Hi, Giktayms! The computer today is so “a friend of man" that, it would seem, everything has long been known about its filling. Only here, in fact, iron is constantly under attack from the category of "people in the know advised," "I exposed a terrible conspiracy!", Not to mention "traditional medicine" and edits of the operating system at random. Today we will clarify some nuances regarding the speed, stability and progress in solid-state drives.

Incomprehensible Truth and Ecumenical Conspiracy

Some readers are already grinning, sitting at the monitors, and firmly believes that the truth in the component manufacturer's blog is not worth waiting. And to someone they see lush conspiracies and evil plans of the world government. Actually, being is in vain and everyone is wrong, because we, the inhabitants of the Matrix, should take any entropy philosophically and write off everything as tricks by Agent Smith.

But seriously - today we have to go through the popular beliefs of varying degrees of naivete. Therefore, do not twist your finger at your head, if we are talking about things that are obvious to most geeks - all questions are “based on real events,” so sometimes even some axioms will have to be voiced.

SSD is not a drive!

Multistage terms take root in Russian. Here the phrase “power supply” does not require additional explanation, “drive” is also an obvious mechanism even for a child. But the phrase "solid-state drive" is too cumbersome and incomprehensible. A simple person thinks that the pumped-collector guy who drives his debts out of clients with a solid body and forms accumulations following the results of these actions is a solid-state drive. You should not decipher the abbreviation “SSD” as “Ultra Speed ​​Disk” either, because there are no disks and moving parts in the SSD. Anyway, SSD is “cardiovascular activity”. Good health to all.



This shows the SSD and drive. These are different concepts.

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Wouldn't a properly cooked hard drive get any better?

It will not . HDD performance has reached the ceiling and is growing only due to a small “straightening”, a teaspoonful every two years. SSDs were faster initially, and, sorry for the expression, dynamically evolving to this day.

Combining hard drives in a RAID array is a good thing in terms of speed and reliability in the absolute, but in this case the “coalition” HDD will be slower. Just because hard drives compared to SSDs are like audio cassettes compared to compact discs. If you want to switch to the next song (get access to information) - even very fast rewinding of the film will be less effective than the laser that has been thrown to another area of ​​the disc. However, even this comparison is exaggerated, because there is no laser in the SSD, and access to the memory cell is in multi-threaded mode.



Even in harsh industrial environments, SSDs are always faster than RAID from hard drives.



Even SSHD hybrid hard drives, which have acquired caching technology in the image of solid-state drives, will always be slower and barely “jump” to the budget SSD of previous years. Because it is impossible to be “a little bit” solid-state drive and argue on the speed characteristics with the “full-bodied” representatives of the family.

What to upgrade: SSD or RAM?

Money to upgrade is not infinite, so you have to decide



Tomato or apple? Much better from any side . Yes, both of these components directly affect the responsiveness of the computer at work, only their specifics are different.

There is a sense to increase the operational memory, first of all, if the computer lacks the available volume in the work tasks. As long as the PC "keeps in mind" a pack of open voracious tasks - the wealth of RAM is more important. And SSD enters the role when you need not to “keep in mind”, but “remember / recall” something from the work done.

Example: Anya and Masha are two stylish and fashionable supermodels. Before going to the social rout, they need to remove their clothes from their luggage as soon as possible and put them on. Anya with dressing helps her friend, except that all outfits are packed in a tightly packed suitcase. Masha dresses herself, but snatches clothes from a special wardrobe closet. Which of them will be faster?

Deadly torrent clients and antiviruses

A limited number of rewriting cycles in SSDs makes people panic, so many are ready to “blow away dust particles” from a solid-state drive, if only it does not overwork.

Totally in vain. First, the lion's share of time antivirus shovels files already existing on drives. He reads them, not writes them down! Yes, updates of signatures arrive from time to time to the antivirus, but with such a degree of paranoia even the operating system on the SSD is not allowed to be installed - can you imagine how many times the contents of the service folders change during a working day?

Secondly, the amount of change is too small to sacrifice computer performance. SSDs are really designed to steer tiny files in huge quantities, and hard drives in similar scenarios are quickly “choked”.

In the end, optimistic and not very much SSD operation scenarios are already provided for by the manufacturer - we have a separate clear guide on TBW, DWPD and other scary words. And do not forget about the warranty, which for modern Kingston drives extends for 3-5 years of use. But to download torrents, if there is something to choose from, it’s better still to the hard disk. Because there are SUVs for fun, and there is - for traveling in the mud. Here HDD rather falls into the second category.

SSD speed degradation

SSD buy, first of all, for outstanding speed, so slow down these components is unforgivable. But the drop in performance as the memory is full still exists and is present on all modern SSDs without exception.

The TRIM service "improver" monitors a uniform load on the disk, distributes data and minimizes this effect. But in order to shift the conditional “boxes in the pantry,” it is desirable that the room was filled with them below your shoulder level, isn't it?

In modern drives, the situation with a full of storage is provided - for the controller, a symbolic amount of memory was initially allocated so that “emergency situations” did not happen. But, if you want to be firmly convinced that the SSD "breathes deeply" - leave free 10-20% of the volume of the drive.





Some SSDs also lose their combat capability.



