How much improvement will I see?

[Hiijinx]

Hello all,

After upgrading parts of my gaming rig over the years, one component has been relatively untouched and am wondering if its time to upgrade.

My current specs are: (build with A LOT of help from toms reviews I might add)

i5 2500k @ 3.3 Stock
z68 Extreme7 Gen3
8GB Corsair Vengeance DDR3 1866
2 X 6990 Crossfire

and the much older
2 x Raptor X 150GB 10000 RPM 16MB Cache in Raid 0

Will upgrading to an SSD yield much improvement over the (then) mighty Raptors?
My PC use is a mixture of high graphic gaming (BF3,Skyrim, Secret World) and 3dsmax/CS5.

At the moment I have everything (OS, games etc) together on the Raid drives - something I know isn't ideal - so if I should invest in an SSD, should I use it for my OS or gaming/programs?

Thanks in advance,

Hiijinx

 

[wkdsean1988]

if you install your os and most used prgrams on the ssd you will notice a big improvement in boot time, load time for apps, and load time for any games you will install.

 

[4745454b]

I'm not as convinced. What's the avg data transfer rate for the rapterx? 120 or so? Even if it was only 100MBps, you are still looking at 180MBps+. An SSD won't be much faster depending on the one he gets. (at 120MBps, two in AID0 should net him over 220MBps, which is where most of the SATAII SSDs are.) I say he's pretty close to what an SSD can do and upgrading to most of them isn't going to do much. Even if he got one of the newer SATA 6.0 drives that can hit 500MBps its only twice as fast as his current setup. While that sounds fast, its not as impressive as you'd think.

Feel free to get an SSD and put windows on it. Many people like how responsive it is. But I doubt you'd see much difference in load times between the SSD and your current AID0 setup.

 

[Hiijinx]

Thank you for the replies all, will save up a few pennies and get an SSD recommended in one of Toms reviews for my OS to separate it from my programs.

 

[Hiijinx]

Seeing as OC have a deal on SSD's atm = what would you do for ideal performance?


#1
1 SSD for OS
Keep Programs separate on RAID0

#2
1 SSD for OS and favourite Games
Everything else on RAID0

#3
2 SSD's
1 for OS
1 for Games/Programs

#4
1 larger SSD and create separate partitions for OS and Programs

#5 Anything I may have overlooked


I have never really thought about keeping my OS/games apart until recently reading that some high spec games, such as BF3, can see an increase in performance - do partitions make up for a separate drive?

As always, cannot thank you all for your really helpful advice.

 

[raytseng]

Similar to (4) put everything you want fast on the SSD. This is OS, Games, Programs

There's no need to partition.
If games are your main thing, once you are done with the game, you can move it to the HDD if you need to make space. If you are a big steam user, go lookup mklink steam to see how to use links to easily move your games to your hdd.

Try to size your SSD so you have a good chunk of free space. It will decrease in performance if it is more full.


Depends what "Everything else" is, but if it is your typical media, it goes on HDD, but I would go for just a plain setup or in Raid mirroring (for reliability not speed). This is stuff you don't need fast. If you're watching a movie, any hdd can serve up your 6gb file over 2hours. Your important tax returns, photos, etc etc. don't need to be fast.


The point of separation is if your OS/apps drive blows up, all that stuff is replaceable and physically separated. Should you upgrade your computer or need to redo the box, you take your data drive with you and just wipe the OS drive.

The real important stuff you put on data drive. That being said, your physical computer could be destroyed in a fire or something so you may also want to backup the REAL important things to cloud or something

 

[Hiijinx]

So having the OS and , for example, BF3, on the same drive should not hinder it anymore than if it had a separate drive?

My usual programs include BF3, Secret World and my work tools include 3ds max and Photoshop - I imagine that these would be my "SSD" programs - and everything else - antivirus, malware, lesser games, browsers etc would be on the HDD. What about drivers (Graphics, mobo etc), would you put them on the SSD or HDD?

Backup wise I have Livedrive and several in/external HDD'S so am all set there!

And thanks for the steam link, that should come in very handy!

 

[raytseng]

1) bf3 and OS Having them on same drive doesn't matter.


2) drivers get installed into windows which is your OS drive, so this is sort of a non-question.
If you are talking about copies of the driver installers, then that doesn't matter where those go.

3) you should put those other apps onto your SSD. You don't need to micromanage every last byte unless you mis-sized your purchase. All that stuff adds up to maybe 1gb or something, who cares just throw it on the SSD. Why wouldn't you want to speed those things up? Why are you getting an SSD, then immediately afraid to use it?

4) if you are getting brainfreeze over this, maybe you should just get a hybrid drive instead then everything is sped up.

 

[Hiijinx]

Hehe reading back what I wrote it did sound a bit silly didn't it - thanks for the wakeup slap Ray
Will follow your advice and look into a decent sized SSD.

Thanks again.