Advice needed! Is it worth upgrading to SSD with my specs?

Hi, recently my Seagate Barraccuda 7200.11 500GB hard disk suffered a firmware failure. I'll be receiving my replacement (it was under warranty) on Mon and was wondering if I should continue using this model as a primary HD or use it as a secondary and purchase a SSD to run my OS.

I'm not very tech savvy, so I'm looking for some advice on whether this is a good move. I'm a PhD student who works from home a lot, so reliability is a major concern (I do not want to lose any data!). Besides work, I only use my desktop to play FM and surf the net.

I do not intend to do any upgrading except for buying a SSD or a HDD (if that is better alternative). I'm a career FM gamer, so I'm interested to know if using a SSD for OS and programs will lead to significant improvements in processing speed given my current specs:

Win 7 64bit OS

Intel Core 2 Quad Processor Q9950 2.83GHz

Asus P5Q Pro P45 XFire Motherboard

Asus GeForce 9800GTX graphics card

2 x Kingston 6400/800 2GB DDR2 RAM

Aerocool Horsepower 750W PSU with 14cm LED fan

Cooler Master Centurion 5 casing

If SSD is the way to go, which should I buy?

Your advice is greatly appreciated! Thanks.

SSD drives are faster and probably won't breakdown. They can last for lots of years.

You'll notice faster time in writing to the disk.

If you can afford it, then go for it.

SSDs will improve loading times (FM and OS) and saving (FM) by quite a bit.

Whether it's worth it depends on how much you want to spend. There are good and quick HDDs out there (i.e. the Samsung Spinpoint F3) although they don't touch SSDs. So is it worth it? It is really up to whether you want to spend or not...

If you are doing technical work for your PhD. on your laptop (i.e. MATLAB), involving reading and writing large files or compiling code, then an SSD will definitely help. Personally, if I were in that situation and had the cash, I'd go for an SSD. Just beware of the low SSD capacity (i.e. high £ per GB) unless you really have too much money to burn.

Looks like you have plenty of power already. You will need an OS, plus installing absolutely everything again, so will also need a spare install of the usual Office things to avoid shelling out on that as well. When I upgraded, my 64GB SSD and Windows 7 were almost £200 in total but I can run considerably more than I was with a 2Ghz processor, and run all sorts of things and switch between them completely smoothly. The main thing I've noticed (given I run so much more for a similar speed instead of a similar amount for far more speed, though there will be that as well) is that running many leagues over a lot of seasons, the speed remains pretty consistent. It's far more of an improvement than faster loading/saving, trust me. Unless you run an awful lot of leagues (and maybe even then, given the difference made between my 1.66Ghz laptop and my current one) I'd have thought you'd have a good speed from what you have already but I imagine you'd see great improvement with whatever you have so I've always thought that if you have the money spare it's a considerably improvement and one worth making. My computer expert friend recommended a 64GB one as the best balance between performance and price, and Crucial as the best manufacturer to get.

I wouldn't buy an SSD for FM but they're worth it for general system responsiveness. I agree with everything x42bn6 wrote. The Intel 510 and Crucial M4 are fast and stable drives; I'd stay away from anything with SandForce chips inside for now given they still had major issues just months ago. The Intel 320 has longer warranty than anyone else (5 years as opposed to 3) but you'll need to flash in the latest firmware version on that if you want to avoid known (and nasty) bugs with it.

Really? I'd have thought that with the amount of information processing FM does, it was well suited to benefit a lot from at SSD.

The way I understand it the database is loaded into memory when you load your savegame or start a new one, not constantly read from disk, so you'll see improved performance when the game needs to access the disk but not to a big degree during processing. It shouldn't be significant enough to warrant the pretty steep per-GB cost of an SSD compared to an HDD, but hey, if you've got the money to burn then there's no real downside.

Processing information is done by the processor. You'll notice a different saving and loading the game as the drive is faster.

Odd, I've definitely seem much more in-game performance (which I was told to expect by my expert friend), especially given I was a very long way (late 2040's) into a big setup when I upgraded which gave considerable improvement, which I doubt was due to W7, acting as a useful point of comparision. Just saying what I've experienced, could be wrong.

SSDs are er great upgrade. I don't buy a new computer without one, but specificly for FM, I don't think you will notice much (except for saving/loading), because FM is more about processing (CPU) power.

I'd say that SSD are for people who have massive facepacks installed as those disks perform best with small files which are loaded and unloaded frequently. Plus I'm not so sure if saving the game to SSD is much quicker then saving to a HDD, especially if it's in RAID 0.

And there's also this neat feature in FM 2012 that lets you choose which player profiles are supposed to be saved in your savegame file, which gives You better control over its size.

Odd, I've definitely seem much more in-game performance (which I was told to expect by my expert friend), especially given I was a very long way (late 2040's) into a big setup when I upgraded which gave considerable improvement, which I doubt was due to W7, acting as a useful point of comparision. Just saying what I've experienced, could be wrong.

