Solid State Hard Drive - DPChallenge Forums

Canon EF 24-105mm f/4.0L IS

09/23/2011 09:34:59 PM · #2

Originally posted by kirbic:

I think Apple will have success with the Thunderbird port. It's the kind of out-of-the-box thinking that we've come to expect from Apple. It's really a re-packaging of data-transfer protocols already in place (PCI Express, Displayport), but the potential is enormous. Connect multiple peripherals including data storage and display on one cable.
Time will tell whether the PC market picks up on it or not. I see the workstation market as potentially the place where adoption would be most rapid. that would be driven by the need for high-capacity, high-speed external storage and advanced display support.

ETA:
All that aside, SSD is going to be the storage option of choice where a fast, moderate-capacity internal drive is needed.

Like Nordlys said, Thunderbolt was developed by Intel with collaboration with Apple. The debut on Macs will help popularize the standard, as it did with USB, and many PCS will get Thunderbolt next year when Intel rolls out their Cactus Ridge chips. Meanwhile, SSD is far from a sure bet as the storage option of choice going forward even for moderate capacity. A 4TB Pegasus RAID costs $999 and transfers 800GB/s over Thunderbolt, and 1-2TB drives will probably become widely available within a matter of months and beat SSD on both price and performance.

The combined protocols of Thunderbolt open up some interesting possibilities, too. Apple's new Thunderbolt display is essentially designed as a full workstation dock for laptop users. It has Thunderbolt and MagSafe connectors on the end of the cable, so you can charge your laptop while Firewire and USB ports on the back of the monitor serve as hubs for all sorts of desktop peripherals� all running over that single cable.

Message edited by author 2011-09-23 21:41:24.

Nordlys

Canon EOS-60D

Canon EF 100mm f/2.8 USM Macro

09/23/2011 01:57:35 PM · #3

Originally posted by kirbic:

I think Apple will have success with the Thunderbird port. It's the kind of out-of-the-box thinking that we've come to expect from Apple.

According to Apple's webpage, Thunderbolt began at Intel Labs.

09/23/2011 12:20:05 PM · #4

09/23/2011 11:26:10 AM · #5

Originally posted by scalvert:

Originally posted by gcoulson:
If the SSD is too expensive, only option I see is a 10,000rpm drive. Not as good, but best of the leftovers.

Apple's new Thunderbolt ports have opened up a third option. Current Macs can get about 200MB/s with a LaCie Little Big disk... and that's with 5400RPM drives! They're fairly cheap, too: 1TB for $399 and 2TB for $499. Daisy chaining multiple drives makes 'em go faster, and they have 7200rpm and SSD versions, too.

Sigh...no Apple in my immediate future!

Medoomi

Canon EF 35mm f/1.4L USM

09/23/2011 08:54:44 AM · #6

Originally posted by scalvert:

aaah, very cool. I was wondering how long before thunderbolt ports were up and running.

must. go. see.

Spork99

Canon EOS M6 Mk II

Canon EF-M 22mm STM Lens

09/22/2011 10:45:30 PM · #7

We're moving to exclusively SSHD's at work...we could get more performance by upgrading the antique software we're running, or using Excel to do every goddamn thing, but dammit we'll have bad-ass hardware.

scalvert

Canon EF 24-105mm f/4.0L IS

09/22/2011 09:25:33 PM · #8

Originally posted by gcoulson:

If the SSD is too expensive, only option I see is a 10,000rpm drive. Not as good, but best of the leftovers.

Apple's new Thunderbolt ports have opened up a third option. Current Macs can get about 200MB/s with a LaCie Little Big disk... and that's with 5400RPM drives! They're fairly cheap, too: 1TB for $399 and 2TB for $499. Daisy chaining multiple drives makes 'em go faster, and they have 7200rpm and SSD versions, too.

Sony SAL-1855 DT 18-55mm f/3.5-5.6

09/22/2011 07:23:00 PM · #9

Originally posted by lawrysimm:

As long as there's enough open space (about 30%) for the wear-leveling algorithms to work well, the lifetime of an SSD, even in use with an OS, is *far* longer than for a spinning hard disk. It's not intuitive, but it's true. Now, like any device, they can still fail for reasons not related to wear-out. That's quite another matter.

lawrysimm

Sony SLT-A57

09/22/2011 07:11:35 PM · #10

The problems with SSD's is that each area of flash memory can only be written to a finite number of times, so they utilise wear levelling to try and constantly spread the data about so prolong the life of the drive.

