Seagate 750gb + 8gb SSD momentus xt @ Pixmania £99.99 + £7 del. £106.99
I’ve yet to see an average score for this drive that isn't 5/5 or far off . And now its less than £100 for the 750Gb model.
So you’d love an SSD drive but the capacity you needs either don’t exist or cost a fortune. Enter the hybrid.
Whilst this only has an 8Gb SSD, its smart enough to use that to work out which files you use most and only cache those. And as its only caching, you don’t have the worry of losing data that comes with full SSD’s. If your laptop only as 1 drive bay or you just don't fancy trying to squeeze your existing hard drive onto a much smaller ssd then this could be the answer.
£112.49 in Amazon (4.6 stars out of 5)
£114 in ebuyer (4.? out of 5)
£119 in dabs (5 out ot 5)
To finish off, here's a quote from Toms Hardware:
"Really, the only time Seagate's Momentus XT slowed down drastically compared to an SSD was when we installed the operating system and applications. Once everything was fully loaded, however, performance rapidly improved as the drive's software algorithms pulled the most frequently-access data into flash, bestowing very SSD-like qualities to it. At that point, it was frankly hard to tell the difference during most common tasks."
All Comments (9)
Jump to unread Post a CommentOf course you're paying extra for the speed (both from the SSD and 7200RPM versus 5400RPM). Here's a sample benchmark from an Amazon review:
Old Samsung Sata:
Login Screen: 1:45
Full Boot: 5:48
Samsung Momentus XT 750gb
1st Boot
Login Screen: 1:25
Full Boot: 4.17
5th Boot
Login Screen: 0.31
Full Boot: 1:27
Thats worth a few quid more IMHO
Edited By: judgey on Aug 11, 2012 01:38
Of course you're paying extra for the speed (both from the SSD and 7200RPM versus 5400RPM). Here's a sample benchmark from an Amazon review:
Old Samsung Sata:
Login Screen: 1:45
Full Boot: 5:48
Samsung Momentus XT 750gb
1st Boot
Login Screen: 1:25
Full Boot: 4.17
5th Boot
Login Screen: 0.31
Full Boot: 1:27
Thats worth a few quid more IMHO
You're paying more than just a few quid extra!
How many times do you need to boot or reboot your machine anyway?
My pc remains on. It's not rebooted for months.
To run faster, your pagefile should be located in the SSD. If you've got a reasonable amount of memory this could fill up a substantial proportion. Also tmp and temp files should be located here. And lots of other caches. There simply isn't the room to locate these all within the SSD. Unless ther's an application with the drive that can swap them in and out and the act of swapping them in and out is going to slow everything down anyway! Can't see it working.
May be useful for booting your machine, but most people, I think, spend much more time running their machine and using it than simply booting it.
I don't think I've seen a 750gb ssd yet but I imagine one would cost about £600. If you need that capacity and only have 1 drive bay, this is a great option.