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From: VanguardLH on 12 Mar 2010 19:11 ToolPackinMama wrote: > On 3/12/2010 6:33 PM, VanguardLH wrote: > >> Just because Flash memory drives are newer doesn't mean they are ideal >> choices to supplant older technology. There are good uses for Flash memory, >> as in USB thumb drives or use in digital camera, but don't use it to >> supplant real system memory or the highly stressed pagefile on the hard >> disk. > > That's a tremendous post full of all kinds of things I didn't know. > Thank you. > > I wonder now if you think SSD hard drives are a bad idea? If I get one, and as I already do know, imaging backups would be scheduled daily to ensure that I can restore my system within a short time (or, at least, until I get a replacement drive whether magnetic or memory based). The SSD drives certainly make the OS and apps load and run a lot faster and speed is very addicting but burnout seems more likely and why backups (at short intervals) become even more important. After all, what are you going to do when that magnetic hard disk fails?
From: ToolPackinMama on 12 Mar 2010 19:31 On 3/12/2010 7:11 PM, VanguardLH wrote: > ToolPackinMama wrote: > >> On 3/12/2010 6:33 PM, VanguardLH wrote: >> >>> Just because Flash memory drives are newer doesn't mean they are ideal >>> choices to supplant older technology. There are good uses for Flash memory, >>> as in USB thumb drives or use in digital camera, but don't use it to >>> supplant real system memory or the highly stressed pagefile on the hard >>> disk. >> >> That's a tremendous post full of all kinds of things I didn't know. >> Thank you. >> >> I wonder now if you think SSD hard drives are a bad idea? > > If I get one, and as I already do know, imaging backups would be scheduled > daily to ensure that I can restore my system within a short time (or, at > least, until I get a replacement drive whether magnetic or memory based). > The SSD drives certainly make the OS and apps load and run a lot faster and > speed is very addicting but burnout seems more likely and why backups (at > short intervals) become even more important. After all, what are you going > to do when that magnetic hard disk fails? Oh I am obsessive about back ups. I copy everything that matters to at least three different places. I have my documents and cherished photos stored remotely... as well as on my netbook, and my second partition, and my external drive. LOL I don't believe in ghosting the drive though. That takes up a lot of space, and I really believe in a clean install for a new drive. I don't really mind reinstalling things, it's ~losing things~ that I mind.
From: VanguardLH on 12 Mar 2010 20:34 I don't do sector-by-sector image backups (even with compression). Like you said, just way too much disk space for that. I do monthly full image backups and daily incremental image backups. These are not logical file backups but image backups. Acronis TrueImage is very handy for this. I haven't yet tried Paragon's free Backup Express program to see if it saves images (full and incremental) or just does file backups. Sector-by-sector backups are only usable if you want to clone the drive. I figure SSDs have their place for personal or even workstation use but they could make servers too unreliable. I suppose, though, you could RAID-5 three, or more SSDs to return survivability and reliability of the server host. SSDs are still a lot more expensive. Of course, considering their higher performance, it seems only proper that you look at a host that boasts a SATA-3 (6GBbps) controller rather than get stuck with the slower SATA-2 (3Gbps). In trying to get the fastest SSD and magnetic disks, a couple example choices might be (and only considering a size sufficient for the OS+app partition): Solid State Drive http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16820148348 128GB SSD SATA-3 costing @ $479 $3.72/GB Magnetic Hard Disk http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16822135003 73GB 15K RPM SATA-2 @ $305 $4.18/GB The SSD is cheaper when looking at the fastest spinning magnetic hard disk (but much more expensive when looking at the common sizes and characteristics of magnetic drives bought by consumers). This SSD has a 3-year warranty whereas the magnetic drive is just 1 year. The SSD will be stone silent whereas the 15K RPM magnetic drive will be pretty noisy. Of course, average consumers would be disappointed that these are "small" drives compared with three 2TB SATA-2 7200RPM magnetic drives (for a total of 6TB of storage) that they could get for the same cost of the SSD. Yes, SSD would be a *lot* faster but at that cost would have 60 times less storage space. Well, my broadband cable connection costs 7 times more than dial-up service but being cheaper won't lure me back to dial-up. Speed is very addicting. I figure an SSD will be in my next build but that's a year or two away. I'll let the early adopters burn their fingers to shake out the SSD market (of course, SSDs really aren't new as I was reading about existing models over a decade ago; they've just gotten cheaper to make it a realizable option for many consumers (i.e., the product with the price curve affordable by enthusiasts). With the changes in CPUs over the last decade, it has remained very disappointing as to how decrepit has remained the mass storage subsystem.
From: ToolPackinMama on 12 Mar 2010 20:48 On 3/12/2010 8:34 PM, VanguardLH wrote: > I figure an SSD will be in my next build but that's a year or two away. > I'll let the early adopters burn their fingers to shake out the SSD market Ditto that. My new mobo has the SATA 3.0, so I am good as far as that goes.
From: Gary H on 13 Mar 2010 15:21
[snip] > >I don't believe in ghosting the drive though. That takes up a lot of >space, and I really believe in a clean install for a new drive. I don't >really mind reinstalling things, it's ~losing things~ that I mind. It is BETTER to do a clean install. It's also a lot slower. When you discover a need to reinstall the OS, it's often when you need the computer NOW. Keep at least one (restorable WITHOUT Windows already loaded) of everything. That's separate from the multiple data backups. |