Have you thought about going back to HDD for primary storage on your desktop?

[WhoBeDaPlaya]

When can I get an 8TB SSD for ~$200?

Fixed it for you
(you can get a Hitachi Ultrastar He8 from a WD MyBook 8TB for ~$249)

 

[Puffnstuff]

I'm torn as my primary and secondary software and data drives are wd 1.5tb black's making my samsung 850 pro boot drive the only ssd in my desktop. I really want to move my software to a ssd and eventually replace all spinners moving them to relic status. My laptop and tablet are all solid state and I'd never go back to a slow mechanical drive in either of them.

 

[BonzaiDuck]

I'm torn as my primary and secondary software and data drives are wd 1.5tb black's making my samsung 850 pro boot drive the only ssd in my desktop. I really want to move my software to a ssd and eventually replace all spinners moving them to relic status. My laptop and tablet are all solid state and I'd never go back to a slow mechanical drive in either of them.

I have a lot of Blues and Blacks in the parts locker or in external USB/eSATA boxes. They come in handy for external backup when time isn't a priority.

I noticed how everyone has started building ITX systems in smaller cases. And I picked up a laptop with a 500GB 2.5" WD Blue in it. I replaced it with a Crucial MX100, moved the Blue drive to my brother's system for his 200 GB of audio files. All the systems in the house are equipped with a single spinner for file storage, and I don't think I'll buy another 3.5" spinner again unless intended for my server.

This time around, with the 6700K, I thought to integrate two 2.5" HDDs with either one or two SATA SSDs (including the boot-system). As an afterthought, I added a 250GB NVMe M.2 drive.

With the NVMe drive, every disk in the system excluding a media DVR drive is "fast" due to my caching strategy. So it isn't a matter of totally rejecting old-tech storage. And I can wait a year or more before I replace the Sammy 960 EVO with a 1TB Pro drive, while I still intend to do the same thing with it as far as allocating a 100GB volume for caching the slow SATA devices.

 

[VirtualLarry]

Heck, now I'm using M.2 NVMe SSDs as primary storage, and using 'slow' SATA SSDs for bulk storage. HDDs? People still use those, for anything but servers?

(I do have 2TB and 5TB HDDs in my NAS units, though.) HDDs for bulk storage only, not in workstations.

 

[BonzaiDuck]

Heck, now I'm using M.2 NVMe SSDs as primary storage, and using 'slow' SATA SSDs for bulk storage. HDDs? People still use those, for anything but servers?

(I do have 2TB and 5TB HDDs in my NAS units, though.) HDDs for bulk storage only, not in workstations.

I would have done what I did even if the only other drives in my system were SATA SSDs. I was driven by curiosity -- see my thread about "Bad-ass caching." So? I have a 2TB 2.5" Barracuda drive with sequential read bench results of ~ 8,000 MB/s. The SATA boot-system SSD shows about 20,000 MB/s. This, of course, integrates about 3GB of my 16GB RAM for caching purposes with the NVMe, and I wouldn't be getting those scores without the NVMe in the mix.

Should I feel foolish? The EVO M.2 NVMe only cost me $130. Can I not wait a year or more to see what prices of 1TB 960 Pro or equivalent are then? Maybe I can wait even longer . . . .

 

[corkyg]

Short answer . . . no!

 

[rchunter]

No way.....In my main pc I have.
2x samsung 512gb 950 pro
1x wd black 4tb
1x wd black 5tb

I have servers too just like everybody else but also still keep spinning hard drives in my main work pc.

 

[BonzaiDuck]

I think I had four Seagate 320GB drives running all the time in my Q6600 system of 2007. Since I started worrying about our electric bill or how we could reduce it, I've been attentive to the number devices running in every workstation. SSDs have made a big difference there.

But I still provision our front-end desktops with a spinner for storage if I think they need it. One of them doesn't. Another one got my 2.5" laptop WD Blue drive -- 500 GB. Other than my server, there's only one system now rocking a 3.5" HDD for storage and DVR. The new Skylake has two 2.5" hard disks in addition to the boot SSD and an NVMe M.2. It was important for me to attach cables to each and every SATA port before assembly: a barrel fan needs to be removed to pull any plugs off the mobo.

I lost two SATA ports for adding the NVMe to a PCIE slot. I'll just leave the SATA cables attached until I either need them again, or have occasion to pull things apart. But this all makes trouble for my plan of having some eSATA ports and some hot-swap bays that are useable.

So I just bought a $25 SYBA 4-port SATA controller for an x1 slot. Who cares about top-end spinner performance when the spinners are "external" drives or backups?

 

[ronbo613]

This is what I don't get. I always go with 5400/5900rpm to avoid heat and that old grinding noise. I don't see the point of 7200rpm for regular consumers with SSD anymore.

