SSD Laptop Computers -

[kaitsdad]

I'm currently very interested in a laptop with SSD, instead of a hard drive.

I currently own an old Sony Vaio, PIII, 1ghz, 40 GB hd, and I know it's only a matter of time before the hard drive gets tired of all the vibration on the bike and turns my laptop into a really cool shaped frisbee.

Does anyone on the forum have any experience, or comments about the SSD laptops?

 

[Makuna]

They will not have as much space as a platter drive. They will cost more than a platter drive. They will use less power than a platter drive. They do handle shock better than a platter drive, both when actually in use and not in use. Most platter drives will park their heads when off and can stand a little vibration and shock. They have faster access than a platter drive for random access and are about the same in serial access.

The big down fall is that their usefull life varies dramatically on how often its gets used, as flash can be written too between 10,000 and 100,000 times before a byte fails. Windows will write to the drive all the time (pagefiles) when you don't expect it to be. General expectations are five years normal use and they need replacing.

For the new NetBook class machines, you don't have a choice, they are all flash now.

 

[sin_loki]

not per say laptops, but "experimental" desktops yes. they generally load faster than a disk based HDD, the they are immune to vibration damage. I don't think you would ever wear-out a SSD but it could cost more to upgrade it later.

more to think about is..... many laptop MFG like to integrate stuff to make it smaller, i could also see in the near future that SSD could be mounted to the main mother board so up-grading for the normal user is pointless and if you have to have it serviced because it stops working, (spilled coffee, dropped "AFG") you could possibly lose everything on the chip-set.

side note: standard HDD's (for me at least) if they are in a non-op state usually can take a small amount of abuse, what gets them is vibrations at 7800+ RPM due to very close proximity of the disk and the read/write arm.

:nerdsmiley:

 

[johnny80s]

If it was me I would just replace the drive. They are cheap and easy to swap out.

Send me a PM if you want some help.

 

[L2M]

The big down fall is that their usefull life varies dramatically on how often its gets used, as flash can be written too between 10,000 and 100,000 times before a byte fails. Windows will write to the drive all the time (pagefiles) when you don't expect it to be. General expectations are five years normal use and they need replacing.

+1 When solid state memory starts to fail it can also behave quite erratically. You certainly wouldn't want to leave your computer running idly all the time as any windows background processes producing page file use would count towards this wear out point. However, at an expected five year life, I'm not sure how many people would really keep the drive that long.

 

[PhilMills]

I bought one of the Asus EeePC ultra-portables back in December and I think they're pretty much perfect for motorcycling.

• Small
• Durable (no moving parts)
• Small
• Fast startup and shutdown

Wearing out the SSD is, practically speaking, a non-worry. If you actually go through the math to figure out how long it's going to take to exhaust the minimum write cycles across the disk it turns out to be a very long time. Regardless, all the netbook/ultra-portables have some form of card reader on them and it's very convenient to store all of your stuff on an easily-replacable SD card.

The charger for my Eee is just a hair bigger than the one for my cell phone, so that's even less bulk and weight to tote around.

 

[Braenen]

I agree with the posts above in that the SSD is much less sensitive to vibration than a standard HDD. Be aware that most electronics do not like to be shaken and they hate impacts. You might want to put a piece of foam between the mount and the laptop to reduce the vibration transfer.

Remember to perform regular backups of the data you want to keep.

 

[sin_loki]

Remember to perform regular backups of the data you want to keep.

+1,000

i have seen too many times a computer crap out (virus or hardware fail) and lose years of important info and pictures that where irreplaceable.

 

[jwilly]

A 16 GB SSD is worth about twice what your laptop is worth. I'm jus sayin?

If your worried about the drive, go buy a new 60 or 80 gig drive for $50 and install and new drive that will outlast the life of the laptop.

JW

 

[ngarider]

I put 2 weeks into a demo Macbook Air with the SSD drive. I took it to Colorado on my annual LD trip, and it performed EXTREMELY well. I wish I could have kept it.