Which SSD and is it worth over HDD

[NewbieGamer69]

Hey guys is need some help with choosing a secondary drive for my PC ive decided to get another ssd, i have a nvme ssd currently but it being a 500gb i filled it up pretty easily, my question is in mu country i have a few options available, so i will list them all and tell me which is worth it the most, and would it be better than just getting a 2tb HDD. Main reason i don’t get an hdd is speeds obviously but also noise? I cant remember if HDD are actually that noisy so change my mind on this, my pc is pretty quiet so i dont want any extra noise, anyways the SSD’s i can choose from

are:

kingston a400 960gb - 123usd

Adata SU650  960gb - 136usd

samsung 860QVO 1tb - 135usd

samsung 860EVO 1tb - 160usd

OR

just get a seagate baracuda 2TB hdd 7200rpm 256mb cache. For 70usd

i am conflicted so i need help, if the HDD during normal operation isnt audible i might go for it but i need your guys help

[Biomecanoid]

Even the worst SSD is a million times better than HDD

[Biomecanoid]

If you have an SSD for boot drive get 2 identical HDDs and make a Raid0 array that way you have lots of space combining the speed of 2 HDDs

[5x5]

Do NOT buy an HDD. Get a Crucial MX500 or an HP Elite

[GravityHurts]

If you just want a ton of storage go with the hdd, especially if you already have an ssd boot drive. But if you care about speed get an ssd.

[Oshino Shinobu]

17 minutes ago, Biomecanoid said:

Even the worst SSD is a million times better than HDD

Not really true now that basically everything's using QLC. DRAM/SLC-less cheap QLC SSDs can be slower, even half the speed on an HDD, at least for sequential and don't fare a whole lot better in random.

 

11 minutes ago, Biomecanoid said:

If you have an SSD for boot drive get 2 identical HDDs and make a Raid0 array that way you have lots of space combining the speed of 2 HDDs

What a baseless recommendation of RAID 0 without explaining the drawbacks.

 

@NewbieGamer69, if you put drives in RAID0, if any of the drives in the array fail or get corrupt, data on ALL of the drives in the array is gone. Yes, you get some benefits for increased sequential read/write performance, and some benefit to random read/writes in certain situations with RAID 0, but generally, I would not recommend it unless you really don't care about the data on it, or you don't mind restoring from a backup, if you have one. 

 

 

As for drive recommendations, a combination of SSD for fast storage and HDD for capacity is generally the best solution. Of the ones you listed, the 860EVO is the best. The QVO is decent, but the Crucial MX500 should be in the same price range, so I'd suggest that instead. If you need more storage for media down the road, go for a 2TB HDD or similar.

[Moonzy]

14 minutes ago, NewbieGamer69 said:

I cant remember if HDD are actually that noisy so change my mind on this

i once built a full silent PC for a person

in the end the hard disk was the noisiest part of his system so i had to swap it out for an SSD

so yes a HDD can be noisy

 

but it was in a noise isolated room, and the only audible thing when i turn on the PC is the "click" and my own heartbeat

it was surreal experience, and very eerie to see the monitor turn on without any fan noise, or white noise of any sort

 

but back to your main question

if you already have an SSD boot drive, you can consider a HDD for the space, unless you want that SSD speed

nothing wrong with an SSD game drive to solve some first world problems

[Sorenson]

I would go with Samsung QVO out of that list. A 1tb Samsung drive for around $130 is a steal. You can probably get slightly faster from other companies, but it won’t matter if it’s for gaming and general productivity. I personally love Samsung drives for their reliability.

[Sorenson]

2 minutes ago, Oshino Shinobu said:

Not really true now that basically everything's using QLC. DRAM/SLC-less cheap QLC SSDs can be slower, even half the speed on an HDD, at least for sequential and don't fair a whole lot better in random.

 

 

I mean yes and no. Any SSD, even a cheap one, will be much better in an everyday use case than a hard drive. How often are people Actually doing sequential reads in normal workloads besides benchmarks? 