Faster hard drives are better for working with video and image files. These types of files get larger and larger all the time, that's why SSD storage is not economically feasible. 5400 rpm drives are fine for archival storage. I use hard drives at both speeds but don't notice any extra heat or noise from the 7200 rpm drives. Depends on the brand and model I guess.

 

[cbn]

Heck, it already is painful when you have to work on a customer's machine that does have a HD, and you are busy waiting...and waiting...and waiting...and did I mention waiting--especially on laptops!

I definitely agree this is true on the low capacity/low cache drives.....but you feel this is true even on the large capacity 3.5" hard drives with high amounts of cache?

 

[CA19100]

Not a chance would I go back solely to a magnetic HDD.

When I built my current box in 2012, I ended up going with a 500GB Western Digital black, a cheap 30GB Corsair SSD, and the Intel Smart Response SSD caching scheme. I expected it to just be a stopgap until I could afford a big SSD, but it actually worked really well; far better than I actually expected it to. I didn't replace it with a larger SSD until just a few months ago, because the system was still lightning fast where I needed it to be.

The larger SSD I bought failed in just four months, unfortunately. SanDisk was very easy with the RMA and replaced it, but the whole process took several weeks. During that time, I was back to the magnetic HDD, and that solidified my opinion that SSDs are the way to go, at least for the OS.

The SSD failure was nothing more than an annoyance, just as a hard drive failure would be, because I had an effective backup strategy. All storage media can fail; if you plan for it, it's a non-event.

 

[cbn]

When I built my current box in 2012, I ended up going with a 500GB Western Digital black, a cheap 30GB Corsair SSD, and the Intel Smart Response SSD caching scheme. I expected it to just be a stopgap until I could afford a big SSD, but it actually worked really well; far better than I actually expected it to. I didn't replace it with a larger SSD until just a few months ago, because the system was still lightning fast where I needed it to be.

Glad to hear Intel SRT worked well.

P.S. This year Intel is releasing Optane Memory in the form of a very small M.2 SSD (for Kabylake owners). It would be interesting to find out how this works compared to an older low capacity SSD (for cache).

 

[PliotronX]

True, but the freezer trick usually gives you a shot at grabbing some data off (worked with a few DeathStars aka 60GXPs I had back in the day), whereas an SSD is insta-gibbed.

The freezer trick worked both times I had tried it on my own drives in the 00s but every time we have tried it at work in the past few years, it has not helped. I don't know if the office is cursed because my coworker used it successfully at home too last year but not for his external drive at work LOL. Its certainly not a reliable plan and shouldn't enter the equation. We have to figure every single drive no matter the media type will crap out at some point. I have seen brand new SSDs die a few hours into service but every one I have installed myself have had no problems so I am fairly confident in them. It is a very mature storage tech. Their SDS is very real but I don't know why the discussion went there. The benefits from having an SSD as the boot drive far outweigh any concerns which should be quelled with proper backups.

 

[BonzaiDuck]

Glad to hear Intel SRT worked well.

P.S. This year Intel is releasing Optane Memory in the form of a very small M.2 SSD (for Kabylake owners). It would be interesting to find out how this works compared to an older low capacity SSD (for cache).

You'd have to wonder how it would work much better or worse than this:

Thread: "Bad-ass caching . . . "

with this:

PrimoCache

I'll bet (could be wrong) that they'll make it proprietary and capable only of a single caching task for a single storage drive with the M.2.

But you know more about it at the moment than I do. I'm plastering it around in every thread: I'm happier than a pig in shit with my new 960 EVO 250GB. And like Goldi-Locks and the three bears, concerning the bowls of porridge: "The size of this one is just right."

 

[Dave3000]

I will never go back to a mechanical HDD for a OS/Gaming drive. Previously I had a 512GB SSD and a 1TB HDD in my main PC and with the sizes games are these days I found myself running out of space on my SSD and having to install some games on my HDD. I recently purchased a 2TB SSD and now I can store all my frequently played games and my less frequently played games as well on this SSD and not have to resort to a mechanical HDD. This 2TB SSD has replaced my 512GB SSD, which I sold, and 1TB HDD. I also have a dual-bay external enclosure with 2x6TB WD Greens connected to a USB port on my main PC. Also my NUC (HTPC), has a 120GB SSD as it's only drive installed, with a 2TB portable USB drive connected to it.

 

[Charlie98]

I recently upgraded my main PC with a 512GB SSD; all my PC's have SSD's, even the lowly HTPC (even if it's a small, slow one.) Now, having said that... I don't trust SSD's, either, just like any other drive, so they are backed up on spinners at least twice on each PC.

Recently I was troubleshooting a friend's PC, I have a basic copy of the OS on a HDD and I booted into it to run some checks... it was agony, I tell you! Waiting... waiting... waiting...

