senses08 Posted January 13, 2016 Share Posted January 13, 2016 Hey Peeps, So I just ordered a new system (not here yet : ( ) and it has an SSD. Its been a while since ive had a pc as ive been using a laptop for the last few years and never used an SSD. I have heard rumors it's best to install fsx (and DCS) on a separate hard disk to windows. My question is which option is best: .FSX on SSD and Windows on SATA .Windows on SSD and FSX on SATA .Both on SSD The System: I7-4970k GTX 970 16GB DDR3 RAM 240 SSD 2TB SATA I am aiming to get orbx and use pmdg and aerosoft products. Im expecting to atleast get 40 frames with this (being pessimistic). Which possibility will give me the best frames? Thanks for the help peeps!! Sent from my SM-G928F using Tapatalk Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
keefpee Posted January 13, 2016 Share Posted January 13, 2016 I understand that if you have your Windows operating system on a SSD & all of your other programs on a SATA HDD it will prolong the life of your SSD - they seem to have a finite life & don't like being written/read all the time. Anyway thats how mine is configured care of my computer literate son! Good luck Keith Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
PhantomTweak Posted January 13, 2016 Share Posted January 13, 2016 Kieth has a good point. I would put FSX, if it were me, on the SATA drive, Windows on the SSD. There is your quick anser. Now, I tell you how to build the clock... You may, if you want it load up a little faster, put FSX on the SSD (just NOT in C:\Program Files, or C:\Program FIles (X86)), but they are rather limited as to space. So, once you start adding aircraft, scenery, textures, effects etc etc (annnnd you will!) you will quickly run short on room. So, IN MY OPINION (and we all know about those!), Put Windows on the SSD, and FSX on the SATA. Additionally, ensure the PageFile is on a sperate drive than Windows is, ie: on the SATA, and is fixed at around 2.5 X Ram. That's just a round figure, rough estimate, rule of thumb sort of thing. You can certainly make it bigger or smaller. The trick is to make it big enough to do it's job, without being so big it wastes drive space to no good reason. Also, making it a fixed size makes it work faster, since Windows won't need to waste time adjusting it up and down in size all the time (and it will, if it's not locked in to a specific size). Hope all that helps a little bit... Pat☺ [sIGPIC][/sIGPIC] Had a thought...then there was the smell of something burning, and sparks, and then a big fire, and then the lights went out! I guess I better not do that again! Sgt, USMC, 10 years proud service, Inactive reserve now :D Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Luke Posted January 13, 2016 Share Posted January 13, 2016 they seem to have a finite life & don't like being written/read all the time. An SSD will handle over 1,000 TB of writes. Their lifetime will exceed yours. Unless you plan on passing it down from generation to generation as a treasured family heirloom, feel free to use it like any other disk. Cheers! Luke Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
senses08 Posted January 13, 2016 Author Share Posted January 13, 2016 Kieth has a good point. I would put FSX, if it were me, on the SATA drive, Windows on the SSD. There is your quick anser. Now, I tell you how to build the clock... You may, if you want it load up a little faster, put FSX on the SSD (just NOT in C:\Program Files, or C:\Program FIles (X86)), but they are rather limited as to space. So, once you start adding aircraft, scenery, textures, effects etc etc (annnnd you will!) you will quickly run short on room. So, IN MY OPINION (and we all know about those!), Put Windows on the SSD, and FSX on the SATA. Additionally, ensure the PageFile is on a sperate drive than Windows is, ie: on the SATA, and is fixed at around 2.5 X Ram. That's just a round figure, rough estimate, rule of thumb sort of thing. You can certainly make it bigger or smaller. The trick is to make it big enough to do it's job, without being so big it wastes drive space to no good reason. Also, making it a fixed size makes it work faster, since Windows won't need to waste time adjusting it up and down in size all the time (and it will, if it's not locked in to a specific size). Hope all that helps a little bit... Pat☺ Thanks all it helps a lot!! Will this not hurt frames too much? Or is it totally worth spending the extra money and getting a spare SSD just for fSX?? Sent from my SM-G928F using Tapatalk Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
