Chris Pirillo » solid-state

Are Solid State Drives Better Than Traditional Hard Drives?

Chris Pirillo — Fri, 23 Jul 2010 19:35:44 +0000

Are Solid State Drives Better Than Traditional Hard Drives?

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Over on our popular questions and answers site, bcgocubs asked how a computer will benefit when using an SSD. Also, they would like to know what everyone’s general opinions are regarding solid state drives vs traditional hard drives. A traditional hard drive has moving parts, but is quite inexpensive compared to an SSD. The solid-state drive is just that: suspended in a solid state with no moving parts. It may be more expensive to buy one of these, but many people are starting to believe that they are much better for your computer.

With a solid state drive, you’re going to have a lot more speed than you do with their counterparts. I personally prefer the speed of the SSD. There are measurable differences when you change over to one of these little babies. However, I had to pay through the nose to get one with some storage room to it.

It boils down to which is more important to you. If you’re looking for maximum capacity, you want a regular hard drive. If you want increased speed and performance, then a solid state drive may be right for you.

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Are Solid State Drives Better Than Traditional Hard Drives?

Are SSDs Good for Gaming?

Chris Pirillo — Thu, 28 May 2009 06:43:37 +0000

Are SSDs Good for Gaming?

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No, there’s nothing wrong with this video or your computer! I was just being my usual dorky self. You know, your computer can run that fast if you have the right hardware. There will always be slow components, of course – usually your hard drive. That isn’t the case if you have an SSD drive though! You might remember a few weeks ago, I did a review of Samsung’s stupid fast SSD. I was just flabbergasted at how quickly everything ran on my computer.

A solid-state drive is something that has no moving parts, and is just stupid fast. Many of you went out and bought your own SSD drive, and are reporting to me that you can’t imagine going back. I’ve noticed so much of a speed increase on my computer since changing over to the Samsung SSD. Programs that use a lot of data – like my instant messenger program – are just lightning fast compared to what they were on a regular drive.

Many of you have asked ‘how is game performance on an SSD?”. Of course it’s faster and better! When you copy your game data over to your drive, you know that it’s going to have to read the information. The faster the read time – the more responsive the game is going to be. Game response on an SSD is great to phenominal. When you’re gaming, you want to keep rolling… so get an SSD.

Fine, don’t believe me? I decided to demonstrate using Need For Speed: Carbon. I’ve already copied over all 5+GB to the Samsung SSD. I chose a quick and easy race, since I’m not the greatest at playing things like this. Heck, I try though! What more do you want?

Remember, the game loaded from a 5GB app on the SSD… and it was ready within a couple of seconds. That’s literally all it took! Think about how long it takes you to load a game like this on your normal drive. You’re jealous now, aren’t you?

You know what you need to do. You need to get yourself an SSD today! Who knows what the future will bring… but the present is stupid fast!

Thanks again to Samsung for sending this to me. My life is just so much better now.

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Are SSDs Good for Gaming?

Are You Ready to Buy an SSD?

Chris Pirillo — Sat, 25 Apr 2009 04:00:37 +0000

Are You Ready to Buy an SSD?

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What’s the bottleneck in your primary machine? For most people, it’s actually the speed of their hard drive. SSD is coming into its own, and can definitely clean up this problem for you. I received a review unit recently, and you can consider me a convert! Samsung sent the unit to me, and I have been flabbergasted at the results.

I’m going to be using this as my primary drive. My old drive was no slouch, but I could definitely feel the crunch when it was working. That’s less of a worry with SSD – there are no moving components. It’s insanely fast, I’m telling you. You’ll be amazed at the difference you’ll see!

I could put this into a notebook, but I’m not going to. I’m putting it into my Mac Pro. I’m going to keep the other hard drives that I had, and copy over files as I need them. Once I have everything off the old drives, I’ll format them and be done with them. I’ll have a pretty happy system, and I’m very much looking forward to installing it! My computer is going to be stupid fast!!!

Do you even know how fast your hard drive is spinning, and what your transfer rates are? I can guarantee that it probably doesn’t come close to what this SSD can do! This is a dream come true, and cutting edge.

If you want massive performance boosts, you need to take a look at one of these, for sure.

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Are You Ready to Buy an SSD?

Samsung’s SSD Hardware is Stupid Fast

Chris Pirillo — Sat, 25 Apr 2009 00:37:08 +0000

Samsung’s SSD Hardware is Stupid Fast

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I recently purchased a Samsung SSD drive and put it in my Mac. I decided to try opening a bunch of intensive programs all at once to see how fast they would open. It is STUPID FAST!! All of them opened before I could even count to two!

So what IS a solid state drive? An SSD is a data storage device that uses solid-state memory to store data. An SSD emulates a hard disk drive interface, thus replacing it in most situations. They’re light, and they’re fast. This makes them ideal for laptops!