This, of course, sounds ridiculous, but happened in the history of SSD, to put it mildly. miscalculations, when the data on the drives could "rotten" because of the manufacturer’s oversight in development. That is, the information was read, but very slowly. It's all about changing the voltage levels in the memory cells over time. In cases when the information in the cells was not “refreshed” for a long time, the SSD read it, as if with a CD covered with dust and scratches. We will not point the finger at the manufacturer of the problem model - just keep in mind that Kingston has never made such mistakes.

SSD do not get faster from year to year

Even as they become! You just need to look not at the most "epic" numbers, but at other information. Yes, when looking at the maximum achievable 550 / 520MB / s for sequential reading and writing, it seems that SSD manufacturers enjoy life in the same way as guys who slowly and lazily add processors + 5% performance with each new generation.

Remember how it was interesting in childhood to look through the glass of the car on the dashboard and see the maximum speed there? The coolest car in the yard among the boys was always the one whose speedometer was marked up to the most impressive figures. And no one was embarrassed that no one ever “ousted” this car to the cherished% n% km / h :)





It's not about maximum speed, but acceleration from a place and pickup, gentlemen



Only then came the understanding that for a car in a city, the speed of acceleration from a place is more important, or even the possibility of fast overtaking / rebuilding is already on the move. Here and at solid-state drives the same specificity.

Stop looking at the top speed of an old SATA-III interface in the end! The real speed of the SSD does not manifest itself when copying a single huge file into memory, but in conditions where medium and small files pile on from all sides, as is the case with intensive computer work. Exactly this “run-up” in non-ideal conditions is important, and it is called “random access speed”. A friend is in trouble, and the speed of drive speeds is in operations with small files, in blocks of 4 and 512 KB.

SSD is useless in old computers

SSD is always useful. It will make life easier for an old PC, even if it works in an outdated interface. For example, in motherboards with SATA-II, the difference in almost all scenarios, except monotonous copying of one file, will be scanty in comparison with SATA-III, to which HDD and SSD are connected in most new computers. Another question is that in this case it will be possible to limit the budget model in order not to overpay for unrealized potential.





As long as there is AHCI - the benefits of SSD are obvious



But in the case of SATA, the first revision of the situation is not so clear: in such cases, motherboards most often do not support the AHCI mode , which means that the “prevention and self-service” (TRIM) mode will not work. Therefore, the SSD will very soon begin to "lose heart" in terms of speed.

As for operating systems, the mainstream (Windows 7/8/10) accepts SSD as native. If only the above AHCI was included in the BIOS. In this case, additional configuration is not needed, even if you transfer the operating system with all the "giblets" from the hard disk.

Oversized SSDs are faster than smaller ones.

Funny belief comes from the era of hard drives, which in the desktop form factor were almost always faster than notebook 2.5 ”modifications. In the case of SSD, the situation, oddly enough, is almost diametrically opposite. Tiny drives of the standard M.2, the size of a cartridge on a game console, work much faster than the usual models with a SATA connector, which work in a connector designed for HDD and because of this can not fully develop the maximum speed. And the SSD in the mSATA form factor is a copy of the same desktop “boxes”, just in a compact size.





A larger SSD does not mean faster. Rather, on the contrary

You can erase information from a solid-state drive faster than from a hard disk.

Nothing like this - when 10 years for cartoons with painted nude girls will become a real sentence and they will come for you on an inconspicuous minibus, physically it will be very difficult to destroy data on the SSD. Qualified guys will still be able to read the information remnants.

Therefore - hardware encryption in the hands and paranoia in all fields, if it does not work out otherwise. Paranoid note: in Kingston drives, even inexpensive KC300 allows to encrypt files on the fly.





SSD is much more difficult to destroy in which case

SSD increases the number of frames per second in games

It depends on the “curvature” of the game itself, because the SSD, as a storekeeper, only distributes a pack of service game files of RAM or video memory in the GPU. And yes, he does it very quickly, so the download speed is reduced. In well-designed games, such procedures are carried out at the level loading stage, and are used very rarely during the game. Accordingly, the gameplay will lie more on the "bones" of the processor, video card and RAM.



In games that were created by alternatively gifted developers, sudden uploads of service files are possible right along the gameplay, and in such cases SSD will help out.

Cache size and “correct” file system

In SSD reviews, it is customary to savor the origin of memory chips and the size of the cache buffer . Moreover, sometimes it seems that the larger this buffer is, the better the drive will work. In fact, the difference lies in the same plane as megapixels in the camera of smartphones - not size, but skill is important. A much more important role is played by the speed indicators of the memory itself and the performance of the controller. In general, do not "worry."





Cache memory is just a servant, not a boss. Do not overestimate her



In the case of the file system, the main thing is not to stick the archaic limited FAT32 by mistake. In other cases, even allegedly harmful journaling systems for SSD will not harm the drive. The fact is that the controller, as a “painfully intelligent” employee, interprets the orders of the “superiors” (the operating system and file system) in the way that is convenient for him and controls the recording on the drive at its discretion. But in hard drives there was a completely different "vertical of power" :)

What else to read?

Some information about the dangers in buying used drives

Device modern SSD and models of the near future

Why SSD replaced hard drives and how it happened

Simple language about the design of solid-state drives



Buy good drives, do not fall for provocations and do not worry about trifles!



Thank you for your attention and stay with Kingston on Hiktatimes!



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For more information about Kingston and HyperX products, visit the company's official website . In choosing your kit HyperX help page with visual aids .