So, an SSD is great if you write to it rarely and use it as storage from which you read frequently, and the access is really fast. The problem is most people use the SSD as a boot drive for the operating system and store their data elsewhere.

Well, the operating system will constantly be writing to that SSD (especially if pagefile.sys is on there and you're short on RAM) so the life of the drive will be seriously reduced.

They are certainly a fad due to the "newness" of the tech and the speed they provide, but personally I see them as a short term fix until a more durable solution arrives. Personally, I cast see the cost/benefit tradeoff at this time.

09/22/2011 04:23:15 PM · #11

Originally posted by kirbic:

My problem is that I need one of the larger drives, which raises cost significantly. My current set-up results in 160GB of space for OS and apps, and I'm running at about 108GB in use. In order for the wear leveling algorithms to work well on the SSDs, you need to maintain a minimum of 30% free space. So I'm right at the limit for a 160GB SSD. If I could pare down, I might make it, but I probably need to consider something a little bigger.

If the SSD is too expensive, only option I see is a 10,000rpm drive. Not as good, but best of the leftovers.

Canon EF 100mm f/2.8L Macro IS USM

09/22/2011 11:50:40 AM · #12

giantmike

Canon EOS R6

09/22/2011 11:28:46 AM · #13

I just put in an order for an SSD myself. I have been watching for prices to drop and reliability to improve, and I now believe it's a decent time to buy. I went with a 120 GB drive which will be my OS/Application drive, but I also will be doing photo editing (mainly Aperture and the plugins) there before I send the final results to the external data drive.

I will try to remember to update this thread with my experiences with this setup.

jagar

Samsung Galaxy S9/S9+

Sony Sonnar FE 2.8 35mm ZA

09/22/2011 11:24:51 AM · #14

I have my os and applications on a SSD and all my other stuff on a normal drive, the start up time is amazingly quick and post processing is also quicker and of course everything is so silent, a must for me from now on.

Neil

Fujifilm X-T30

Nikon AF-S NIKKOR 24-70mm f/2.8G ED

09/22/2011 10:49:17 AM · #15

I added one to my last PC as a data drive for my XML files (which I do a lot of postprocessing on). Increased the speed of my processing by a factor of 10. I bought a larger one for my newer computer...but I haven't installed it yet because my new computer unfortunately doesn't have a lot of expansion space or extra SATA ports (actually, I have one extra port...and I don't mind leaving the drive sitting on the bottom of the case in a small ICE cage I bought...but I want to install two!

09/22/2011 10:35:42 AM · #16

Originally posted by gcoulson:

If you can stand the noise, maybe some Velociraptors in the meantime?

I'd be afraid they'd hunt and eat my other drives ;-)

09/22/2011 10:34:47 AM · #17

Originally posted by kirbic:

Pricing is still keeping me away, though. I can easily afford it, but I don't consider it a wise use of funds. I expect that within 12 to 24 months, price & performance will be at a point where I will be making the jump.

Yeah, right now SSDs are all the rage. I'd wait for the novelty to wear off a bit, and the longevity/reliability of the drives to improve.

If you can stand the noise, maybe some Velociraptors in the meantime?

09/22/2011 09:54:55 AM · #18

I've been toying with the prospect of replacing the RAID array which I use for my OS & apps. It's a pair of 80GB 7200 RPM 80GB drives in RAID 0, and it tops out around 160MB/s sustained throughput. Some of the newer SSD options could put me closer to 500MB/s, with a lot lower latency.
Pricing is still keeping me away, though. I can easily afford it, but I don't consider it a wise use of funds. I expect that within 12 to 24 months, price & performance will be at a point where I will be making the jump.

Medoomi

Canon EF 35mm f/1.4L USM

09/22/2011 09:41:07 AM · #19

If you're thinking of upgrading components, your performance increase depends totally on where your bottleneck currently is, but if you're buying a new system, you'll notice a big speed increase with a SSD drive.
Whether it going to make editing video a breeze, is another question--rendering full HD files maxes out most systems.
(I'm running with two Intel X25-M's @ 225MB/s throughput each)

09/22/2011 08:25:33 AM · #20

Cost:Performance benefit is debatable.

Personally, I believe in using a small SSD (40-60Gb) for the OS and some other small apps you use a lot. Then have a big, fast HDD (7200-10000rpm) or two (RAID?) for the rest.

bnilesh

Canon EOS-5D Mark II