[Oshino Shinobu]

2 minutes ago, Sorenson said:

I mean yes and no. Any SSD, even a cheap one, will be much better in an everyday use case than a hard drive. How often are people Actually doing sequential reads in normal workloads besides benchmarks? 

I mean, transferring files is a pretty normal use case. For QLC drives without any cache, transferring pretty much anything other than loads of little files is going to be pretty poor. 

 

It's certainly more nuanced than the "million times better" comment I was responding to. 

[NewbieGamer69]

2 hours ago, 5x5 said:

Do NOT buy an HDD. Get a Crucial MX500 or an HP Elite

Yeah thats why i said i only have the choices i mentioned, if i could i would get those, i was asking between the ones i mentioned

[NewbieGamer69]

2 hours ago, Moonzy said:

i once built a full silent PC for a person

in the end the hard disk was the noisiest part of his system so i had to swap it out for an SSD

so yes a HDD can be noisy

 

but it was in a noise isolated room, and the only audible thing when i turn on the PC is the "click" and my own heartbeat

it was surreal experience, and very eerie to see the monitor turn on without any fan noise, or white noise of any sort

 

but back to your main question

if you already have an SSD boot drive, you can consider a HDD for the space, unless you want that SSD speed

nothing wrong with an SSD game drive to solve some first world problems

Thats the problem i like to think my pc is sillent but my noise measuring app on my phone says otherwise, when its just on and im not doing anything intensive i put my phone next to my pc case and close to it and says 40db when im gaming you can deff hear the fans a lot more and goes up to 50db, not sure if an hdd would be heard more or less in that situation.

[Moonzy]

1 minute ago, NewbieGamer69 said:

i put my phone next to my pc case and close to it and says 40db when im gaming you can deff hear the fans a lot more and goes up to 50db, not sure if an hdd would be heard more or less in that situation.

your phone's mic is probably noisy to begin with tbh

the system i was building had 1 fan, that doesnt even turn unless cpu hits 70c

so it truly doesnt have any parts moving until the load is high, and the owner doesnt game so there's no GPU either

 

but in all honesty, is a hard disk noise really that noisy? if you mind the noise then you could take up linus' style of tossing the computer into another room, i did that too but on a budget (no thunderbolt)

[NewbieGamer69]

3 minutes ago, Moonzy said:

your phone's mic is probably noisy to begin with tbh

the system i was building had 1 fan, that doesnt even turn unless cpu hits 70c

so it truly doesnt have any parts moving until the load is high, and the owner doesnt game so there's no GPU either

 

but in all honesty, is a hard disk noise really that noisy? if you mind the noise then you could take up linus' style of tossing the computer into another room, i did that too but on a budget (no thunderbolt)

Oh you are right ill check my normal room sound levels and ill get back at this, but i think it was around 30db when nothing was on and silent. Ill have to double check though. I have a cpu fan and gpu fan which get pretty loud when gaming but thats to be expected i guess, i just dont want it to be noticable you know?

[5x5]

15 minutes ago, NewbieGamer69 said:

Yeah thats why i said i only have the choices i mentioned, if i could i would get those, i was asking between the ones i mentioned

Out of those, the 860 EVO is MUCH better than anything else. The others aren't worth considering.

[Moonzy]

1 minute ago, NewbieGamer69 said:

i just dont want it to be noticable you know?

it'll be a different type of humm

i cant really tell you if it matters because it's very subjective

personally mind it, so i tossed my desktop to another room, and pulled cables in

[NewbieGamer69]

1 minute ago, 5x5 said:

Out of those, the 860 EVO is MUCH better than anything else. The others aren't worth considering.

Even if i dont do any work that require any crazy transfer speeds or whatever? I just want to game and download movies and stuff, and maybe some light work like coding but nothing too much. Is the evo that much more reliable?

[5x5]

Just now, NewbieGamer69 said:

Even if i dont do any work that require any crazy transfer speeds or whatever? I just want to game and download movies and stuff, and maybe some light work like coding but nothing too much. Is the evo that much more reliable?

Yes, it's a TLc drive with a good controller and proper DRAM cache. It's going to be world's better than cheap QLC crap or DRAMless abominations.

