SSD Usage

[lawtai]

So I recently built a new computer and bought the Samsung 830 128GB SSD drive, my first SSD. So far, I've installed Win7 and some widely used programs such as Office, Photoshop/Lightroom, and a game (League of Legends). I still have roughly 80GB left, as well as a separate 500GB HD.

Is there any reason why I couldn't just use my SSD as a normal HD and basically install everything on there, or store a bunch of stuff there? Other than photos, which I would plan on loading onto the 500GB HD, I don't really install much. Should I worry about the SSD dying sooner just from normal use?

I'll probably use this comp for 5 years or so, and just build another or buy another comp. Do I really need to worry about the SSD?

[jesseinsf]

Sure you can. SSDs wear out from "Writes", not "Reads". Just Google search what services needs to be disabled (If they are not already). Most drives have a 3 year warranty, while a few have 10 year warranties. You can move your temp internet folder and account folders to the HDD. For account folders you click Start, then click the account name on the top left. Just make sure you create folders for each folder you are moving. But make sure you create the "My Documents" folder and put the Music, Pictures, Videos, Downloads and "Saved Games" folder inside the My Documents folder on the HDD. I don't use a PageFile because I have 12GB of memory (Though you may need it). You should have a Pagefile if you use curtain apps like Adobe's Products. I would also move the pagefile over to the HDD and make it small.

BTW, you should not fill "any" drive over 75% of it's capacity.

[+Fahim S. MVC]

Sure you can. SSDs wear out from "Writes", not "Reads". Just Google search what services needs to be disabled (If they are not already). Most drives have a 3 year warranty, while a few have 10 year warranties. You can move your temp internet folder and account folders to the HDD. For account folders you click Start, then click the account name on the top left. Just make sure you create folders for each folder you are moving. But make sure you create the "My Documents" folder and put the Music, Pictures, Videos, Downloads and "Saved Games" folder inside the My Documents folder on the HDD. I don't use a PageFile because I have 12GB of memory (Though you may need it). You should have a Pagefile if you use curtain apps like Adobe's Products. I would also move the pagefile over to the HDD and make it small.

BTW, you should not fill "any" drive over 75% of it's capacity.

That's pretty much all FUD.

The only thing you need to do is make sure defragmentation is switched off - and Windows usually does that automatically for SSDs.

Otherwise, just use the SSD like any other drive.

[jesseinsf]

That's pretty much all FUD.

The only thing you need to do is make sure defragmentation is switched off - and Windows usually does that automatically for SSDs.

Otherwise, just use the SSD like any other drive.

Hi Mr. FUD,

Now why would someone move their account folders to another drive? Hmmmm, maybe because it is like the best backup scheme that you can do. Plus you don't want to fill up Valuable 128GB disk space, plus it saves allot of unnecessary writes to disk. And yes, Writes do wear out any drive whether it's an SSD or HDD. And why would you turn off Defrag? Well you would probably say that it is because Defrag isn't needed, when in fact defrag does wear out a SSD faster than it does a HDD. And yes, Windows does turn off required services that they beleive can harm a SSD. But it is always a good thing to check to make sure the services are turned off by default.

[ShadowPHP]

Hi Mr. FUD,

Now why would someone move their account folders to another drive? Hmmmm, maybe because it is like the best backup scheme that you can do.

The best backup you can do is a backup.

Hi Mr. FUD,

Now why would someone move their account folders to another drive? Hmmmm, maybe because it is like the best backup scheme that you can do. Plus you don't want to fill up Valuable 128GB disk space, plus it saves allot of unnecessary writes to disk. And yes, Writes do wear out any drive whether it's an SSD or HDD. And why would you turn off Defrag? Well you would probably say that it is because Defrag isn't needed, when in fact defrag does wear out a SSD faster than it does a HDD. And yes, Windows does turn off required services that they beleive can harm a SSD. But it is always a good thing to check to make sure the services are turned off by default.

