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Best SSD setup in a system

Tags:
  • Gaming
  • Hard Drives
  • Motherboards
  • Components
  • Cache
  • Hardware
  • MSI
  • SSD
Last response: in Components
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July 3, 2014 11:05:14 AM

I recently purchased new hardware for my Gaming machine. My complete system:

    MSI Z97 Gaming 9 AC (new)
    Intel i7 4790 (new)
    Corsair Vengeance Pro 2400MHz 2x8GB (new)
    MSI GTX770 TF 2G OC (2 months old)
    WD500GB Black (1 year old)


Now, I'm thinking of is getting a 64GB M.2 (supported by the motherboard) to use as a cache drive, once I find one I can afford (the system put me back way more than I expected). My thinking was to get the cache drive and another WD 500 Black and then RAID the 2 WD hard drives.

I just noticed today that hybrid dives are now available in 3.5" form factor. That means I can get a 1TB hard drive with 8GB NAND storage onboard. My question is, will this be better than having 2xWD Black in RAID? Considering that I'll still have the 64GB M.2 installed on my motherboard. Will the 8GB cache on the HDD work well with the cache on the motherboard? I don't know much about such low level stuff. I'm considering that the data on the HDD's cache might be duplicated on the motherboard's cache, and when it go's back to the HDD for data, it would have to get it from the disk anyway.

Also, on a side note, if I get the proper M.2, the interface to the motherboard will be 10GBits/s, where the Sata3 HDD will be 6 GBits/s.

More about : ssd setup system

a b 4 Gaming
a c 259 V Motherboard
July 3, 2014 11:53:40 AM

IMHO, the best, easiest, potentially fastest solution would be:

SATA III SSD - no smaller than 120GB. Holding the OS and all your applications
WD Black for anything that doesn't fit on the SSD
Add other spinning drives as space is needed, no RAID

A standard SSD is faster overall than the hybrid, or the 2 x WD Black in RAID 0.
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