Time for a new laptop. Maybe...

[sLaughterMed]

Don't need more than 4gb of RAM?  Apparently you have never tried to edit video coming from a Gopro. ...

Def

Hey, I thought I was the expert!

Just kidding. I'm a layman at best. But dmac is right, a lot has to do with read and write speeds. You really will see greater improvement across the board with a SSD in your old computer than an new computer with a normal HDD. Consider it an investment.

If you are worried about space (SSD's are more expensive per GB), its possible to have both a SSD and HDD in a laptop in the same time (SSD for OS, programs, and current work, HDD for archiving). This allows you to get a cheaper, smaller SSD (around 128GB or 256GB would be great for this setup, depending on the size of your actively editied GoPro Vids), and still have plenty of storage. Your current laptop may even have room for it stock if its a 17" monster laptop, or you may be able to replace your CD reader with a HDD cradle (my 14" Lenovo has this feature, as do many other laptops this size and higher).

<----  Informatics village idiot here.

Would a SSD work on a Netbook with a Intel Atom processor?

Thanks in advance

Does it have a standard 2.5" hard drive?
If yes, I don't see why not. Although in a situation like that, the lack of RAM and processing speed may be a problem, unlike in Def's case. You may not see the same improvements as someone who has enough of both

[Whoey]

<----  Informatics village idiot here.

Would a SSD work on a Netbook with a Intel Atom processor?

Thanks in advance

Does it have a standard 2.5" hard drive?
If yes, I don't see why not. Although in a situation like that, the lack of RAM and processing speed may be a problem, unlike in Def's case. You may not see the same improvements as someone who has enough of both

There are non standard format (smaller) SSDs available... so it's really a factor of seeing what you can afford that will fit, and what is currently installed. Many smaller machines don't actually have discreet components (like my Lenovo Yoga 2 Pro where the ram is actually soldered on, so there's no possibility to upgrade or change it.) Hard drive on the other hand usually is removable, but I'm not sure it will help a whole lot with such low horsepower. you might be better off looking at a more modern machine and spending a little more to have some decent performance and sell/pass on the notebook to someone who would be happy with it as is.

Putting an SSD in my (now 6+ year old PC) made a huge difference. At the time I sprang for a 60gb which was about the best bang for the buck. Given the age of my PC it still gives several modern machines a run for the money, hence my hesitation to upgrade or replace it (aside from being able to afford a replacement) I'm currently at a point where there really is nothing else I can do to make this machine faster, and any further upgrades are just throwing money away unless they can be used in a replacement.

As mentioned the manufacturers finally caught on and started making hybrid devices which is great for speed and maintaining storage capacity where you have limited space like laptops. Definitely worth looking at.

One of the most important things IMHO with SSDs is to make sure both the read and write speeds are fast, some drives are cheaper and have about only half the write speed vs the read, this will still be better than standard, but in heavy use like video editing I suppose it's best to have both maxed as possible (both 500+ MB/s).

[sLaughterMed]

<----  Informatics village idiot here.

Would a SSD work on a Netbook with a Intel Atom processor?

Thanks in advance

Does it have a standard 2.5" hard drive?
If yes, I don't see why not. Although in a situation like that, the lack of RAM and processing speed may be a problem, unlike in Def's case. You may not see the same improvements as someone who has enough of both

There are non standard format (smaller) SSDs available... so it's really a factor of seeing what you can afford that will fit, and what is currently installed. Many smaller machines don't actually have discreet components (like my Lenovo Yoga 2 Pro where the ram is actually soldered on, so there's no possibility to upgrade or change it.) Hard drive on the other hand usually is removable, but I'm not sure it will help a whole lot with such low horsepower. you might be better off looking at a more modern machine and spending a little more to have some decent performance and sell/pass on the notebook to someone who would be happy with it as is.

Putting an SSD in my (now 6+ year old PC) made a huge difference. At the time I sprang for a 60gb which was about the best bang for the buck. Given the age of my PC it still gives several modern machines a run for the money, hence my hesitation to upgrade or replace it (aside from being able to afford a replacement) I'm currently at a point where there really is nothing else I can do to make this machine faster, and any further upgrades are just throwing money away unless they can be used in a replacement.

As mentioned the manufacturers finally caught on and started making hybrid devices which is great for speed and maintaining storage capacity where you have limited space like laptops. Definitely worth looking at.

One of the most important things IMHO with SSDs is to make sure both the read and write speeds are fast, some drives are cheaper and have about only half the write speed vs the read, this will still be better than standard, but in heavy use like video editing I suppose it's best to have both maxed as possible (both 500+ MB/s).

Frankly, SSDs are still so new I wouldn't really trust a cheap SSD to last anyhow. I had forgotten about the non standard connections, but for most people, anything beyond swapping out standard easily removable parts is too much.

Dont most old netbooks use 2.5" HDD's anyhow? I was assuming they did, but now im not sure

[Whoey]

Depending, some are 1.8 iirc, and you can get SSDs that are essentially a matchbook size. In any case most of them are the standard side by side SATA power connectors, so swapping is pretty easy imho... getting to it might not be so much... depends on the machine.