Windows 7 will optimize itself if an SSD is being used - http://blogs.msdn.com/b/e7/archive/2009/05/05/support-and-q-a-for-solid-state-drives-and.aspx

I'd suggest just leaving everything at default on the SSD - You'll replace the drive long before you wear it out.

[jesseinsf]

The best backup you can do is a backup.

Windows 7 will optimize itself if an SSD is being used - http://blogs.msdn.co...drives-and.aspx

I'd suggest just leaving everything at default on the SSD - You'll replace the drive long before you wear it out.

I'm acting as if he is Savvy and you are acting as if he's dumb. And yes, I might seem to scare him a bit, but I'm just being truthful. Who knows, he may be a type of guy who gives his HDDs and SSDs a beating all day long. So my vision is basically a worst case senerio.

Also, I Beleive I said that Windows basically optimizes itself by turning off curtain services that cause allot of writes to the SSd. But it's good to make sure that what windows is suppose to turn off is off. When I started using a SSD; not all required services were turned off automatically until a year ago when there was an Intel Driver update for the controller.

[+Fahim S. MVC]

I'm acting as if he is Savvy and you are acting as if he's dumb. And yes, I might seem to scare him a bit, but I'm just being truthful. Who knows, he may be a type of guy who gives his HDDs and SSDs a beating all day long. So my vision is basically a worst case senerio.

Also, I Beleive I said that Windows basically optimizes itself by turning off curtain services that cause allot of writes to the SSd. But it's good to make sure that what windows is suppose to turn off is off. When I started using a SSD; not all required services were turned off automatically until a year ago when there was an Intel Driver update for the controller.

Firstly, there is little evidence to suggest that your SSD won't outlive its usefulness - that is you will stop using it before it stops working. Defrag is pointless on an SSD because it is a random access mechanism (not a spinning platter like a traditional hard-drive where the location of data is important to the overall performance of the drive), and yes, switching it off does reduce wear - and that is the only thing that Windows does automatically (since Vista I might add), because it is the only necessary optimisation to make.

The let's think we can engineer windows brigade, also like to think they know better than Microsoft in the optimisation of the OS or the vendors of the SSD which have spent time developing wear leveling alogrithms, so try the following, all which is totally pointless:

1) Switch off the page file or move it to a spinning platter drive. I know, we'll take a file which is there to make Windows perform better and use its advanced memory management algorithms, a file accessed more than any other on the computer and tell the computer it does need it or move it to a slower piece of storage - because that will help with machine performance.

2) Swtich off super-prefetch. Again, we'll remove the cache that Windows automatically builds for itself to optimise its performance after adding a bit of hardware to optimise performance, therefore not gaining the best out of the hardware - taking a step back and two steps forward.

3) Move Temporary Internet Files and other such caches to a spinning platter therefore slowing access to them and reducing overall system performance - sounds like a great idea.

4) Make sure you only fill the disk to 75%. Never understood this one - so when I but a 128GB, I get a 118GB drive and I should only use 88.5GB of it? HELLO PEOPLE - SSD manufacturers have developed adavnced wear levelling algorithms to make sure your SSD wears down evenly - some even keep some of the flash to use when the normal stuff wears out. Stop thinking you know better.

Back when a 64GB SSD was expensive, I am sure there was a good reason to move some stuff onto a cheaper, more capacious type of storage but now SSD prices have tanked and 128/256GB SSDs can be had for (more) reasonable prices, there is no reason to really get the best performance out of your SSD and use it for all files on your computer without these stupid tweaks that actually do nothing.

[lawtai]

I've done some of the things typically suggested, but for the most part have left everything as default. I did notice that disk defrag wasn't actually turned off, but I had TRIM enabled. Not sure why Win7 didn't detect everything for the SSD.