[NewbieGamer69]

2 minutes ago, Moonzy said:

it'll be a different type of humm

i cant really tell you if it matters because it's very subjective

personally mind it, so i tossed my desktop to another room, and pulled cables in

Sounds good i might consider that, just one last question, i lost the little tray where the HDD was suppposed to stay in my pc case, can i just leave it inside or will that not be good for the drive like that

[Moonzy]

3 minutes ago, NewbieGamer69 said:

i lost the little tray where the HDD was suppposed to stay in my pc case, can i just leave it inside or will that not be good for the drive like that

it's best to mount your HDD securely, as it's sensitive to vibrations and shock while operating

[5x5]

4 minutes ago, NewbieGamer69 said:

Sounds good i might consider that, just one last question, i lost the little tray where the HDD was suppposed to stay in my pc case, can i just leave it inside or will that not be good for the drive like that

Order a new tray. They're like 2-3$

[Oshino Shinobu]

1 hour ago, NewbieGamer69 said:

Sounds good i might consider that, just one last question, i lost the little tray where the HDD was suppposed to stay in my pc case, can i just leave it inside or will that not be good for the drive like that

Wouldn't advise that. Either get a new tray, or if you can, screw it in with all 4 screws. For HDDs, mounting them securely really matters as even little movements and vibrations can shorten the life of the drive. 

[NewbieGamer69]

2 hours ago, Moonzy said:

it'll be a different type of humm

i cant really tell you if it matters because it's very subjective

personally mind it, so i tossed my desktop to another room, and pulled cables in

I just tested it out so when my pc is off the db monitor shows 23 to 25db in my room and when my pc is turned on with no apps running its 30-34db from where i sit, 15 minutes of gaming(fortnite)show same numbers. Maybe it gets just all tiny tiny bit louder when gaming for a lot longer but its around that mark. Is that considered silent? Will the HDD be heard in my PC?

[Moonzy]

6 hours ago, NewbieGamer69 said:

I just tested it out so when my pc is off the db monitor shows 23 to 25db in my room and when my pc is turned on with no apps running its 30-34db from where i sit, 15 minutes of gaming(fortnite)show same numbers. Maybe it gets just all tiny tiny bit louder when gaming for a lot longer but its around that mark. Is that considered silent? Will the HDD be heard in my PC?

idk, i never measured in decibels

imo quickest way is to test it out

[Biomecanoid]

On 7/25/2020 at 7:44 PM, Oshino Shinobu said:

Not really true now that basically everything's using QLC. DRAM/SLC-less cheap QLC SSDs can be slower, even half the speed on an HDD, at least for sequential and don't fare a whole lot better in random.

 

What a baseless recommendation of RAID 0 without explaining the drawbacks.

 

@NewbieGamer69, if you put drives in RAID0, if any of the drives in the array fail or get corrupt, data on ALL of the drives in the array is gone. Yes, you get some benefits for increased sequential read/write performance, and some benefit to random read/writes in certain situations with RAID 0, but generally, I would not recommend it unless you really don't care about the data on it, or you don't mind restoring from a backup, if you have one. 

 

 

As for drive recommendations, a combination of SSD for fast storage and HDD for capacity is generally the best solution. Of the ones you listed, the 860EVO is the best. The QVO is decent, but the Crucial MX500 should be in the same price range, so I'd suggest that instead. If you need more storage for media down the road, go for a 2TB HDD or similar.

Somebody is grumpy today.

 

I do Raid0 in all my PCs staring back from the Pentium4 era even laptops and even Raid0 with SSDs and never had issues unless its like a 10 year old machine.

 

I want top speed for my PCs and nothing better to have than a fast ssd or hdd,and whats even better than one ssd/hdd ? 2 in Raid0.

 

Also you should backup your important data regardless if its stored in a Raid0 array no excuse for being lazy.

 

No point in trying to "bury" a techonogy that works for decades if you can't be bothered to backup your stuff.

 

Forums are not IT classes its for helping out and making suggestions. If one doesn't know what Raid is google is there to do research and learn.