SSD vs HDD Torture Test

[TheProfosist]

... which everyone already knew.

I think your exaggerating quite a bit with "everyone". Just take a look at YouTube and even some of the comments in this thread.

[Bosh]

It doesn't matter if the above scenario is common or not - the video tells us absolutely nothing that we don't already know.

I think you're missing the point. SSDs are faster, that's clear, but almost all the available benchmarks are done in ideal conditions which tells nothing to the user in the long run, and even though the video isn't the holly grail of storage benchmarks it gives you a solid proof that what a lot of people think about doing will come out as expected.

[Tda62]

Yeah nice vid and very informative

[rashdanml]

I think you're missing the point. SSDs are faster, that's clear, but almost all the available benchmarks are done in ideal conditions which tells nothing to the user in the long run, and even though the video isn't the holly grail of storage benchmarks it gives you a solid proof that what a lot of people think about doing will come out as expected.

Proof which is completely unnecessary, because it's easily inferred from other, known proofs:

1) HDDs are slower than SSDs - from "ideal" benchmarks.

2) HDDs slow down over time - fragmentation and defragging for HDDs is well documented.

 

Inferred, and perfectly valid conclusion, because it's blatantly obvious from the above proofs:

3) Over time, SSDs would be faster than comparing new to new, due to HDD fragmentation. SSDs don't have any issues associated with fragmentation and clutter on the drive, so read/write speeds don't change (might be minimal if at all). 

 

All this video does is put a number to it - a number which isn't repeatable. "How much faster is an SSD compared to an HDD after 5 years?" should be rephrased to "How much faster ON AVERAGE?" which requires multiple, repeatable tests; statistically, average results are more valuable than results of a single test. The tests above aren't repeatable, as it accounts for far too many random variables, depending on individual use cases. The results are therefore unreliable, even if multiple tests were done under a "worst case scenario" as the definition of "worst case" differs from case to case. 

 

I haven't missed the point. I'm simply saying that any experiment even remotely attempting a "realistic" use case is unreliable. 

 

 

I think your exaggerating quite a bit with "everyone". Just take a look at YouTube and even some of the comments in this thread.

 

* Every enthusiast on this forum. Average users considering SSDs would generally consult with an enthusiast during the process. I'm also disregarding the trolls. 

[Bosh]

SSDs don't have any issues associated with fragmentation and clutter on the drive, so read/write speeds don't change (might be minimal if at all).

You clearly have no idea of what you're talking about, please read about flash file systems before spreading misinformation.

Now, get off the S.S. SmartAss and move on. Nobody said this was a scientific study from the IEEE to contribute to the knowledge of mankind, it's a simple benchmark for a typical use case of SSDs from a YouTube channel where there are several non tech savvy people around. Your undergraduate attitude isn't helping people either, think about that first.

[IdeaStormer]

Did you watch the intro of the video?

They clearly say that this isn't the usual test, but a real life scenario where you have an HDD and you buy an SSD to clone the HDD, something very common these days.

And why isn't the comparison fair? People don't care about the theoretical limits of untypical scenarios, the comparison is fair as it goes along with the typical use case.

Try to be more open minded man, the video is useful and not an HDD-geek's fantasy, move on.

 

No one of a sane mind would take a corrupted drive or a drive (HDD) 10 years old (or there abouts) and then clone it over to a SSD. If you read even a fraction of the threads here, its re-install, re-install, re-install, no one clones a lame drive to an SSD! If you do, then you have many more issues this site is not qualified to solve.

But yea feel free to clone a lame drive to an SSD for your system, I dare you!

 

:rolleyes:

[IdeaStormer]

--snip--

 

Some members feel every video they do has to be a 11 on a 0 to 10 scale no matter what. They do hit a 0 from time to time yet those won't ever admit it. This one was a zero.

[RainColt]

It's less about the drive itself and more about the files on it, since it was cloned it's the same mess of files on each drive. 

 

But I just got an SSD, put my OS on it, it's wonderful

 I was thinking the same thing as CGurrell when watching the video. The hard drive has been used for 5+ years and moved from computer to computer (one which was oil cooled even close proximity to oil could be a risk) and was just kicking around for a bit. that drive have been beaten up good and hard, and I would like to see it put up against an SSD that has been physically beaten as badly as that hard drive. I suspect that physically it would be in better shape but then there would also be general degradation of the flash chips.

 

[Guest]

Just wanted to say that I liked this video would very much like to see more actual measurements in your videos as opposed to opinions however well phrased they may be.

[capawesome9870]

5400 rpm multi platter laptop HDDs are horrid and are only there to pad the spec sheet.

 

 

i have updated / actually timed results of shutdown and restart. 

 

109 seconds to shutdown

46 seconds to the Log on screen (i have a limited account with no password so it is just clicking on it to start loading my account)

250 seconds for the HDD light to stop (from the log on screen) at this point i can start using my computer

[MG2R]

IMO, you guys missed the most important thing: doing stuff like opening a browser and Microsoft Word (both alone and at the same time). All the things you did were things lots of people will discard as "not going to do that very often", but opening programs and actually using the machine is something that everybody does.

[IdeaStormer]

IMO, you guys missed the most important thing: doing stuff like opening a browser and Microsoft Word (both alone and at the same time). All the things you did were things lots of people will discard as "not going to do that very often", but opening programs and actually using the machine is something that everybody does.

 

The last time someone wanted some answers to their system being so freaking slow, well they had every program on the system (pretty much) loaded up and of course only 4GB of RAM and the system was hitting the page file a mad man. When I shut it all down and showed them that that was the issue they said they needed all their apps open because they wanted them already loaded and ready to go and they thought that was more efficient than doing it one per usage. Well if they had more RAM or loaded the page file on faster media maybe, but some self control and knowledge  would of done saved them some money.

 

There are many factors to a system's performance not just SSD vs HDD, although it is a big factor, but never leave out the End User...

[TheProfosist]

The last time someone wanted some answers to their system being so freaking slow, well they had every program on the system (pretty much) loaded up and of course only 4GB of RAM and the system was hitting the page file a mad man. When I shut it all down and showed them that that was the issue they said they needed all their apps open because they wanted them already loaded and ready to go and they thought that was more efficient than doing it one per usage. Well if they had more RAM or loaded the page file on faster media maybe, but some self control and knowledge  would of done saved them some money.

 

There are many factors to a system's performance not just SSD vs HDD, although it is a big factor, but never leave out the End User...

As in "you cant fix stupid"

[TheWolfHowling]

Interesting, so even under the worst conditions, the SSD was still significantly faster and more responsive than the HDD. However, I have been thinking about upgrading my laptop 750GB HDD to a MX100 256GB SSD and I probably will do a fresh Windows 7 install to get rid of any junk code that might be caused the problems with networking and my laptop not hibernating & shuting down properly. Plus it's a good oppotunity to go through my folders and files and clear out anything that is no longer relevant, and which files can be moved off internal storage.
PS. What ever happened to the computer in the fish tank?