SSD/HDD

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Doug99

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I'm configuring a new build desktop PC.
It will have a 1TB SSD as primary storage, with an option for additional HDD storage.
Why both?
Cheers All
Doug
 
Go with the SSD as it will be 10 times faster than a mechanical HDD. You do not need the speed for a storage drive but it is a very good idea to have a second drive for storage so that if your primary drive goes down then at least all your important files should be safe on the secondary drive. That is, of course, assuming you save all your important stuff to your secondary drive. You will be surprised at the number of people that I go to who do not backup their important stuff. They also say yeah but I have a partition on my primary drive where I store all my stuff. No good if your primary goes down. The partition will go with it along with all the important stuff.
 
Fred Blogs said:
Go with the SSD as it will be 10 times faster than a mechanical HDD. You do not need the speed for a storage drive but it is a very good idea to have a second drive for storage so that if your primary drive goes down then at least all your important files should be safe on the secondary drive. That is, of course, assuming you save all your important stuff to your secondary drive. You will be surprised at the number of people that I go to who do not backup their important stuff. They also say yeah but I have a partition on my primary drive where I store all my stuff. No good if your primary goes down. The partition will go with it along with all the important stuff.
Click to expand...

You raise an interesting point, inadvertently or not. The secondary HDD may well be subject to the same encryption as the primary SSD. Without the encryption key, the back up is worthless.
 
...and if your chosen motherboard supports it (which most do these days), look for an NVMe (PCIe) drive rather than a SATA SSD. Prices at the moment are similar, but the interface is far faster and you don't need extra space to mount the drive, or run data and power cables.
 
256MB SSD for Operating System and programs

2TB HHD for your data (if you can - add a 2nd 2TB HDD & Mirror the the HDD)
You will need to change the 'path' in the OS for your data.
 
Diver Fred said:
256MB SSD for Operating System and programs

2TB HHD for your data (if you can - add a 2nd 2TB HDD & Mirror the the HDD)
You will need to change the 'path' in the OS for your data.
Click to expand...
I would have agreed with you a few years ago, but given the price of solid state at the moment, 256GB is really stingy for a C: drive, when a decent name 1TB drive is only £35.
I wouldn't even spec a HDD for a storage drive any more. I still back up to spinning rust, but for daily use, there really isn't a need for the whine of a mechanical drive! :)
 
RandomGrinch said:
256GB is really stingy for a C: drive
Click to expand...
My C is 75mb. Small makes it easier for backing up. Also easier to have a duplicate on a second drive. A standby boot partition is very handy when something goes wrong. For even more safety, I keep an offline copy of the boot partition on a drive that powers off with a custom switch.
 
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SSD drives are lovely - fast and silent- but beware. I've just had one die on me- no warning (as i've had in the past from spinning rust about bad sectors or similar)- went from absolutely fine to totally dead overnight.
No loss of essential data but i have lost some device drivers (thanks Sony for deleting your support site) so a bit irksome.
 
oldbutnotdead said:
SSD drives are lovely - fast and silent- but beware. I've just had one die on me- no warning (as i've had in the past from spinning rust about bad sectors or similar)- went from absolutely fine to totally dead overnight.
No loss of essential data but i have lost some device drivers (thanks Sony for deleting your support site) so a bit irksome.
Click to expand...

I had, perhaps. naively assumed that the Intel Rapid Storage Technology program would warm me if anything was amiss. However, yeah, I guess that if part of a NVME board fails, you are instantly stuffed.
 
Just back everything up, as you would have done for every drive, ever. I haven't seen any stats, but I'd bet that SSDs are similarly reliable to HDDs. Usually a HDD failure is fatal too, unless you send it to a lab, they can sometimes recover data but this shouldn't be something you plan to rely on.

You can always reinstall windows, it takes time but it's not precious. I run a business and wouldn't want the downtime, so I keep complete drive images of all PCs on an external drive using VEEAM software, I refresh the images every now and then, but the computers don't generally change much other than Windows updates, which would all happen automatically anyway if an old image was restored.

But your own documents, photos etc need backing up, locally and online.

If my drive failed I'd buy a new one, slap the system image on it then update my documents, job done.
 
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