Could I use a 60-64 gb ssd for a windows 7 boot drive?

Honestly I think people over baby their ssd drives.

That is a good observation. I also think that some think an SSD is somthing special. But at the end of the day it is only another Sata disk that runs fast.

Runs slightly "faster" would be the correct phrase there. You are dealing a form of static memory over magnetic coating on the platters inside a typical mechanical drive.

Flash drives work on very much the same principle but are generally much smaller since the prices for a 64mb may run higher then for a 120gb SSD at this time! For a 128gb or 256gb model you are well on your way towards building a new case! Try some $700 for a 256gb flash drive more then the Micron 1tb SSD just announced which will priced under $600!

The real noticable difference however is not simply the technology but also which kernel is in use as far as the 32bit or 64bit Windows. With the 32bit the obvious swapping of data out to the drive is prevalent by way of the paging file meaning a slighter slower access time as well as accessing the drive more.

With the 64bit on the other hand you see more data preloaded into ram with less if any swapout to the drive depending on the software in use. That reduction in access time due to swapping out sees the greatest reduction as far as the minor performance hit. To be able to take full advantage of an SSD you need to look at all aspects if the goal is performance only as the reason.

Here the need was for workspace over how fast the drive was or I would have initially gone for a Raptor for the host drive prior to SSDs. Those were 160gb and 300gb for the largest models while seeing 36-37gb approximate with initial release and 74gb sizes as well. The 15,000rpm Raptors still remain small while the 10,000rpm VelocityRaptor models have reached the 1tb mark.

The one vulnerability seen by both Raptors and SSDs still effecting any other HDs as well to watch for is temps! The faster spindle speeds on the mechanical drive sees a critical need there while memory is also in need of seeing low temps. Generally you can assume an SSD would be a bit more durable in the long run however since it is solid state without any moving parts!

Since I do game a lot, the 4k read times were of importance to me.
All the jargon aside, it's definitely faster. In some cases things load so much faster I completely miss things like load screen hints (very common in games) because the load screen is not much more than a flash.
Not everything gets this benefit mind you. Some things just plain load slow.
Like anno 1440 or the sims 3.
Sandbox games like sleeping dogs, saint's row, gta etc all seem to perform much better in general. The tiny hitches I used to get when they have to run to the drive to pull new world textures, well that just doesn't happen anymore either.

Then there are some other benefits, like never having to defrag.
I've owned raptors in the past, they have the same problem all platter drives do. They get slower as they get full. There is also the issue ...especially with the raptors that when doing lots of small reads they often never even spin up to full speed, crushing the benefit of having them.

I'm a real believer in SSD's at this point. So much so I have two of them in this one machine.

kbrady1979 said:

What Flash Drives are you looking at that are that costly?

I think the original Raptors were 10k RPM as well.

SSD's don't have a problem with heat. If you mean the inside case temps are affecting the SSD, then something is seriously wrong.

The main difference between an SSD and a flash drive is a very specific controller......as far as I am concerned, the hardware might as well be interchangeable, because the controller is what gives an SSD 99% of it's performance. Nand memory these days mean very little in the grand scheme of things.

What flash drives are that costly? You haven't been shopping for the larger capacity models apparently. Have a look at one price for a 256gb I initially found priced for less elsewhere but this will show just how high they can be at times in this 2010 blog on a Kingston DT310 256gb model. Kingston's 256GB USB Flash Drive is $1,108

The price I had been finding was actually between $500-$600 while shopping around. As for the original WD Raptors I think you will find even the 36gb and 74gb models released in 2003 were 10k rpm with a life expectancy of 1.2million hrs. for reliability.

As for heat that was operating temps when a case isn't adequately cooled. Note since they are not mechanical they won't have any internal heat built up like you would see with a mechanical but more like your average dimm would be seeing. One of the main reasons is from not drawing the power from the supply you would see from a mechanical drive as a rule there.

How did we get on USB flash drives? I thought the OP was asking about SSDs. SSDs and USB Flash drives are not even close to similar.

essenbe said:

How did we get on USB flash drives? I thought the OP was asking about SSDs. SSDs and USB Flash drives are not even close to similar.

Both still use NAND technology or more commonly referred to as flash memory. Flash drives are a bit more limited in the number of channels used resulting in a lower performance since their general application isn't for OSs to start with. Then you add the usb controller vs Sata controller differences in as well.

Despite being used on usb flash drives can still be OSed however despite the performance hit for things like trying out the other guy's OS or for data recovery tools. Once you get into capacity with either SSD or flash drives you still run into the high prices and why the reference was made to flash drives earlier.

They're not in the same class, and as far as prices you're quoting over $1000 for a USB 256GB drive and a 256GB SSD is about 50 times faster and less than $200.