Is Intel Smart Response worth it?

[Vengince]

Hi!

I purchased a ASRock Z68 Extreme4 Gen3 motherboard and I want to know if I should utilize the Smart Response technology even though I have a decent sized SSD (OCZ Vertex 3 2.5" 120GB SATA III MLC Internal Solid State Drive) and also a decent HDD (Western Digital Caviar Blue 320GB 7200 RPM).

Everything I'm reading seems to say that this technology is best used by people who have smaller SSD and want to take advantage of the speed with the added benefit of storage space from a HDD.

Should I allocate space on my SSD to Smart Response or just keep the two drives separate?

I mostly do gaming and video editing and I'll have 12gb of ram and a Radeon 6950 1gb GPU


Thanks for your help!

 

[JackNaylorPE]

http://www.ukgamingcomputers.co.uk/difference-between-h67-p67-z68-and-h61-chipsets-a-22.html

Finally, another feature of a Z68 chipset is known as SSD caching which is where it allows the use of a small (say 10 or 20 GB) Solid state hard drive to act as a cache for a larger ‘traditional’ hard disk. If you are already planning the use of a Solid State drive this feature is redundant.

 

[inanition02]

I would say keep the drives separate. Quick response only improves reads on commonly used files - writes are just the same speed as the mechanical HDD. 120gb is more than enough for the SSD to be the full boot drive and also host a few games/commonly used apps.

 

[nukemaster]

With a 128GB SSD, you should be good with the SSD holding you OS and most used apps. And use the other drive for personal files.

This is not to say that Intels option is not a good one for some users(I have a system with it in use and it works fine). Just for you, I think the SSD(due to its size) for OS/programs and the HDD for files is best.

 

[Vengince]

Thank you all!

I won't waste my time with it since I probably won't need it for my tasks.

 

[Vengince]

Best answer selected by Vengince.

 

[a4mula]

I understand that SRT doesn't offer the same performance as a true SSD setup. However, coming from someone that's been using 2x SSD in RAID0 for a year now I can honestly say that the idea of SRT even with it's reduced performance is quite appealing.

To be quite honest owning SSDs is a trial. While I realize that some of the steps people take to reduce write thrashing and unchecked growth (User Profiles, ugggh, what a pain) is overboard there's still always a sense that I have to baby my drives.

SRT is an install and forget solution that while might not be adequate for heavy threaded programs like Photoshop, seems more than enough for everyday users and gamers.

My next build will be with the Intel 311 and SRT, not because I couldn't do another SSD array, but because I don't want the headache of another one.