What is a SSD?

The sweet spot for size is 128 gb. You can go smaller like 64 gb but today you can easily find a 128 for under 100 usd. If you are a huge gamer and insist on all of your software and games being on the drive then larger are available. Otherwise a complete Office pro suite, photoshop, quicken, Nero, and lots of games can be very happy on 128-256 gb capacity. Many are finding the Samsung 840 pro a great drive, I have a Samsung 830 as well as 4 Crucial's and a lone 120 gb OCZ which I grabbed on sale for 49.00 usd delivered ! Once you clean install Windows which it will just rip through you'll be looking for other software to load as it handles it so quickly. Great tutorials here and advice when you get it and are ready to install !

I agree its the one upgrade you can do thats makes a huge real world difference, and YES. Worth the investment for OS and apps.

SSDs are much faster because of no moving parts and basically do not need to seek.


Without getting into the technical side as to why, imagine it like this.

Someone asks you a question.
You have the answer written down in your notebook. So you grab your notebook, flip to the page and recite the answer.

Thats how a standard HD works. It must spin up, find the data, then load it,.

If someone asks you that same question, and you recite the answer instantly, directly from memory.....
Thats how a SSD works. It just grabs it and loads it. No seek, or search time.

Perhaps a bad way of putting it, but you get the idea. SSDs can also read DATA at a much faster rate.
Sort of like Guy #1 (Standard HD) has finished reading pg1 of a book. Guy 2 (SSD) has just finished page 5,of the same book, in the same amount of time.

whs said:

The most common comment we hear here from first time SSD users is, "Why did I wait so long".

Pioneering the SSD was not an obvious task. I got my first OCZ 60GB (without Trim) for $265 in 2008. In those days there were few people that knew anything about it and I had to figure the beast out myself. The guys on the OCZ forum were no help either because either they were either nuts or their explanations were beyond my comprehension.

I still have this SSD and a recent health check certified it until 2022. I will replace it though with a bigger Vector which is already on my desk and use it as an external device.

I wasn't talking about you, Wolfgang, although you probably said something similar. I probably got my first one a year or 18 months after you. I don't even know how many I have now. I know I have 3 256GB ones now. I thought about buying 1 more 256GB and putting them in raid 0 so I could be the only one on the forum with a 1TB SSD.

kbrady1979 said:

essenbe said:

I wasn't talking about you, Wolfgang, although you probably said something similar. I probably got my first one a year or 18 months after you. I don't even know how many I have now. I know I have 3 256GB ones now. I thought about buying 1 more 256GB and putting them in raid 0 so I could be the only one on the forum with a 1TB SSD.

Feel free to donate one of those Samsung 830's to me......you know, if they are just getting in your way

How about a Samsung 840 of 120GB for $90.

Newegg.com - Building Your Ideal Setup or Buying Some Add-Ons? Don't Miss These Deals.

kbrady1979 said:

essenbe said:

I wasn't talking about you, Wolfgang, although you probably said something similar. I probably got my first one a year or 18 months after you. I don't even know how many I have now. I know I have 3 256GB ones now. I thought about buying 1 more 256GB and putting them in raid 0 so I could be the only one on the forum with a 1TB SSD.

Feel free to donate one of those Samsung 830's to me......you know, if they are just getting in your way

I'm a collector. Why break up the start of a good collection?