[neufuse Veteran]

4) Make sure you only fill the disk to 75%. Never understood this one - so when I but a 128GB, I get a 118GB drive and I should only use 88.5GB of it? HELLO PEOPLE - SSD manufacturers have developed adavnced wear levelling algorithms to make sure your SSD wears down evenly - some even keep some of the flash to use when the normal stuff wears out. Stop thinking you know better.

Even now Samsung with the 830 line of drives makes suggestions like that... Even their samsung magician recomments you set aside 10% to 25% of their drive as over provisioning not in use space that it can swap blocks with if needed. Not saying its correct, but the SSD mfg themselves are pushing for that kind of idea.

[Shane Nokes]

Indeed, and Superfetch/Prefetch/Readyboost should also be automatically disabled by Windows if it's an SSD with adequate performance as it's actually faster. This is actually stated in documentation from MS.

[SuperKid]

Just do what you should always do and backup your important data!

[protocol7]

Indeed, and Superfetch/Prefetch/Readyboost should also be automatically disabled by Windows if it's an SSD with adequate performance as it's actually faster. This is actually stated in documentation from MS.

Interesting. I got my first SSD last week and did notice that Defrag was turned off for the two partitions I cloned to it. Now I just checked my Services and Superfetch is set to manual. And my Prefetch folder just contains the default few files.

In my case the only change I made when moving to the SSD was to disable file indexing. I never needed this. Pagefile and hibernation were already disabled.

[uus831]

I have an Intel SSD on my laptop (120GB) and i use it for everything (No other storage in my laptop). Is it safe to use it upto less than 1% free space left?

I use it for Visual Studio (a lot of temporary files) so the drive get hammered a lot.

Been using the drive for over a year. I have not disabled page file, because if the computer crashes, then there is no debug dump file.

By the way, there is no Intel SSD toolbox for Windows 8, and I'm planning to upgrade to W8 this weekend, do I need to install Intel SSD Toolbox (old version) or don't install at all?

[Shane Nokes]

Weird. The page & hibernation functions shouldn't have been affected. My system has both enabled (on 8 Pro here). Defrag was already disabled and actually set to do the TRIM functions automatically. Prefetch & Superfetch were off. I do leave file indexing on though since I have a ton of files & use search fairly often.

I have an Intel SSD on my laptop (120GB) and i use it for everything (No other storage in my laptop). Is it safe to use it upto less than 1% free space left?

I use it for Visual Studio (a lot of temporary files) so the drive get hammered a lot.

Been using the drive for over a year. I have not disabled page file, because if the computer crashes, then there is no debug dump file.

By the way, there is no Intel SSD toolbox for Windows 8, and I'm planning to upgrade to W8 this weekend, do I need to install Intel SSD Toolbox (old version) or don't install at all?

3.0.3 should work just fine. Just set it to Windows 7 Compatibility Mode before attempting the install if you're doing a fresh install, or you'll get a weird installer GUI error that will block install. Once you do that though it works just fine.

I wouldn't recommend using it all the way up to 1% free space. You want to leave some free space purely for error fallback.

[protocol7]

I mean I'd already disabled the pagefile and hibernation before I got the SSD. I use neither of them here.

[threetonesun]

I have an Intel SSD on my laptop (120GB) and i use it for everything (No other storage in my laptop). Is it safe to use it upto less than 1% free space left?

I use it for Visual Studio (a lot of temporary files) so the drive get hammered a lot.

Get a cheap, small USB external drive and write to that. You could probably find an 80GB one in a case for pocket change on Ebay.

Even if running it down to 1% doesn't prove to be an issue, I imagine the system warnings about running out of space get annoying.

[Jason S. Global Moderator]

aahhhhh im so tired of SSD folklore. it's just a hard drive. use it as you normally would.

all this stuff about reads and writes, and "dont fill it over a certain amount" is nonsense. the vast majority of people will never pound their SSD enough to 'wear' it out.

[neufuse Veteran]

aahhhhh im so tired of SSD folklore. it's just a hard drive. use it as you normally would.

all this stuff about reads and writes, and "dont fill it over a certain amount" is nonsense. the vast majority of people will never pound their SSD enough to 'wear' it out.

