1 month with SSD(Solid State Drive) - Great.

[Kuky]

Did a restart again and the icon is still there... maybe your icon is just hidden?

[Pilotasso]

Hey Pilotaso, I just read about IDE and AHCI settings in BIOS you talked about and wanted to know more about it and if it would be good thing to change to AHCI and from what I read pretty much only benefit from going to AHCI would be to enable NCQ but I am thinking this would have benefit for normal HDD that have spinning disk, in SSD there are no moving parts so I don't see how it could have any benefit for them?

 

According to a bulletin on the OCZ site;

And an example of what p***es me off when people make claims and have no idea what thet talk about:

This guys wants to claim how setting his BIOS to AHCI does not causes this performance degradation with his SSD... then says he DOES have slight lag and how it's because the drive has to start spining? :lol:

 

By the way this is from this website: http://windows7forums.com/windows-7-hardware/18767-ahci-ssds.html

 

I was advised by the guys on the store to make the switch. They showed me benchies on their forums. I see no lags whatsoever. they occur if you have acoustic and power management on which is another thing entirely. With those the disk does spin up/down. I have switched those off and get no such lags. ;)

[Pilotasso]

Well apparently it is easy to load the AHCI drivers eaven if you run in IDE mode at the moment. Here are the steps:

 

Start windows as normal in IDE mode, go to search and type in "regedit" click it. Go to HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINES => System => Currentcontrolset => service then go down and click on msahci. Right click "Start" and click modify. Change the value to 0 and restart. Enter the bios, switch to AHCI, load in as normal. Windows will download drivers automatically, restart again.

 

(HJ)

 

Thats it Hijack but theres an easy way. google Windows manager 2.0.0. Theres an option in there to make the switch a one click afair.

[Pilotasso]

Did a restart again and the icon is still there... maybe your icon is just hidden?

 

 

Mine too. AHCI allows hot plugging. Thats why you see your drives on the tray.

[Thunderbird]

Question

If i buy the Intel 2.5-Inch 160 GB X25-M Mainstream SATA II MLC Solid-State Drive

will i be able to install OS in it ? for sure its on Laptop and not desktop

[Pilotasso]

Yes. It was an issue at the first generation SDD's but you can do it now almost as commonly as hard drives themselves. Most SDD's are prepared for laptops and since I dont think there are many laptops that can take 2 drives anyway they must be bootable. Take your time to research and inform yourself on your local vendor on that possibility.

[Pilotasso]

Just thought you guys would like to know. Its been silk smooth ride with starcraft II too when before I had stuttering problems running it from the hard drive. The game sucked up 2GB's while playing and started to move on my page file on the SDD. Not even a hickutp. :) sweet

[Bucic]

For those who are planning to wait another 5 years for the SSDs to become affordable ;)

 

Let's make it quick. When I load a mission for a second time my HDD stays practically idle. During missions I suffer from virtually no HDD induced stuttering. All on regular HDD at 7200 RPM and 4 GB of cheap RAM. How is that possible?

[Kuky]

Probably things are already loaded and still in RAM since aplication has not been shut down... but how often are you gonna run same mission over and over anyway?

[Bucic]

Probably things are already loaded and still in RAM since aplication has not been shut down... but how often are you gonna run same mission over and over anyway?

You're right about the RAM but you don't get the bigger picture. The effect of a mission loading faster after it has been launched previously is known from XP too. But Win 7 brings it to a whole new level. I did a simple test on my XP machine. I launched more than 15 applications simultaneously, including all the CAD software I had installed then (some consisting of more files than Windows itself!). I loaded up tens of websites in my browser and opened few CAD projects. Result? Memory usage - barely 1 GB out of 2. The rest was free. Equals Useless. The sucker has put everything else into swap file. And that means HDD.

 

Read yourself how Win 7's Superfetch does it differently. Don't make me re-write what's there.

 

You ran your multiplayer mission and sometimes fly looped waypoints. That's enough for the Superfetch. It's even enough to trigger it by looking around (completely!) for a while just after the mission has loaded.

 

What's not covered by the brilliant Superfetch is covered by the UltimateDefrag 3. It doesn't make your HDD equal to SDD. But it makes a huge difference and that's that.

[Pilotasso]

For those who are planning to wait another 5 years for the SSDs to become affordable ;)

 

Probably things are already loaded and still in RAM since aplication has not been shut down... but how often are you gonna run same mission over and over anyway?

 

 

I have never experienced stutter free gaming with 4GB, even though I considered the performance with the HDD to be pretty good. The problem there is no such thing as "all textures finished loading into your big RAM cache". The game keeps on loading textures thru the mission, plus theres the memory leak issue. Gameplay becomes less and less fluid as the memory leak increases. With my HDD after 2 hours of play it became unbearable with stutters and low FPS.

 

Now, Its very diferent, I have no delays, no jittering and no stutters when I enter mission and textures are still loading (virtually in a snap now). As memory leaks starts to sink in I have much much less impact from it. So far I have not hit the "unberable limit" though FPS does decrease (you wont notice untill alot of time has passed).

 

Those of you thinking your fine with HDD have never tried SDD for sure. its a luxury and you can live without it, yes, but its not the same without it AND you do get what you pay. ;)

Edited November 17, 2010 by Pilotasso

[JEFX]

Pilotasso,

 

I am now bying a new system that (I think) will be fantastic for DCS A-10 (and upcoming few years) and I am getting a SSD along with a standard HDD. How do you set-up your files? You put the system (Windows 7/64) AND DCS Warthog executable on the SSD? other important things?

 

thanks, I dont know really how to use it...

 

JEFX

[Pilotasso]

OS+page file + heavy games on the SDD. Less intensive games and data on a separate large HDD.