 

[BonzaiDuck]

I will never go back to a mechanical HDD for a OS/Gaming drive. Previously I had a 512GB SSD and a 1TB HDD in my main PC and with the sizes games are these days I found myself running out of space on my SSD and having to install some games on my HDD. I recently purchased a 2TB SSD and now I can store all my frequently played games and my less frequently played games as well on this SSD and not have to resort to a mechanical HDD. This 2TB SSD has replaced my 512GB SSD, which I sold, and 1TB HDD. I also have a dual-bay external enclosure with 2x6TB WD Greens connected to a USB port on my main PC. Also my NUC (HTPC), has a 120GB SSD as it's only drive installed, with a 2TB portable USB drive connected to it.

I looked at that 850 EVO, and the reseller's page naturally had a link to the Pro. That would be "nice to have." All that on one, single SATA port. 5-year warranty, if you can trust Samsung.

Then again, my server has taken the file-storage burden away from the front-end workstations. I think the latter are actually over-provisioned with storage. And I have all these 1TB Blue drives I use for backups, either regular -- or on-the-fly. And one particular model of Startech hot-swap bays and caddies. And one particular model of Thermaltake external USB_drive boxes -- some converted to eSATA.

I can't wrap my brain around trying to sell a used item that was $50 to $80 new. I've given them away. But a few come in handy.

What I've done with my sig system is explained well enough in the "Bad-ass Caching" thread -- probably still on page one of this forum. Instead of one disk, I have three. Well, four, if you count the one currently mounted in the hot-swap bay. But I only see two without the caddy inserted.

So . . . for 2.5 TB, the total came to . . . mmmm . . . . approximately $385. As I watch my savings account, I'm going to contemplate what I can do with a 2TB SATA drive, versus a 1TB NVMe drive -- even versus a 2TB NVMe (there's a 960 Pro in that size, isn't there?).

You'd maybe like to squeeze more than 5 years out of a 2TB SATA SSD. Thinking about it on a straight-line basis, even a pensioner like me could say it would hardly matter. But I DO get a kick out of tinkering with the pile of cyber-shit I already own.

What will we be saying about 2TB SATA SSDs in five years? I'll probably be saying that I like to tinker with old cyber-shit.

 

[cbn]

Recently I was troubleshooting a friend's PC, I have a basic copy of the OS on a HDD and I booted into it to run some checks... it was agony, I tell you! Waiting... waiting... waiting...

What hard drive was this?

I've used some really slow ones myself.....3.5" with 8MB cache and 80GB to 160GB platters is just terrible.

 

[WhoBeDaPlaya]

I looked at that 850 EVO, and the reseller's page naturally had a link to the Pro. That would be "nice to have." All that on one, single SATA port. 5-year warranty, if you can trust Samsung.

I'm absolutely going to be flamed for saying this, but I put equal stock in Samsung and OCZ.

While I still use a few 840 Pro SSDs in various rigs, their f*ckup with the 840 EVO left a sour taste (and prior to that another f*ckup with the Spinpoint F4's silent bit-corruption firmware).

With OCZ, I've had nothing but trouble-free operation, though admittedly I've only used a few models (original Vertex 2, Agility 3, Agility 4, ARC100), but every one of those 20+ OCZ SSDs are still running 24/7/365 to this day.

 

[Erithan13]

I've thought about going back to spinners about as much as going back to single core CPUs and dial-up internet. The word 'revolutionary' gets thrown about so much in the tech industry but I think SSDs can legitimately be called that. It's easy to underestimate the difference they make until you go back to a system with a spinner and then you wait....wait....wait.....argh.....you know I can be a little bit nostalgic about the satisfying mechanically clunky startup noise of a HDD but I also remember so many times sitting there with the drive thrashing madly while the system is effectively frozen. Not to mention how slow booting could be and that delay between the desktop appearing and when you could actually start doing anything without bogging the drive down further. Oh and how trying to copy or backup anything would completely kill the performance as well since one poor little HDD had to serve everything.

I do like a SSHD as a compromise for a gaming/storage drive. It's certainly nowhere close to a SSD in pure snappiness but the cache does help to avoid the worst of the slowdowns you would get without it. When you start playing a new game the decrease in load times is quite noticeable as the drive learns what to cache.

 

[BonzaiDuck]

Storage and capacity. The only reason to use an HDD is storage and capacity and "persistence" if you plan to store data on them with long periods of being unpowered.

For me, though, a 5,400 rpm drive is not a slug the way I use it:

The write rate is actually higher than you'd expect for a spinner, and it must be the 128MB of onboard cache for the 2.5" Seagate barracuda.