It is probably boosting the performance of things in the background, freeing up resources for Football Manager.

There would be a slight improvement as FM doubtless reads some files on-the-fly (facepacks for example). I don't know how much of an improvement, however.

It's also possible you are experiencing the placebo effect somewhat.

I'd note that SSD long-term reliability issues are overblown as you will realistically be replacing your PC before your SSD is ruined anyway. However, there is a reason why SSDs aren't being used that much by corporates - because there is that concern. As long as you get an established piece of hardware (i.e. not the SandForce), you should be good to go.

SSDs are half good/half placebo.

They will greatly increase the boot time (who cares about boot time as long as its under 2 minutes?) and the loading time of applications.

With regards to running applications, then SSDs have a limited impact on performance - CPU or GPU are more likely to be a bottleneck on running applications than the HD.

Of course that varies from game to game, and games that access the HDD more will see a greater performance.

Reliability wise - SSDs are not a patch on HDDs. That doesn't mean one will blow up immediately, but they are more likely to die.

SSDs are half good/half placebo.

They will greatly increase the boot time (who cares about boot time as long as its under 2 minutes?) and the loading time of applications.

With regards to running applications, then SSDs have a limited impact on performance - CPU or GPU are more likely to be a bottleneck on running applications than the HD.

Of course that varies from game to game, and games that access the HDD more will see a greater performance.

Reliability wise - SSDs are not a patch on HDDs. That doesn't mean one will blow up immediately, but they are more likely to die.

Should that not be:

They will greatly decrease the boot time.........

NEVER run a game from your OS SSD. EVER.

Why not? I've planned to buy a SSD for my system + Office + FM with facepacks with savegames saved on a RAID 0 hdd's. What's wrong with that?

Thanks for all the informative replies.

On FM11, I had 10+ playable leagues, most of the remaining on view only, a large database 100K+ players, and the mega graphics update released by sortitoutsi loaded. I wasn't unhappy with general day-to-day processing. Yes, matchdays may take a while at times, but I rather that than poorly sim-ed results. Only slightly annoying things were the slow game start up and experiencing lag when I click on player profile screens, switch menus etc. Now, I'm thinking the custom graphics were to blame?

So now I guess it's up to me to decide whether it is worthwhile to fork up the cash just to overcome those little annoyances...

NEVER run a game from your OS SSD. EVER.

Care to elaborate why?

Upgrade RAM/CPU before anything else. SSD will not make FM go magically faster. You will hardly notice the load difference on SSD alone.

If you going to buy SSD, buy it for the OS not for a game.

From personal experience id take a raptor sata hdd over a ssd any day of the week.

This is my opinion... feel free to ignore it.

Why not? I've planned to buy a SSD for my system + Office + FM with facepacks with savegames saved on a RAID 0 hdd's. What's wrong with that?

Could you explain what is a RAID 0 HDD? I think I have a similar idea planned... SSD for OS and programs including FM, use my current HDD for storage including FM saves and facepacks. But now, after reading the thread, it seems it would benefit more if I had the saved games and facepacks loaded on the SSD. Or am I misunderstanding things?

Could you explain what is a RAID 0 HDD? I think I have a similar idea planned... SSD for OS and programs including FM, use my current HDD for storage including FM saves and facepacks. But now, after reading the thread, it seems it would benefit more if I had the saved games and facepacks loaded on the SSD. Or am I misunderstanding things?

2 hdds working as 1.

If 1 crashes they both are screwed.

2 hdds working as 1.

If 1 crashes they both are screwed.

On the other hand, it theoretically offers double the throughput, so your hard disk reads and writes twice as quick.

RAID 0 SSDs... Do want.

Upgrade RAM/CPU before anything else. SSD will not make FM go magically faster. You will hardly notice the load difference on SSD alone.

If you going to buy SSD, buy it for the OS not for a game.

From personal experience id take a raptor sata hdd over a ssd any day of the week.

This is my opinion... feel free to ignore it.

If I were to upgrade my RAM, do I need to replace my current RAM or can I simply add more? I currently have 2 x Kingston 6400/800 2GB DDR2 RAM. Would upgrading to 6 or 8 gb RAM make any difference in FM with 64 bit OS?

On the other hand, it theoretically offers double the throughput, so your hard disk reads and writes twice as quick.

RAID 0 SSDs... Do want.

Yeah, it does write and read qucily but only large files. Small files (facepacks for example) aren't that fast. That's why most people buy a SSD for system files (because system reads and writes lots and lots of small files - like 4kb) and they add 2 disks in Raid 0 for writing larger files and installing games. Of course CPU and RAM are two most important things for FM but I would very much like to see some HDD vs SSD comparison when playing FM with loads of downloaded graphics with it.