 

It depends on the amount of titles you use, you can consider a 120GB or a 240/256 SSD. I have one 120GB. All the SIM's + Starcraft II are on the SDD. Sup com 1&2, unreal tournament III and videos+MP3 are on the HDD.

[Pilotasso]

Also, torrent manager is installed on HDD and temporary directory also on the HDD. Its recommended to relocate all temporary write trash to the HDD to keep the SDD at peak performance (garbage collection and TRIM functions should be able to keep pace for the rest on the SDD applications) one exception to this is the page file. You need that on SDD for quick responsiveness of the system.

Edited November 17, 2010 by Pilotasso

[JEFX]

Also, torrent manager is installed on HDD and temporary directory also on the HDD. Its recommended to relocate all temporary write trash to the HDD to keep the SDD at peak performance (garbage collection and TRIM functions should be able to keep pace for the rest on the SDD applications) one exception to this is the page file. You need that on SDD for quick responsiveness of the system.

 

Pilotasso

 

I think that I am following you (with difficulty, because I dont understand all what you are talking about...)...

 

Can you explain, HOW do you do this (because usually Windows installs things where it wants...)

 

 

thanks

 

 

JEFX

[Bucic]

I've prepared an hour long benchmark track file but it won't be of any use because I can't disable Superfetch on my system, so I won't have anything to compare my first run with Superfetch on.

[Pilotasso]

Programs that generate alot of temporary internet files on your disk (to act as cache), such as Torrent managers, E mule or your web browser will probably select the C:\ SDD by default to write those files on.

This is not desirable, internet cache files causes constant writes (every time you access a page or downloading files) and this takes space and will tend to degrade your SDD performance.

 

Enter OPTIONS tab and change temporary files directory for the HDD drive instead.

This reduces writes on your SDD.

 

See the below picture, where C:\ is my SDD.

D:\ and E:\ are my mechanical hard drives.

 

 

Downloaded files (incoming files) and temporary files are now located on my HDD E:\ drive.

Also avoid sharing your SDD for other peers. Put all shared files on the HDD (mine are highlighted on bold under SHARED DIRECTORIES).

 

Now the SDD is free of that activity and its cleaning algorithms will have an easier time keeping its flash cells at top speed.

Edited November 20, 2010 by Pilotasso

[KaspeR32]

So I'm in a little bit of a Dilemma. My computer seems to be nearing it's end. I love flight simulators but my machine chugs with FSX and even BlackShark. I'm running a Q6600 2.4 GHz with a Radeon HD5770, 6 gigs of 800MHz Ram, Win7 64-bit and a terrible old Hard drive. SATA 320GB 7200 rpm. I'm not even sure of the brand it's not a WD caviar black though I know that.

 

Here's the reason I'm posting in this thread, the HD. Do you guys think I am being bottle necked by my hard drive (Both my OS and games are on this drive) with these simulations? And if so, would it pay for me to upgrade to a SSD and keep the 320GB as storage or just get a new system? I mean obviously it would fix everything if I got an i7 system but would it be a waste for me to get a SSD on my current Q6600 setup? Or can it possibly improve my experience with these mentioned sims for a lot less money than a new rig?

 

I can purchase a new i7-950 system for about $1k.

Or I get get a SSD for $200 (SLC I'm guessing from what I've read)

 

Any advice would be appreciated, thanks guys!

[Rusty_M]

well i just ordered a 60 gb ocz SSD today in a moment of madness. Hope it's as good as you guys say.

 

Ill be back in this thread once i have the rest of the components and I'm struggling to get it all right.

[Pilotasso]

60 GB is a little short, but you can cram a game or 2 inside. make sure you switch BIOS to AHACI before installing the OS on it. Let us know how it goes for you.

 

KaspeR32, if you feel your PC is nearing the end maybe you should reconsider upgrading it at all. Analyse what are your options, what budget you got. An SDD will not inflate your new machine price IF your willing for trade offs, such as not buying a high end card to afford an SDD. GFX cards are overrated while storage speed is, heavilly. Storage usually is the last priority and what makes it worse is thats precisely the bottleneck of any system that needs to be adressed.

More often than not poeple buy a GFX every 6 monyhs and get little to no improvement at all.

Switching to SDD easely supersedes a better GFX or a better CPU in many scenarios. It will ALWAYS improve your performance regardless of application compatibility or resources demands.

 

When I switched over from HDD to SDD I saw much more improvements than switching from my Geforce 9800GX2 card to an 470GTX (had no chance but buy it because the older card died).

All my applications benefited from the SDD, while only my RTS and FTPs games had any difference with the new card. (the old one worked pretty well despite being only just as good as a 450GTS when the game was not SLI compatible, such was the case as LOMAC and DCS tittles).

Edited November 24, 2010 by Pilotasso

[HiJack]

I can purchase a new i7-950 system for about $1k.

Or I get get a SSD for $200 (SLC I'm guessing from what I've read)

 

Any advice would be appreciated, thanks guys!

 

Not a doubt in my mind. Get a 120GB SSD and install Windows 7 64 bit. Remember to switch off disk indexing.

[Rusty_M]

Thanks Pilotasso. I'll probably just use it for W7 and nothing else so as not to cram it full. Will be accompanied by at least a single 1 tb HDD

[Pilotasso]

Windows wont fill it completely, you can still play the SIm on it without filling it.

 

I have LOMAC+DCS KA+DCS A10+StarcraftII and I still got 63GB free (120GB). :)

[Rusty_M]

so I suppose it's worth thinking carefully about what else is installed on the SSD if space is limited?

[Pilotasso]

Yes, For example I install all small applications like WINRAR on the mech hard drive. Same for joystick programming application, torrent managers etc etc.

Edited November 24, 2010 by Pilotasso