Probably best bit of SSD is that it has no moving parts, so your data is probably safer than in a standard platter based disk.

I'm not an expert either, just speaking from my limited experience.

[sLaughterMed]

Feeling pressured yet Def?

Just kidding. We just really like SSDs, and think you will too. Im sure you'll make the right choice in the end....

[Gerhard Gerber]

I can tell you this, and i7 with the OS living on a SSD just flies, I was lucky enough to have a 17" Dell with 2 drive bays at my previous job, and you don't wait for anything!
And, that was still the previous gen chipset......

I always liked Asus, but they tend to be expensive.
I was very happy with every Lenovo I worked on so far, but I am worried about constant reports of factory-installed spyware...

JMO FWIW

[Gerhard Gerber]

Have to add, used the Dell about 2 months before we got the SDD's - the performance gain is significant.

Also, for reasons I don't understand, all i7's just seem to be exponentially faster as far as network comms is concerned.

[sLaughterMed]

Have to add, used the Dell about 2 months before we got the SDD's - the performance gain is significant.

Also, for reasons I don't understand, all i7's just seem to be exponentially faster as far as network comms is concerned.

The programs the run the comms areprobably designed to work with the 4 cores, plus hyperthreading. Many programs arent programmed to take advantage of hyper threading, so you see no performance gain over a 4 core processer without hyperthreading

[Grant Lamontagne]

Well, you have all convinced me to try an SSD upgrade and reinstall.

The factory drive in it is all of 120 gigs so it won't be hard to beat that.  I think I'll look for a 240ish gig drive and see how it works out.  I'm sure a clean install and faster drive will keep this machine alive a little longer at least.

Now to find a decent drive.... and how to clean install Win 10. ...
Def

[firiki]

Thank you for the info, gentlemen

This is a Netbook my wife got in 2011 for basic Internet access and file retrieval for her work as she would have to be travelling a lot for the next year and a half. That thing worked OK for about six months then started slowing down and then freezing. We did a disk format and new install but it is still very slow. 1GB RAM. I doubt trying to salvage it would be worth it. I think we'll sell it to a second hand shop and get a SSD for our poor laptop that's been struggling a lot lately. Breaking the Internet thread? Nope nope nope.

[Whoey]

Well, you have all convinced me to try an SSD upgrade and reinstall.

The factory drive in it is all of 120 gigs so it won't be hard to beat that.  I think I'll look for a 240ish gig drive and see how it works out.  I'm sure a clean install and faster drive will keep this machine alive a little longer at least.

Now to find a decent drive.... and how to clean install Win 10. ...
Def

http://www.tigerdirect.ca/applications/SearchTools/item-details.asp?EdpNo=9642327&CatId=5300 or similar maybe?

[sLaughterMed]

Well, you have all convinced me to try an SSD upgrade and reinstall.

The factory drive in it is all of 120 gigs so it won't be hard to beat that.  I think I'll look for a 240ish gig drive and see how it works out.  I'm sure a clean install and faster drive will keep this machine alive a little longer at least.

Now to find a decent drive.... and how to clean install Win 10. ...
Def

http://www.tigerdirect.ca/applications/SearchTools/item-details.asp?EdpNo=9642327&CatId=5300 or similar maybe?

Page is dead Whooy

I know Samsung makes good drives, but they are a bit pricey. I'd go for one with a long warranty (the SanDisk detron got had 10 year warranty, sounds good to me), and good read/write speeds. This might be a handy resource to help you decide Def:

http://ssd.userbenchmark.com

Also, keep in mind that SSDs will slow down if you fill it up. TRIM on Windows 7 and up deletes files permanatly to help prevent this, but it does mean that if something is deleted, its gone forever (unless it ends up in the Recycle Bin). Overwhelming recomendation is to not fill it up more than 75%. So while you are shopping for a SSD get a HDD enclosure for the old one, and use it as a file archiver (so your SSD dosent get above 75%

Oh, and did I ever tell you having a spare HDD as a file backup is a really really good idea?

[raistlin65]

This might help:
http://www.tomshardware.com/reviews/ssd-recommendation-benchmark,3269.html

They recommend Samsung for best budget price/performance. I've used a couple of them. They work well.

[Grant Lamontagne]

Good to know.  I usually lean towards SanDisk when it comes to flash memory.  If they say that Samsung is better then I guess I'll give it a shot.

Def

[detron]

Good to know.  I usually lean towards SanDisk when it comes to flash memory.  If they say that Samsung is better then I guess I'll give it a shot.

Def

I bought a SanDisk Extreme Pro.  those come with a 10 year warranty.  that made me feel I could trust it a little more

[Grant Lamontagne]

The drive itself is the cheap part.  The warranty can't/won't cover the loss of data and that's where the real problem is.

Def

[sLaughterMed]

The drive itself is the cheap part.  The warranty can't/won't cover the loss of data and that's where the real problem is.

Def

Which is why you buy a backup drive and BACKUP ALL YOUR DATA REGULARLY!

[detron]

The drive itself is the cheap part.  The warranty can't/won't cover the loss of data and that's where the real problem is.