longbreak754 Posted January 13, 2016 Share Posted January 13, 2016 + 1 to putting the OS on the SSD with a fixed sized Pagefile on the SATA. Other points to consider: SSD: As keefpee pointed out, SSDs have a finite life span - opinions vary but most 'experts' suggest a life span of 80,000 to 100,000 individual writes per cluster. I would only use the drive for the OS and app such as office and AV suites. This will allow you to turn off windows indexing for the drive. SSDs should never be de-fragged but there are a number of programmes available that can be used to 'optimise' the drive. There are also a number of apps out there that allows you to keep an eye on the health of the drive - one such app is called SSDLife Pro. Its freeware and although states its for W7 only I have used it on W8 and 10. SATA HDD: Consider partitioning the drive to make it quicker to defrag when required. For example you could make a partition solely for FSX and another for other apps/games etc. Regards Brian Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
longbreak754 Posted January 13, 2016 Share Posted January 13, 2016 ...............Their lifetime will exceed yours..................... Thanks all it helps a lot!! Will this not hurt frames too much? Or is it totally worth spending the extra money and getting a spare SSD just for fSX?? Luke: Whilst SSDs have a higher Meantime Between Failures (MBF) tolerance and therefore will usually last longer than a standard HDD they don't have 'excessive' lifetimes. senses08: In my earlier post (#6) I highlighted an app that can be used to monitor the health of SSDs. I have two rigs with SSDs fitted - one which I currently run FSX on which has two SSDs fitted (one for OS/Apps and the other solely for FSX). They were fitted at the same time at the beginning of Jul 2014. At this moment in time using the app tells me that the drives have an estimated lifetime of 7 yrs 9 months for the OS disk and 8 yrs and 2 months for the FSX disk. Based on that I would recommend going for another SSD for FSX if you can afford it. Regards Brian Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Luke Posted January 13, 2016 Share Posted January 13, 2016 Luke: Whilst SSDs have a higher Meantime Between Failures (MBF) tolerance and therefore will usually last longer than a standard HDD they don't have 'excessive' lifetimes. Read this article: http://techreport.com/review/27909/the-ssd-endurance-experiment-theyre-all-dead All of the drives are good for at least 600-700 terabytes. I use my machine every day for some pretty disk intensive operations (compilations, data aggregation) that involve multiple iterations. I've got a pair of Samsung 840 EVOs, and have been using them for 18 months now. In that time, my OS SSD has had a total of 3.36TB written to it, courtesy of Samsung Magician. My other SSD has had a whopping 1.2TB written to it. Even if the drives only last a tenth as long as the drives in the article - so "only" 100TB, they're still likely to last me a quarter century at current rates. Does your data differ? Cheers! Luke Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
loki Posted January 14, 2016 Share Posted January 14, 2016 Modern SSD drives are quite likely to last just as long as any consumer level hard drive. Don't forget that hard drives also have a limited lifespan (the drive heads, for example, are typically designed for 300,000 cycles). I leave the page file on the same SSD as Windows, though set to a fixed size. If the system does need to use the page file, it will respond much faster on the SSD than a hard drive and keep system performance up. Data such as music and photos is stored on a hard drive. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
il88pp Posted January 14, 2016 Share Posted January 14, 2016 I keep Win (7-64b) on C:\, and FSX also on C:\. That is on the SSD. My HDD has drives D:\ and E:\ Reason is that I make regularly a system image of C:\ This image then holds the whole system (All programs I mean). It holds Windows, and FSX, plus the FSX registry entries. If ever something goes wrong, I simply restore the system image of C:\\, and all is restored. I had to do this twice, because of a virus, and when I did drive D: and E: were not affected. Drive D and E are where I keep my data, pictures, documents. No working programs installed there. My backup strategy; --once every 6-8 weeks a image of C D and E together. (size image is around 300Gb) --once every two weeks a image of C (these images contain also the boot partition, also on the SSD) --once every two weeks a simple plain copy of D: and E: --added to that a plain copy of a few locations from C: like the FSX folder and things from the desktop and "My Documents, My Pictures" folders. All these backups kept on a 2Tb external HDD. I really like having my C:\FSX folder on C:\\. Btw, you talk about SSD vs Sata. A better way of saying it would be SSD vs HDD Because both are connected via a Sata cable.:) [sIGPIC][/sIGPIC] Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
paul_c2 Posted January 14, 2016 Share Posted January 14, 2016 240GB SSD? Both would fit fine on this. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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