New Laptop HardDrive: Recommendations and Considerations?

samsung evo 850 is good.

http://thewirecutter.com/reviews/best-ssds/

 

get a samsung ssd. Don't buy any other brand.

 

I definitely recommend the Samsung SSDs.

I can never go back to a traditional drive

 

Samsung SSD, even if you go with a smaller than 1tb drive you won't regret it (if it's an SSD). I'm okay with Crucial and can't remember new model pny too. I mean any modern SSD will kill a HDD.

It'll be like a new computer. Samsung and others do offer free imaging software, just need to plug in new drive w/ usb adapter/csddy. I always like doing a clean install, but the times I've used the imaging software (both free dl's and provided versions) they work fine.

If you do go the imaging route you'll want to run AS SSD (it's free dl) benchmark to make sure the drive is aligned (there's other ways to check this but this is quick route). Sometimes if it's an older drive with issues or not the same size replacement it can show up out of alignment (it's easy to fix and there's free sw to do it too, just need to search Google, pretty sure there's freeware on sourceforge iirc).

 

*HDD caddy etc

 

PS on newer SSDs (made roughly in last year or two) I haven't had any issues (knock on wood), but with any storage solution (ssd/mechanical) you'll always want to have some form of backup for the stuff that can't be replaced.

 

The Samsung drives come with software that will let you clone your drive. It's really easy.

 

SSDs have come a long way, they will last longer than hard drives and with the new 3-D NAND technology the write limit is now a nonfactor.

Don't waste your money on a hard drive OP.
SSDs are well worth the money and SAMSUNG is miles ahead in tech/features than any other company that manufactures SSDs.

Pro vs. Evo?
Get the EVO, Pro is not really worth the increase in $$$.
Get the 850 because there is a weird bug associated with 840 where performance degrades over time.

 

just whatever you do, don't buy a hard drive at best buy. i bought one for my desktop, died on me not even a year later.

 

No. Defragging an SSD does nothing. In order to maximize write life of the cells, the controller automatically spreads out all of the writes into different parts of the drive to evenly distribute the cell wear. Since there is no physical motion when you read data like a traditional hard drive, moving your data closer together physically, which is what defragging does, makes no difference in performance.

What laptop? Make sure you buy the correct type/size. There are a variety of different sizes for SSD now: regular 2.5", msata, m.2, pcie, etc. If you're upgrading from a regular hard drive, it's most likely the traditional 2.5" drives, but always good to double check.

Also, careful when you buy the drives that you know exactly what you're buying. There are hard drives, solid state drives, and hybrid solid state hard drive which combines a small ssd cache (8gb) with a traditional (large) platter drive. The performance from best to worst would be ssd >>> hybrid > hard drives. You do pay a pretty penny for 1tb ssd though, for a Samsung 850 EVO ssd, expect to pay about $300 while a hybrid drive would only set you back $90.

 

I bought most components for my pc with deals found here:https://www.reddit.com/r/buildapcsales/. If you already know what you want you can search and find out how much and how often it goes on sale. https://pcpartpicker.com/ and slickdeals are also helpful.

 

Fragmentation is a non-issue like jchu said. The only reason it is an issue on HDD is because there is a physical movement of the head to seek data on the platter.

With an SSD it is irrelevant where the data is located and/or how much free space there is between chunks, etc.

I believe Windows 10 recognizes this and performs other optimizations when you select the defrag feature with an SSD installed, however its entirely irrelevant because Samsung comes with Samsung Magician, its own maintainance program that lets you set and forget SSD optimizations. Keep in mind because of the nature of SSDs you are going to want to keep at least 10-20% of the drive free at all times or performance will heavily degrade (again Samsung Magician has a feature that lets you reserve space on the SSD).

In essence practical capacity is 80% of whatever is advertised.

 

Right, I personally haven't had any issues and have bought roughly 8-10 for various systems over the last 4 years, I think on one I needed a special firmware update (non-samsung), but even then it didn't have data issues (and I agree on 840 mess).

I was just saying in case something crazy happened and you had family pictures that weren't backed up, but the chance of catastrophic failure is crazy low. Definitely agree through, 850s are solid and I have bought multiple and even though the 850 Pros are technically better I don't see the point for most users, I mean you won't see a real world performance increase and unless you really like benchmarks or the longer warranty... It's not worth it. I mean just look at SanDisk's 10 year warranty, lol in a few more years (or less) I'll be onto the next generation of SSDs, 950s look pretty amazing but not for the premium price atm.

Yes, I'm a tech junky.

 

And RR and others are spot on, no Defrag

 

Agreed. I always turn off scheduled de-frag when upgrading a computer to an SSD.

 

How about disabling page filing as well?

 

if anything..defragmenting is bad for the SSD in terms of longevity. at least i remember reading that somewhere.