Should i put the OS on Isolated SSD

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theshaddii

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Nov 19, 2012
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I am about to put together my first computer. I Bought three hard drive. One 60gb SSD, one 512GB SSD, and one 2tb HDD. My original plan was to install the OS and hardware drivers on the 60gb and use the 512gb for program and games leaving the 2tb to handle mass media storage. But I am wondering if that is the best way.
My second thought was to install OS and drivers along with programs and games on the 512gb and use the 60gb for SSD caching the 2tb. My mother board is the Asus sabertooth x79 so I know it supports SSD caching I just don’t know if you can do SSD caching on a secondary drive or if it is even beneficial.

I would really like your thoughts on the matter for the best way to set up the system.
My other components include
I7 3930k processor
32gb corsair vengeance ram
H100i cooler
Gtx 680 graphics
1000W PSU
 
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corbeau
If I were you I'd put the OS on the 512GD SSD. I have windows 7 on my 64GB SSD and my programs on an HDD, even with several optimizations, I only have around 13 GB free on the SSD, not a great place to be.
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corbeau

corbeau

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If I were you I'd put the OS on the 512GD SSD. I have windows 7 on my 64GB SSD and my programs on an HDD, even with several optimizations, I only have around 13 GB free on the SSD, not a great place to be.
 
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WyomingKnott

WyomingKnott

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Aside from the fact that you might find 60 GB cramped for Win7 after a while. Use the 512 GB drive for OS and games, as corbeau said. 60 GB will be tight for Win7 after a while. What a luxury to have a 515 GB SSD!

I doubt that caching a data drive will give you much improvement. Do you have a laptop or other machine that would benefit from the 60 GB SSD? Sell or trade or return it?
 
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theshaddii

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What kind of optimizations. What else to you have on that drive as win 7 is only supposed to require 20gb?
 
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ericjohn004

ericjohn004

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I think the best way to go is to put your OS on a 120GB SSD. The reason why it's important to have only your OS on one disk is because the chances of it getting corrupted are much lower. The chances of corruption are lower because if you install only your OS on this SSD and maybe just a couple highly used programs, you can download and install all of your games and everything else on your HDD, and none of these downloads will corrupt the OS. Plus your OS won't all bloated and it'll never start to perform slower like they normally do.

Plus, what I do is, I put only my OS and the programs I use daily on my 120GB SSD, then I make a 50GB partition of my mirrored SSD with my OS and programs Installed on it on my HDD. So when I have to reinstall for whatever reason, everything will be JUST like I had it. And all my other programs on my HDD won't be affected either because it'll only be the SSD that'll be deleted. This is another reason why it's good to have just your OS and a couple programs on your smaller SSD. It's the absolute BEST way to go. To me it's important to have your OS isolated.

Edit: BTW, I find 60GB to be plenty as long as all you have on there is your OS. Nothing more. It should only take up half of those 60GB at first. Maybe more after updates and whatnot. Just don't put anything else on there and you should be fine. I have my OS AND numerous programs on my 120GB SSD. And out of 111GB, I STILL have 77GB FREE. And I have a lot more than just the OS on there.

So yeah, your 60GB SSD should be JUST FINE.
 
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ericjohn004

ericjohn004

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As far as caching goes, you do see a great performance improvement while transferring data from say, a USB 3.0 thumb drive, to your cached SSD. The problem is, you still have that 17ms latency of an HDD. Even caching doesn't solve that problem. So your programs, although moving much faster, will still seem to be slow because of the lag between you clicking on it, and it opening up.

I had a 64GB mSATA with a 1TB HDD and I thought of the caching thing too. But I ended up just using the 64GB mSATA as a 64GB SSD for a specific set of programs. I find it's always good to have certain things isolated from one and other. This way your drive isn't reading and writing on so many programs at once. It only has certain programs to worry about and nothing more. This is another reason to keep your OS isolated as your OS's disk only had the OS's reads and writes to worry about, and not any of the numerous programs you may be running.
 
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WyomingKnott

WyomingKnott

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Ericjohn004, he doesn't have a 120 GB SSD. He has a 60 and a 512. I think that you are drifting off-topic in a few ways.

My personal opinion is that SSDs are so fast that, for normal (unbenchmarked) use having OS and programs on the same SSD is no performance hit. Ericjohn004 does have a point about restoring the OS without affecting games, but keep in mind that most games use the registry and you could end up with OS and games out of sync, not working.
 
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theshaddii

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Well i may be able to get my hands on an intel 510 series 120gb SSD (but thats a big maybe. we have an extra one at work i would have to talk the boss into selling it to me cheap.)

I have already had the 64gb drive to long to return or exchange it. I could sell it but lets say for a second i decide to install everything on the 512gb. is there somthing beneficial i could do with the 64gb. Maybe make a mirrored back up of the OS...my case has one of those Xdocks on it that reads SSD drives it that make any difference in your answer.

I know i must sound like a novice and for intents and purposes i am. I actually am having a friend help me assemble and he knows what he doing. I just need help making up my mind what is best. 2 days till we assemble. That how long i have to make up my mind.
 
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WyomingKnott

WyomingKnott

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Nothing wrong with being a novice; most of us were once. I wouldn't do backups to an SSD. No need for speed. I'd pick up _two_ external drives to use in your dock. Alternate backups. If one fails, you still have the other.

I have 12 bare drives that I use for backup purposes.

If you do heavy video editing or photoshop you could put your scratch space on the 60. If you have another machine that you has a mechanical OS drive you could cache it. My personal opinion is that with a 512 GB SSD you really don't need anything other than normal-speed data and external backups.

My usual answer is "you could send it to me," but I can't think of a use for it in my systems. OS on SSD, as well as software and such games as will fit. Data, music, videos, My Pictures, and My Documents on the HDD. It's just simpler that way. Do backups.
 
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theshaddii

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Video editing hit the nail on the head. That the main reason i am building this machine. Render times on my current machine are easily 4 times longer than the acttual video and i am only rendering in 720p.

As for using it for scratch space i am not sure. U see many of my videos exceed 60gb because they are not compressed well by fraps.

I am planning on keeping my old machine but i thought a mother board had to support SSD caching and i am not sure if the one inside this HP does. Any thoughts on that?
 
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corbeau

corbeau

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I moved the Swap File, Temp Files, lowered the max for system protection, redirected save files for some games (because even if you install the game to a separate drive the save files still go on the primary unless you redirect them, which doesn't always work). but after 2 years, with OS+updates, Microsoft Office, and anti-virus+updates, the SSD just gets a little full over time. Plus every time you install a program, including games, even if most files are saved to secondary drive(s), it still uses a bit of your primary drive (this forced me to install visual studio to a VM before I dual booted with server). Gotta go with bigger than 60gigs for the long term if it's your primary machine.
 
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ericjohn004

ericjohn004

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Your 60Gb SSD IS plenty large enough for your OS. I don't see why you don't just put your OS on there. Like I said, I have windows 7 all updated with some programs and I still have 77GB left over on my 111GB SSD. Use it for your OS. That's what I would do for sure.
 
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