These drives have been around for some time, but it is only recently that they have started to become available through normal channels and even available to the average consumers; despite that fact they are still far from affordable.

Not only are they stupid fast, they’re completely silent. You’d expect to hear your hard drive “working” when you’re doing something, right? Not with one of these babies. They’re just totally and completely quiet. What a change that is!

If you’re in the market for something like this, I’d definitely recommend the Samsung. It works very well, and I’m absolutely happy with it.

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Samsung’s SSD Hardware is Stupid Fast

Unboxing an Asus Eee PC Ultraportable Computer

Chris Pirillo — Fri, 25 Apr 2008 05:45:04 +0000

Unboxing an Asus Eee PC Ultraportable Computer

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The super lightweight solid-state drive Asus Eee PC showed up at my house the other day. It was sent to me courtesy of Asus, specifically thanks to an engineer of theirs who is a regular community member of ours. Without further ado, let’s do the unboxing!

As I open the box… something on the inside was glowing! I pulled out things like a copy of Microsoft Works, a battery notice, and some other papers. But.. that was it. There was nothing else in the box. I guess that makes this a non-event? I’m kidding of course. I already had the Eee PC running before I began recording.

It’s so small and light. It’s just insane. I have never found myself attracted to this size of a laptop. I have always craved power. There are times, however, that you just don’t need that much power. I’ve found that having a laptop near the television is a good thing. I may want to look something up or check my email during commercials, you know. Having a lightweight laptop for that purpose is great. There is a built-in webcam on this system, so I had to try it out! I’ve already uploaded a video to YouTube, called Asus Eee PC 4G Test Recording.

Here are some of the features of the Eee:

At 7″ and weighing only 0.92kg, you can take the Eee PC anywhere.
Bumps and shocks are no longer issues. With a dependable solid-state disk, you get unparalleled shock-protection and reliability.
Power-efficient design provides longer operating time when on the go.
With a rapid start-up time, the Eee PC is always ready to get into action.
No technical manual required with the specially designed, user-friendly and intuitive graphic interface.
You’re always connected with built-in WiFi 802.11 b/g that automatically detects and connects to the Internet at any hotspot.
The Eee PC includes the documents and the e-mails software, and a suite of other productivity software to help keep you on track.
Upload photos and videos and share them instantly on Flickr or YouTube without waiting till you get home.
Enjoy music and videos with extensive support for a wide range of digital multimedia.
Log on to Skype or other network, and you can connect with friends anywhere, anytime.
Clear up wire clutter with the built-in card reader, speakers, and microphone.

This little machine is an excellent buy, and perfect for anyone who doesn’t need a powerhouse of a laptop.

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Unboxing an Asus Eee PC Ultraportable Computer

Solid State Hard Drives

Chris Pirillo — Thu, 30 Aug 2007 00:02:30 +0000

Solid State Hard Drives

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http://live.pirillo.com/ – Swat sent me a video email, wondering what exactly a solid state hard drive is… and is it better than a regular hard drive.

A solid state drive is one that has no moving parts. This makes it faster, lighter and thinner. These types of drives are ideal for laptop (portable) use. As of right now, these solid state drives are only available in high end models of laptops. Eventually, I think this will be the standard.

Many people believe that the wave of the future is going to involve having a solid state memory that your Operating System runs from. This will greatly increase the speed of your startup, and probably increase overall performance. I’m tired of waiting! The future of computing is exciting, and I wish it were here now!

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Solid State Hard Drives

What is SSD?

Chris Pirillo — Tue, 05 Jun 2007 17:16:43 +0000

What is SSD?

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http://live.pirillo.com/ – N52 wants to know what SSD is, if it’ll be the future of storage, and the advantages and disadvantages of this technology.

The term SSD means "Solid State Disk" and it’s just that: solid. There are no moving parts whatsoever in a solid state device. Its main advantage is just that: no moving parts.

Since there are no moving parts, it means the device will consume less power (great for laptops) and be less susceptible to failure (there is no mechanical failure). Also, since there are no platters to spin up access to data is much faster.

SSD is the future, no doubt about it, but it does have some hurdles to overcome before it can ever replace disk drives on the desktop.

SSD costs a lot more per Gigabyte than conventional disk drives
These devices fail after a significantly lower number of writes than traditional drives.
Storage is significantly lower on these devices than the 1TB behemoths we have on the desktop nowadays.

What does all of this mean? You’re going to see SSD creep into your machines slowly: they’re not going to dramatically take over the desktop in one fell swoop. Take Microsoft’s ReadyDrive as a first step in this direction: it’s a laptop drive that uses 128MB of flash to significantly reduce the amount of power a laptop uses to access data on a hard drive.

In the next decade we’ll probably see SSD move toward the desktop. Eventually, when the technology becomes cheap enough, we’ll probably see SSD overtake the antiquated hard drive.

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What is SSD?