[Palomine]

Available in-store or online with free shipping. Requires promo code.

Nothing perks up the performance of an old PC more than swapping out the HDD boot/system drive for a SSD.

ADDED LATER: I'll be re-using this thread to let users know of other/current specials and will re-title it accordingly (since the prices are only good for a day or two).

Please scroll to the most recent post to see the current item.

[ftl03]

Anand Tech have it reviewed: "slowest modern SSD drive" is their conclusion  

Pal adds: always prudent to check credible reviews before buying of course. Thanks ftl03.

[TheZookie007]

Well, now we know why it was so cheap

For me personally, unless an SSD is at least 256 GB capacity, I don't pay it much attention. As a boot drive, though, it works.

[Palomine]

Well, now we know why it was so cheap

For me personally, unless an SSD is at least 256 GB capacity, I don't pay it much attention. As a boot drive, though, it works.

I'm talking about using SSDs as boot drives, and to be honest even 64G is plenty for an OS and apps (I'm assuming even for Windows... I routinely boot a laptop with the full version of Ubuntu Linux and apps off of a 12G flashkey with room to spare). I don't think there's much point in having all your data on an SSD given how huge, cheap and reliable 3, 4, and 5TB regular hard drives are... particularly for data that's only used occasionally, like most image and video files (i.e.: your "archive").

As I posted about some time ago, I got a 128G Kingston SSD and velcrod it inside my ancient (2006) recycled PC and boot into Ubuntu (or Mint). Here's that pic, with the SSD on the right:



And I swear, for 98% of general computing tasks (web surfing, videos, writing/spreadsheets/basic graphics, etc...) this old PC feels every bit as peppy as the big i7 tower I've got (but rarely use) or my friend's $1,300-$2,200. new computers. The improvement when I switched from a HDD boot drive to the SSD was very tangible.

[BacE]

I personally use the Samsung EVO 850. they write almost as fast as they read.
€77,- for 120 GB
€110,- for 250 GB

[Palomine]

Today's one day promo-code special that might be of interest to some:

http://images.frys.com/art/email/110215_mon147hgf/mon_web.html?site=cemail110215#set2

...while you can do better on a cost-per-TB basis with a 3, 4 or 5TB drive, if you want 6TB in one box with just one USB connection, this ain't bad. The Western Digital "My Book" line are their basic series... a 2 year warranty I think. The enclosures are vertically oriented and about the size of a thick paperback book or small bible. I've got the 5TB ones myself and am quite happy w/them so far... they're relatively quiet, run cool and the activity LEDs are white, which I personally prefer.

I'll be re-editing the title of this thread to the name of the item currently on sale.  

[Palomine]

Just an update: I didn't buy those 6TB drives, but the same ones in the 5TB size instead, which were on sale for $109. each. No problems with them so far.

[bignatslover]

Just an update: I didn't buy those 6TB drives, but the same ones in the 5TB size instead, which were on sale for $109. each. No problems with them so far.

Fantastic news!

I have yet to take the plunge with an external drive - I have this fear that it might be too slow.  And yet for all of this fear I have, I have not done my due diligence to see if the external drive would in fact be any slower than my SATA-Connected 4TB Hitachi that I currently use.  I wonder things like would it matter if it is USB 2.0 vs 3.0?  It is my own fault for not knowing these things, as I just need to do a cursory amount of research first.

[Palomine]

Fantastic news!

I have yet to take the plunge with an external drive - I have this fear that it might be too slow.  And yet for all of this fear I have, I have not done my due diligence to see if the external drive would in fact be any slower than my SATA-Connected 4TB Hitachi that I currently use.  I wonder things like would it matter if it is USB 2.0 vs 3.0?  It is my own fault for not knowing these things, as I just need to do a cursory amount of research first.

I used to avoid external drives except for use as backups, but over the years I've gotten so used to using them that they now serve as both my backups and as (most of) my connected storage. Yes, I've consulted the bar charts that compare the advertised I/O speeds of various versions of USB, Firewire, eSATA... and of course, the newer/faster ones *are* generally faster (i.e.: USB 3 is faster than USB 2, Firewire 800 is faster than 400, etc...). However, let's be realistic: you don't always need the fastest possible I/O for every single thing. And other system factors come into play too of course.

Unless you're a working video editor or only play 4K videos, the reality is that even older I/O speeds will probably be adequate 98% of the time. My PC is a basic model almost 10 years old (so, a relatively narrow internal data bus and a very modest graphics card; also it doesn't have USB3, so my new USB3 external drives are limited to the slower I/O speeds of USB2) and honestly, weeks of heavy use can go by before I encounter any sort of system performance symptom that might possibly be attributed to finite I/O speeds. I.e.: you save a thousand JPEGs in a folder... what difference does it really make whether that folder lives on a USB external drive or on a lightning-fast SSD drive connected to your PC's internal SATA? The difference in load time for one vs. the other is very modest/often imperceptible... and even w/my old PC limited to USB2 I/O, I've got no trouble playing back 2K videos from an external drive w/o stuttering.

Remember: your OS, apps, etc... are probably going to boot and run from your internal drive... in my case a SSD connected to an internal SATA connector... THAT'S where most of the speed improvement that can be felt comes from (vs running from a traditional HD boot drive). But the vast majority of most folks' data doesn't need to reside on storage with the fastest possible I/O: it's accessed infrequently and when it is, a few microsecond's worth of delay during the load time will almost always be moot. When you figure how much more you usually pay per GB for faster drives, the choice (to use regular/common/cheap USB3 externals) becomes even easier for 98% of situations.

Pretty much most externals these days are USB3, though if you pay more, you can get them in boxes that also have eSATA and sometimes FW800 ports too (and of course there's NAS ...network attached storage too). I tend to use USB3 drives because they're common and inexpensive (I used to be a big FW fan when I was running Macs, but IME PC support for FW is iffy, so I've given FW up for the most part). Also, let me remind you that no matter which type of I/O you settle on for external storage, IME it rarely runs as fast as you'd hoped for really large data transfers. Anecdotally, this feels worse w/USB (where I'll start a backup and it writes at USB2 speeds but degrades to half that within a couple hours). I recall doing the same thing years ago on Macs w/FW800 drives and they'd maintain that fast FW800 write rate for hours and hours.

Just my two cents.

[bignatslover]

Unless you're a working video editor or only play 4K videos, the reality is that even older I/O speeds will probably be adequate 98% of the time.

In my case the most intensive use is to run six media player windows at once and then task-bar selecting "Show Windows Side by Side" so I have six beautiful women dancing before me.   

Remember: your OS, apps, etc... are probably going to boot and run from your internal drive

Yep.  OS speed doesn't seem to vary at all because of this.  But I *do* need my external drive to load those six videos of Abbi Secraa and play them without stuttering.   

this feels worse w/USB (where I'll start a backup and it writes at USB2 speeds but degrades to half that within a couple hours).

Oh yes I think everyone can relate.  I still use a standalone MP3 player, and connecting it via USB and adding songs to it is so s-l-o-w sometimes, I am reminded of the days when I was using a 1541 drive on my C-64 and had time to paint the room while waiting for things to load: