Replacing a conventional drive with a solid state drive

[jbc]

I have a four year old PC that I replaced with the one that I am working on now. The hard drive got just to slow, so I am thinking of taking out the conventional hard drive and replacing it with a solid state drive. My question is this, if I am going to put on it is an OS such as Windows XP or perhaps Suse Linux how large a solid state drive do you think I need to buy?

 

[SirCyber]

I would say a 16GB at least

 

[KSoD]

Well it depends. Not on the OS in use but the other stuff you do. The OS itself may not take up much room. But if you isntall 30 games then it might. We cant advise you with only half the picture. We need more info about what you do with your PC in order to be able to help. Plus know that SSD do not come in the same sizes as regualr hard drives. So you may be limited to only getting a 32GB or something like that in SSD if you dont want to spend that much as well.

So give a cost guideline and a bit of info on what you do with your PC if you want help.

 

[S0ULphIRE]

I'd say 32Gb SSD is a good size to go for. It gives you enough room for your OS and a few games, all your other data you can keep on an $80 1tb drive.

 

[Puddle Jumper]

The smallest good SSDs are 30gb so I wouldn't go any lower than that. One other thing to keep in mind is it's recommended to leave at least 10% of a SSD empty for performance reasons.

Also if you plan on installing Windows on a SSD I highly recommend using windows 7 instead of XP. 7 has a number of automatic optimizations for use on SSDs and is the only version of Windows that supports TRIM (whcih helps keep a SSD performing like new).

 

[jbc]

Quite right Mak. Here is what I intend to do with it, the solid state drive will be required to hold the OS and perhaps, if there is space Mozilla Firefox and Thunderbird and perhaps Open Office. A conventional external hard drive will handle open office if the SSD does not have enough space and any and all data.

Oh, and the hard drive that I am replacing unfortunately is an IDE so I will need to replace it with a new IDE SSD.

 

[pcsluzba]

I'm not sure if you find IDE SSD, are they not all SATA (at least my supplier does nto sell IDE - it is slow interface anyway)?
Then you will need SATA controller as well.

 

[wafflehammer]

Oh, and the hard drive that I am replacing unfortunately is an IDE so I will need to replace it with a new IDE SSD.

No offense but I don't believe you are aware of what you're getting into.

SSD's are most likely all SATA

Any SSD <$100 are brands I've never heard of....then the point that they are all 8gb..and a few 32gb...but I wouldn't even touch those lol

So expect to spend like $150+ and for like 32gb storage space (comparing to like a $60-80 regular harddrive that has 640gb-1TB)


EDIT: There seem to be a few PATA(IDE) SSD's on newegg... But just remember..IDE is a lot slower than SATA so you're basically making the speed(and cost) of a SSD useless :|

 

[jbc]

Perhaps its not worth it since the interface is an IDE. I believe that I can not order a SATA interface along with the new SSD. I think thath the mother board needs to be specificaly made to support the Sata interface.

 

[pcsluzba]

You can buy SATA controller if you have free PCI slot on your mobo.