In MY opinion: NO. Unless you qualify for any of these four conditions:
- Professional with absolute need for performance
- Has with money to burn
- The price drops
- The reliability increases
Completely and totally disagree. That's not saying your post is wrong, just that I disagree.
I was in the same camp until I experienced it for myself first hand. My first setup was with an Intel 40GB SSD on my Work PC, which ran an i7 920 and a 750GB Hard drive for storage duties. Windows startup and general application performance are markedly improved when you use an SSD for the boot drive, and even the 40 & 80GB drives are getting into the realm of affordability. FFS, am I the only one that remembers when 80GB hard drives were $400?
Here's where I sit on the issue:
Buy an SSD that fits your need. I would recommend a minimum of a 40GB SSD to install Windows 7 on, but buy higher
if you can.
Set up a second platter based hard drive for data storage and general program use (large program installs should go on the HDD as well)
You won't see a performance hit by having some programs on the hard drive, at least not as much as folks think it impacts.
7D8 said:
You may get a slight boost in Window operations, but every time you go to run a program or game, the SSD will have to wait for the HDD.
This happens anyway on platter only hard drive systems. An SSD isn't some magical object that transforms Windows into an instant-gratification-mobile. There are still lag times and delays in opening programs that haven't been accessed in a while, but if you install a program to the SSD that doesn't hit a lot of the sequential power that an SSD offers, you'll never notice the difference.
If you're a pro that does a lot of video work, then yes, SSDs hands down. If you're an end user who is curious and has the money, sure, why not. If you're just toying with the idea and you can't justify spending that kind of money on an SSD, then sit tight for prices and performance to improve. You won't be sorry.
For the record, installing the Corsair Force 120GB into my Dell M1530 laptop (T9300 CPU, 4GB RAM) sped it up considerably. It has given the system new life, and my boss recently let me upgrade the 40GB Intel to the same Corsair in my work PC and things have just been even more amazing with the added space.
Also, another thing to remember with SSDs is that you never have to defragment them. Speeds remain constant, and even on the old windows load that this laptop has (install date: 8/10/10) things are just as fast as they were when I first installed the OS, even after all the hell I've put it through.
Reliability is another naysayer "issue" - that 40GB Intel is still going strong and it's over a year old. I've had platter based drives since then die many times in the same time span (replaced by OEM refurbs and those died too - not a lot, just a couple). Money is still really the only deciding factor.
<steps off of soap box>