Def

I agree with that statement, but I always back-up.  but I figure if I am going to invest in a drive, I like to know it wont die in one year and the company just shrug it off and expect me to buy another one

[raistlin65]

The drive itself is the cheap part.  The warranty can't/won't cover the loss of data and that's where the real problem is.

Def

Which is why you buy a backup drive and BACKUP ALL YOUR DATA REGULARLY!

I have a backup drive. Do a backup every couple of months of everything with it. But I also have a SugarSync account that backups over the Internet to the cloud all my main stuff in My Documents folder as I make changes/add new files to my hard drive. It's immediate. That's the best combo, IMO.

[raistlin65]

You guys might also be interested in the results of this endurance tests of Kingston, Samsung, Intel, and Corsair SSDs:
http://www.zdnet.com/article/ssd-endurance-death-by-petabyte/
The bottom line: all of these drives were written to much, much, much more before reaching failure than the average consumer would in ten years.

[Grant Lamontagne]

The drive itself is the cheap part.  The warranty can't/won't cover the loss of data and that's where the real problem is.

Def

Which is why you buy a backup drive and BACKUP ALL YOUR DATA REGULARLY!

I do indeed do that.

I have a 1tb external drive will all kinds of stuff on it that just failed.

Def

[derekmac]

I backup locally, and online.  My entire computer is backed up to Backblaze, and it does it constantly. 

[Sea Monster]

Backup regularly?

Or....delete regularly, destroy the hard drive with fire, shred your passport, shave your beard and move to another country every 7 years...

Philosophies on data hoarding differ....

I'm on my fourth laptop since 1997 (so about 4 years each?)

I generally go "cheapest possible option with features to work with other stuff if required".

I have the benefit that work provides a computer for Autocad and images etc, so all my personal computer has to do is access MTO.org and play music.


I have absolutely no technically useful advice.
Get one with a screen?

[Whoey]

Well in light of some disk failures or rather impending failure warnings I decided to finally move a bunch of my data around, and a few days ago snapped up a Samsung SSD 850 EVO (250gb) on sale.

It arrived this morning and I bunged a clean copy of Xubuntu on it, and I've now just about got everything configured back to how I had it for the most part. Did not think this old girl had much speed to be recovered but it sure is a lot snappier than my old setup!

[Smashie]

Well in light of some disk failures or rather impending failure warnings I decided to finally move a bunch of my data around, and a few days ago snapped up a Samsung SSD 850 EVO (250gb) on sale.

It arrived this morning and I bunged a clean copy of Xubuntu on it, and I've now just about got everything configured back to how I had it for the most part. Did not think this old girl had much speed to be recovered but it sure is a lot snappier than my old setup!

Good choice, my desktop runs two of them in raid 0.

[raistlin65]

Well in light of some disk failures or rather impending failure warnings I decided to finally move a bunch of my data around, and a few days ago snapped up a Samsung SSD 850 EVO (250gb) on sale.

It arrived this morning and I bunged a clean copy of Xubuntu on it, and I've now just about got everything configured back to how I had it for the most part. Did not think this old girl had much speed to be recovered but it sure is a lot snappier than my old setup!

Anyone who hasn't tried an SSD, will be pleasantly surprised once they do.

In early November, my brother bought a new HP 17" laptop with 6GB of ram and a mobile Core i7 processor. Asked me if he should up the RAM (he wanted to see if it was possible to get more speed), and talked him into getting the same SSD. He was very surprised at how even on that Core i7, things just felt a good bit snappier with the SSD installed.

BTW: upgrading a modern HP laptop hard drive is a tortuous process of removing about 20 screws. I kid you not. Crazy how many screws were in the back of that thing to get to the HD inside. 

[Whoey]

I already had an OCZ Agility 3 (60gb) I picked up about 3 years ago. It is/was primarily for my windows os which I never use.

I could never really make up my mind as to what linux distro to install as most of them didn't feel quite right and came with apps I don't want preinstalled. Also a bit worried at how long it would take to get everything in line again. Xubuntu is pretty close to the mate setup I had, albeit a tad different, there a couple apps it came preinstalled with that I axed in favor of my preferred ones, but for the most part it's what I need.

I'd say I'm not quite completely restored yet, maybe somewhere around 75%. A few apps aren't configured and a few tweaks still need making. For the most part my daily use programs are up and running. I'm still missing a few items I have/used in my old system.

[Smashie]

Is Linux supporting TRIM now?

[Whoey]

apparently so, although it seems unclear if newer distros and drives require it to be enabled or not...

this seems a pretty thorough guide:
http://www.webupd8.org/2013/01/enable-trim-on-ssd-solid-state-drives.html

[Syph007]

My laptop died a month or so ago and I had to buy a new one and I also HATE spending money on stuff like that.  My requirements are very lean though so I just bought a budget business dell laptop for 600 all in and IM happy with it.  I cant stand the consumer line they sell though loaded with crap and have shiny glare screens, but the business ones come without junk and have a matte display.  Not a gaming machine but it runs well and works and thats all I needed.