lately (Seagate's 7200.11 series for instance)... The Vertex line and Intel's X25-M / X25-V all support TRIM fully so there's no performance degradation issues as long as you don't fill 'em up all the way. Newegg, MWave, and Provantage all have the 40GB X25-V. I just ordered one for my netbook...

The only downside to the X25-V is the low sequential write speeds, but random read/write speeds still put any regular HDD to shame.

Migrating an existing install from a HDD to a SSD can be tricky but it can definitely be done... You just need to A) partition the SSD first (using your Win7 OS disc) and B) find an image backup program that will respect the existing partition and not re-create it to restore the image. It's not that complicated, might take you some trial and error depending on the program you're using but it's hardly impossible.
 
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P.S. If you're shopping at MWave click their banner ad at the top for $10 off any order over $100. If you're looking at the Vertex drives on Newegg use code SNCOCZ for another $10 off (the rebate will probably stick for a while but the 30GB drive at 'least will probably go back up a bit in price tomorrow, they had a Shellshocker going on it).
 
Thanks for the info, Impulse! I guess I hadn't realized that the smaller SSDs had come that far down price wise. Guess i need to do some checking around before I go through the installation of the VR.
 
I agree with impulse go the SSD route, the days of running an OS on a regular HD are slowly coming to an end. Once you experience the low access times on a SSD for windows you won't go back.
 
Would I gain anything by short-stroking and only using - say - 50Gb?
Click to expand...

Maybe a pubic hair improvement in specs but you'd never know it in the real world.

These 80GB VRs (I have one also) are already short stroked 150GB VRs....you'd be short stroking a short stroke! :D

I see you pretty much decide on an SSD anyway.

Just to let ya know, I went from an 80GB VR boot drive to an Intel 80GB G1 @ May 2009....after that I'm spoiled! :D
 
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