Solid State Hard Drives

[RobDog888]

I wonder that when "sectors" are exhausted for writting if the size of the drive will report the new smaller size. Thinking that over time you may see your drive size diminish if the logic is that way.

Or perhaps it just marks it as a bad "sector" and doesnt report any change in drive size.

[chris128]

I would imagine its the latter - I cant see them designing hard drives that just start to shrink over time :P

[Lord Orwell]

I would imagine its the latter - I cant see them designing hard drives that just start to shrink over time :P

actually it seems they did. According to documentation, the drives are actually designed with "extra capacity" which you don't actually have access to. Only the "wear-leveling algorithm" gives access to it as needed.

For a wish-list, i would like one of the dram-based ones. You can load them up with ram chips and the effective capacity is as large as you can load it. It has a battery and unloads the ram into flash memory on power down, so you have the best of both worlds. speed and non-volativity. Oh, and most hook into the pci-x4 slot.

[chris128]

According to documentation, the drives are actually designed with "extra capacity" which you don't actually have access to.

yeah so then the drive doesnt ever appear to actually shrink - you wont suddenly see your 64 GB drive showing that it is only 50 GB in explorer, thats what I meant.

[JuggaloBrotha]

i watched a thing on System about this. You know how you boot to your desktop and windows is still not really useable for a minute or so while all the background crap is going on? This doesn't happen with ssd drives. Couple this with faster booting and it's a win-win.

That's why I set my Win7 Logon background to the same image as my regular background, that 30 second pause went away after doing so.

Customize Win7 Logon Background

[RobDog888]

yeah so then the drive doesnt ever appear to actually shrink - you wont suddenly see your 64 GB drive showing that it is only 50 GB in explorer, thats what I meant.

So they put a safeguard in place so the user never "sees" the drive size decrease, good idea. Too bad there isnt a way to access and use the bonus space.

Say but then depending upn how long you use the drive, what would happen when the bonus space is used up.

[RobDog888]

Just read this article on Intels latest firmware update that gave a 40% speed boost.

http://www.tomshardware.com/news/Int...25-M,8944.html

[Lord Orwell]

latest tekzilla gave great ratings to a 3 1/2 inch bay adapter for ssds. It not only protects the drive, but it keeps it cool with venting. $19.95

[AsmIscool]

I have not worked in the industry for many years but with a platter you have data written on a physical surface. It was a long winded process and quite expensive but at least there was a chance. If you get a spike and your flash chip goes up in smoke I see no way of retrieving your data. There may be those that are a lot smarter than me out there but I am sure we have all said this to clients Ad Nauseum before but Backup, Backup, Backup if you want to use an SSD drive.

[chris128]

this page http://www.buzzle.com/articles/data-...ard-drive.html seems to indicate that you can recover data from SSDs just as easily as standard drives

[RobDog888]

Good to know that they are more susceptible to damage although that should have been assumed since htey are all electronic.

[chris128]

Good to know that they are more susceptible to damage

huh? Why is that good?

[RobDog888]

So more care can be taken to protect them. They are not as durable as others

[chris128]

Ahhh I see what you mean now. Mine still hasnt arrived anyway it was delivered again yesterday and no one was in again! Got to go pick it up from the depot on Monday now..

[RobDog888]

I hate it when that happens. Especially when its a package that Im really wanting to get asap. Well at least you will be sure to get it on Monday.

[chris128]

Well I went and got the SSD today, just finished installing Windows 7 on it and a few of my apps. It does seem a bit more responsive now and boots up and shuts down a bit faster It takes something like 6 seconds from me hitting the shutdown button to it being turned off lol

[RobDog888]

It takes something like 6 seconds from me hitting the shutdown button to it being turned off lol

I always knew you were a computer abuser!

So are you guys alll buying the 2.5" form factor drives?

[chris128]

Yeah mine was 2.5 " but I cant find any way to screw it into my case properly so its just laying on the bottom of the case lol

[RobDog888]

There are converter cases for 2.5" to 3.5" for about $20-$25 but I think you may only need something like a hard drive mounting kit.

[JuggaloBrotha]

Yeah mine was 2.5 " but I cant find any way to screw it into my case properly so its just laying on the bottom of the case lol

With no moving parts, I don't see why that would be a problem... until you move the comp that is.

[RobDog888]

Maybe possibility of ESD that may damage it?

[AsmIscool]

Unless it is a very poor design no production product for consumer use should have ESD risks. That is part of the design process. However the marketing department will tell you that there are no moving parts. It is a sales pitch. There are moving parts and they are called electrons. They are moving through an extremely fragile environment at a sub micron level. If something does go wrong it is likely to be catastrophic. ARF or Acceptable Rate of Failure is accepted at around 7.2% in industry. You do not want to be one of the lucky ones if your data is not safely backed up.

[RobDog888]

Sales tax is higher then that

[Lord Orwell]

Unless it is a very poor design no production product for consumer use should have ESD risks. That is part of the design process. However the marketing department will tell you that there are no moving parts. It is a sales pitch. There are moving parts and they are called electrons. They are moving through an extremely fragile environment at a sub micron level. If something does go wrong it is likely to be catastrophic. ARF or Acceptable Rate of Failure is accepted at around 7.2% in industry. You do not want to be one of the lucky ones if your data is not safely backed up.

I've had a worse failure rate than that with regular drives. And don't get me started on fans.

[RobDog888]

Yes I lose a HD every year
Its unacceptable failure rate IMO

[AsmIscool]

Actually you want to hear the fan in my switch. It sounds like a truck with bad air brakes. Designed in of course because the sales department wanted something that sounded impressive. Dont really want it in the room next to my bedroom all night though.