If I were to upgrade my RAM, do I need to replace my current RAM or can I simply add more?

Depends on your motherboard, see the manual for it.

Should that not be:

They will greatly decrease the boot time.........

Oh dear, yes you are of course right! Bad mistake on my part

The suggestion is to get a small SSD and install only an OS on it for stability reasons. I think SSDs have progressed past the point of that being a necessary precaution but it takes a while for these things to get out of fashion. Unless there is another specific reason that I am not aware of.

Regards replacing RAM - it's always better to get completely new chips rather than adding one to an existing one, as this can cause problems if the timings/speed or various other minor properties are not identical. Particularly if they are to be run in dual channel mode. It's cheap enough anyway, even 4GB of DDR3 Gaming speed RAM can be had for under £40.

NEVER run a game from your OS SSD. EVER.

I have 3 SSDs in my PC, two for Steam and one for my OS and non-Steam games. I don't understand your point, as for as long as SSDs have been out I have been using them for my OS while running games on them. No performance downgrade, just a faster launch time for games. To the op, I'd definitely suggest an SSD. It's like upgrading from DSL to Cable, once you have cable, you'll never go back.

If your main concern is reliability and not losing any data, then I suggest you save your PhD work on the net. You can use either Microsoft or Google - that is free. Or you can buy your own online storage facility.

But shouldn't you have access to some online facility through the university? Something you could get access to from anywhere? That should be basic for any university to deliver that... Otherwise much work would/could get wasted...

If your main concern is reliability and not losing any data, then I suggest you save your PhD work on the net. You can use either Microsoft or Google - that is free. Or you can buy your own online storage facility.

But shouldn't you have access to some online facility through the university? Something you could get access to from anywhere? That should be basic for any university to deliver that... Otherwise much work would/could get wasted...

Yeah I do have access to such facilities - only reason why I didn't lose any of of PhD work when my HDD died. More of not wanting the hassles of another desktop breakdown in the near future.

NEVER run a game from your OS SSD. EVER.

Never listen to people on forums.

I've tested dozens of SSDs in a variety of scenarios. They're bombproof, and assuming you don't buy a stupidly cheap one, ludicrously fast. Hell some of the ones I've tested can smash a RAID Velociraptor setup. The only reason people suggest solely running OS on them is because big ones cost a fortune.

Never listen to people on forums.

I've tested dozens of SSDs in a variety of scenarios. They're bombproof, and assuming you don't buy a stupidly cheap one, ludicrously fast. Hell some of the ones I've tested can smash a RAID Velociraptor setup. The only reason people suggest solely running OS on them is because big ones cost a fortune.

Yea, this is what I thought about SSDs now. They're not brand new technology any more, they're in probably the 5th or 6th generation by now and so stability shouldn't be so much of a worry.

The one thing with SSDs that needs to be taken note of is the myth that they speed up everything a hell of a lot. They don't - once something is loaded into memory (so an application, or a game) then pretty much the only time the data will go back to the hard drive is when it is loading or saving - so basically once a game has loaded into memory, the SSD will not provide a speed boost any longer.

Although on that note it's worth pointing out that practically no games load their entire asset sets into memory at launch due to the sheer volume. They will access the HDD/SSD either continuously or at loading screens, or a mix thereof, and any memory pages ending up in the pagefile will be significantly faster to juggle if this is stored on an SSD. Definitely correct to expect no miracles in terms of gaming though; you'll see very small differences, if any, once in-game, if only due to memory caching making quick disk access times non-critical. The engines are just coded to be robust in this regard.

The major benefits for games are at launch and loading times for sure. FM's loading is mostly number crunching in memory so this shouldn't be affected. What may speed up a bit is the interface, especially if you're one to add huge amounts of assets via facepacks and whatnot as x42bn6 already touched on.

I had an OCZ Vortex 2 that died on me on saturday , the controller on the disk failed. I have had numerous Sandforce controllers die on me at work recently as well. best ive found so far is Crucial M4 128Gb and thats what I use at home now.

SSDs are not bombproof , they have hardware issues as much as other disks if not more IMO and experience. Echoing the comments about only running your OS on them , if you choose to run FM then save your game onto another disk

For what it's worth SandForce has a terrible track record, much worse than for ex. Marvell (the other major player for controllers). I wouldn't take SF's bad reliability as representative of the rest of the field.

Keep in mind that backups are relevant/important regardless of type of storage - nothing is faultless.

@forzamr_b, from a purely FM perspective, to get the best speed improvement make sure you don't save your games compressed. My uncompressed save game is about 500mb and saves/launches in about 10 seconds, compressed the save game was much smaller but because of the CPU requirement in compressing the file saving took about 1 minute.

Thanks for all the advice. I have decided not to splash the cash yet. I'll wait a couple more years when I it's time to do a complete upgrade of my PC.

This thread can be closed now.

Cheers