I find it funny also especially since you can now buy Enterprise class SSD drives which are still MLC drives not SLC like you would expect used as storage servers... HP has one we looked at this past year that has 28 SSD drives in a MSA storage array expensive as heck, and if write was an issue, this is where you would wear the drives out fast... hundreds of people reading and writing to the arrays day in and out... I know our MSA box right now with 14 HDD's gets about 10TB of data read a day and about 1TB of changes / writes a day...

[Astra.Xtreme]

You're not supposed to fill a mechanical HDD over 85% because of how the data is written on the platters. By filling up a HDD too far, you cause strain on the heads since they have to constantly travel across the platters to access the data. Obviously the more empty space, the less the heads have to move. Mechanics wear out.

A SSD has no moving parts and is just an array of NAND gates, so this sort of wear doesn't occur. Yes, the NAND has a limited write capacity, but there are algorithms and garbage collection to ensure a certain gate isn't beat to hell.

So overall, filling a SDD up to 100% doesn't hurt anything. If you are constantly filling and emptying it, then yeah it will affect the life of it obviously, but I doubt anybody does writing to that extreme of a level.

[neufuse Veteran]

You're not supposed to fill a mechanical HDD over 85% because of how the data is written on the platters. By filling up a HDD too far, you cause strain on the heads since they have to constantly travel across the platters to access the data. Obviously the more empty space, the less the heads have to move. Mechanics wear out.

I haven't heard ideas like that since the 1980's! This is virtually irrelavent today, especially with the load balancing algorithms that the hard drive firmware uses to spread data around the drive as its written to prevent excessive head movement.

[Astra.Xtreme]

I haven't heard ideas like that since the 1980's! This is virtually irrelavent today, especially with the load balancing algorithms that the hard drive firmware uses to spread data around the drive as its written to prevent excessive head movement.

I'm sure there are algorithms that do such a thing, but you can't deny the fact that if you fill the drive to 95% as opposed to 50%, you are causing quite a bit more wear and tear on the heads. No algorithm in the world can compensate for mechanical wear. That's exactly why SSDs were created.

[neufuse Veteran]

I'm sure there are algorithms that do such a thing, but you can't deny the fact that if you fill the drive to 95% as opposed to 50%, you are causing quite a bit more wear and tear on the heads. No algorithm in the world can compensate for mechanical wear. That's exactly why SSDs were created.

wear is definatly an odd thing on magnetic media, head movement between track 0 and the closest tracks to it can cause more wear then going from track 0 to the outmost track.. mainly due to the linear nature of the head motor movement stepping back and forth such a small distance quicky.. creates more heat, more noise.. just not as good as ssd's all around..

[uus831]

is there any intel tool that i can use to boot up my computer to secure erase my ssd before installing win8? I'm not too keen on using linux based tools, not sure if its actually does secure erase.

intel ssd toolbox requires the drive to be unmounted to secure erase, and that's impossible for a drive in use.

[Shane Nokes]

The reason I don't recommend filling it up to the last 1% is that if for some reason there is a failure on portions of the memory it can at least attempt a graceful recovery. No matter what the technology is, always have a sensible approach to data retention & recovery. Best practices state that unless you have a proper backup mechanism that you shouldn't fill a drive just in case of random failure of portions of the storage sectors. That can still happen on an SSD, but for different reasons than on a standard drive.

[Shane Nokes]

is there any intel tool that i can use to boot up my computer to secure erase my ssd before installing win8? I'm not too keen on using linux based tools, not sure if its actually does secure erase.

intel ssd toolbox requires the drive to be unmounted to secure erase, and that's impossible for a drive in use.

The best way to still be able to use the Intel utility is to just toss the drive into another machine temporarily and perform the secure erase from there. There's not a bootable iso from Intel to perform this function, unfortunately. :(