Saving SSD life, is it worth?

Forum Storage : SSD Saving SSD life, is it worth?

I'm going for a 128gb SSD and I've read everywhere that there are methods to keep the SSD in health and extend the SSD life,
by moving OS temp file, caches, documents folder or similar things.

Is it really worth to have all this cares or is it quite useless? Is a SSD life so "short" without these tricks?

PS: if these methods are really useful, so you have to buy also a fast HDD where storage temp, caches, etc.? (a low speed "eco" HDD probably it's too slow for storing them)

Message quoted 1 times

Reply to shmk

(1) No, you do not have too.
(2) I always do (A) disable hibernation and (2) Set page file min/max (virual memory) to the same size - 1024 mb for 4 gigs of ram and 512mb when 6 or more gigs of ram are installed. (C) Also limit/disable restore points as these take up alot of space over time and can not be moved to a HDD.
(3) The other items are more a question of Space. Keep in mind that there are a lot of single drive laptops running an SSD and you cannot move the files you indicated.

.. Temp files not a big issue if on HDD as to performance.
.. My Documents - Myself, I do NOT mix my data with the OS/Program drive. Most of the files are small and there is very little difference in loading a word document, or small excell spreadsheet from an SSD or HDD -(maybe 100 mSec). Large Data files you want on the HDD anyway.

Message edited by RetiredChief on 10-09-2011 at 03:51:37 PM

Reply to RetiredChief

Useless IMO. Just make sure it is aligned, in AHCI mode, TRIM enabled, minimise pagefile if you have enough RAM as well as disable system restore and instead use regular full image backup to save storage space, plus leave it on at the logon screen for a couple of hours a week for garbage collection to work and you are fine.

Edit: I forgot disable hibernate. RetiredChief's post reminded me of that. Hibernation is useless if you have ssd because boot is already so fast.

Message edited by Pyree on 10-09-2011 at 03:34:29 PM

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Reply to Pyree

^+1, use powercfg -h off to disable hibernation.

One thing I do is use file redirection (mklink command - see link at bottom of this post) when I'm using an SSD. I redirect my entire user folder - so the AppData and everything is on the HDD. This certainly saves writes on the SSD, but mainly it saves space (as you know, $/GB is very high on SSDs compared to HDDs). As was said above, opening the data files in MyDocs, MyPics, etc or the settings/cache files that are in AppData is pretty fast even off of a mechanical HDD. And I can use the saved space for additional programs that do benefit from the speed.

http://www.starkeith.net/coredump/ [...] her-drive/

Reply to Inanition02

I agree w/ the chief .... not so much wear and tear as space...... I do about 24 builds a year fro friends, neighbors, colleagues, etc. I get about half as many other boxes "brought over" with SSD's because they filled up their SSD's over 6 -8 months.

E-mail, user files, etc, browser caches, abandoned temp files, dump files, etc can fill the thing up fast.

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Reply to JackNaylorPE

Thanks all for the tips.

What do you think is the "best" virtual memory size for a 8GB system? (disabling it will kill the system?)

Software like antivirus and firewall are safe on the ssd or is it better to move them on the hdd?

Reply to shmk

Gene O wrote :

With the wear-leveling algorithms in modern SSD you do not have to worry about excessive wear under almost all use conditions. I have a 128GB M4 and I have browser and Photoshop caches on it, Photoshop temp on it, windows temp files on it, documents on it etc. IOW no special arrangements. After 3 months of usage, the projected lifetime of this (25nm 3000 erase cycle) SSD is 14 years. In fact, this SSD has been tested 3x past its expected lifetime by others so I guess I have somewhere between 14 and 42 years left on it. I'll be either spoon fed or dead before it will wear out from erase cycles - with no special precautions

I've just bought a new Cruciak M4 128gb (fw: 0009) and SSDLife says: health 100%, estimated lifetime 8 years. How could be yours 14 years after 3 month of usage?

Reply to shmk

I just have the default virtual memory on SSD and have firewall and anti virus on SSD. I think the SSD will last long enough until my complete rebuild.

If you are using SSD, that means you are going for performance.

In three years time mobo will be change, probably all SATA III or even SATA express.

You will want to change the SSD to keep up with performance, just like with the CPU and GPU.

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Reply to Pyree

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