And of course these are benchmark results -- in this case -- with Samsung Magician. I've run that benchmark several times, with the results varying between 3,000 MB/s and 10,000+MB/s.

I'm just not inclined to use anything less than an SATA SSD for a boot disk.

"But you have a 960 EVO M.2 NVMe 250GB! Why don't you use THAT as a boot disk?"

Well -- it enhances my SSD SATA boot disk . . .

"But it's not HARD-ware! It's software!"

Is "firmware" hardware or software? I see it as just an add-on extension of my OS. I don't care if I'm duplicating data between levels of storage. That's the "extra" hardware I pay for, but I pay less.

At least I'm not trying to integrate something like that first hard disk in history, that had to be transported on a truck.

 

[VirtualLarry]

Well, that "Read" benchmark of your "5400RPM HDD", is really just testing the RAM-cache of PrimoCache I think. A normal spinner without some fancy caching software is not going to turn in those kinds of numbers. (Higher IOPS than a SATA SSD? LOL.)

But it's interesting to learn that the benchmarking in Magician is drive-agnostic, and not limited to only Samsung drives.

 

[UsandThem]

http://www.portvapes.co.uk/?id=Latest-exam-1Z0-876-Dumps&exid=thread...d-960-evo-vs-crucial-mx300-vs-wd-red.2493272/

 

[BonzaiDuck]

Well, that "Read" benchmark of your "5400RPM HDD", is really just testing the RAM-cache of PrimoCache I think. A normal spinner without some fancy caching software is not going to turn in those kinds of numbers. (Higher IOPS than a SATA SSD? LOL.)

But it's interesting to learn that the benchmarking in Magician is drive-agnostic, and not limited to only Samsung drives.

I wouldn't still be working with the Primo for 2+ years if I'd had a problem with it, but 2+ years gave me time to try different things. I've tried it with -- and without -- an SSD cache thrown into the mix. The RAM wouldn't do that unless I had a 32GB kit and allocated a lot more than 3GB to caching tasks. Instead:

960 EVO in a DT-120 PCIE x4 card

It's an "experiment" in progress, but I've been celebrating daily for a week's time.

Magician reports that the drive "is not supported," but it runs the tests on any connected drive without a hitch. The results seem more or less consistent with Anvil, but the sequential read rate reported in the latter is roughly half. I think I should add a third benchmark program to the list. I'll look for one. But can I see it? Can I feel it? Yes. Absolutely. Positively.

Because I have dual-boot win7/win10, I split the physical disks between them including the cache. I can't mix caches between OSes, unless it's volatile cache established at boot-time. This means I need a common storage location for files (not programs) used by both OSes. Fine -- my file server is one of two or more options.

Currently, I've made 100GB of the EVO serve Windows 7, and Primo will allocate the same cache between caching tasks, so 50GB is used for the spinner, 50GB for the SSD. The results with an SATA SSD were good, but puny compared to this with the SATA deploying twice the caching-volume size, since I wouldn't cache a boot SSD to anything but RAM.

Before the NVMe EVO, I was caching to an SATA SSD, and the boot SSD was only caching to RAM -- which is volatile, unless I choose to save the cache at restart/shutdown. The NVMe caching SSD leaves me currently with a 50% hit-rate for the boot disk -- probably growing with more and varied use.

Complex? Maybe to set up. After that, just drive letters seen and unseen. No drive-letters for the Win 10 volumes when running Win 7 and vice-versa. Of course, the caching volumes are only labeled by Primo. Disk Management shows them, but they aren't "Windows" volumes.

Not being able to share SSD-cached data between the OSes is only a drawback of doing this with a dual-boot system. I'd have double the space available for either OS if I chose to install only one of them. Nor would I use an SSD or a cached HDD to store movies. For those types of files, you wouldn't use valuable space on a 1TB SSD (@ something like $300+ retail), when you could use a spinner for them. OF course, change the production costs, change the prices, that could also eventually change.

I just want to apologize for my prolix OCD posts about this of late. I've got to . . . . get over it . . . and . . . move on with my life!

EDIT: I see DigDog posted after this, but I'll insert my note. I found AS SSD and ran some more tests. I'll post to the thread I created and embarrass myself there.

 

[DigDog]

my entire system is under 100Gb, and i could get rid of 30Gb of porn (but i can't, because it's a collection of films with Brigitte Lahaie, and you can't find that kind of quality nowadays), so i really don't see the point of using a HDD when

Mushkin Triactor 240GB Solid State Drive - Internal, 2.5", SATA 3.0(6Gb/s), Upto 560MB/sec Read, Upto 500MB/Sec Write, 2 Million Hours (MTBF) - MKNSSDTR240GB-LT
Item#: 40192839 | Model#: MKNSSDTR240GB-LT

Price:
$74.99
$2 Shipping