SSD price has already reduced, how to choose SSD versus HDD?

SSD price has already reduced, how to choose SSD versus HDD?

Whether you install computers by yourself or directly buy the complete machine or laptop, SSD has already become the standard. With the rapid innovation and development of NAND technology these two years, SSD capacity is bigger and its price continues fall, which makes people happy. SSD price has already reduces by 50% compared with the same period of last year. But now, the price of 500GB SSD is similar to HDD with 2TB capacity, some people may have selection difficulty.

Even most people know SSD experience is great, it boots fast and software starts in a second. The critical factor is capacity. 500GB capacity is small just enough to install some movies and several big games, which is unmeaning to you even the fast speed.

We find SSD and HDD products to compare, in order to imitate these two situation.

Crucial BX500 480GB the SSD representative

Even the unit capacity SSD price is less reasonable than hard drive, SSD unit capacity price is the lowest at present. It is the most important that SSD has a better experience than HDD.

WD Blue 2TB HDD representative

2TB HDD is enough to contain a lot of game, audio and video material, whose price is close to 399 presently or even 379 sometimes with discount.

The differences between SSD and HDD in physical structure.

The biggest difference between SSD and HDD is that there is no small and sensitive components such as motors, discs and head rockers, which is determined by the different working theory between these two hard disks.

Compared with HDD, SSD saves more time in machine part movement. Meanwhile, NAND Flash Memory, the main memory component used in SSD, is an electronic component. Therefore, SSD transmission speed is faster than HDD.

Compared with HDD, SSD is more reliable in common falling and incident with better shock resistance and less noise in work, because there is no small and sensitive parts.

Simple performance comparison test

The biggest difference is velocity which is the core factor determining using experience. Let’s do a conventional AS SSD Benchmark test.

The real SSD continued write performance is above three times of WD 2T Blue and 4K write and read is better than HDD with about 50 times gap, which really decides software opening and game loading speed.

So the kind of fast file transfer that SSD brings us, and the smooth experience of loading the game opening and closing in a second will make it impossible for you to go back when you have used it.

SSD is really better than HDD just in speed and using experience.

The HDD advantage is the super capacity.

Because SSD is divided a certain capacity to make system disks, there is less than 500G for remaining capacity for storing software or games, the gap between the two is quite large.

Service life is an inevitable topic.

Even the SSD price is so cheap, the SSD writing life span is an inevitable topic. If HDD is broken, there are some ways to recover data. Some say we can restore by opening. Once the SSD particles are damaged, they are basically hopeless.

This statement is reasonable, which is determined by the storage principles of HDD and SSD. But the probability of occurrence is really very, very low. Here we begin to talk with data.

SSD has a P/E service life of 10,000 to 100,000 SLC flash memory, 3,000 to 5,000 MLC flash memory, 1,000 to 3,000 TLC flash memory and 500 to 1,000 QLC flash memory. Because of the technical principles, TLC and QLC flash memory do have congenital reliability degradation problems. It's normal to have some worries, but do you really need to worry about that?

Let’s calculate, officials say some present common TLC SSDs from 480GB to 512GB capacity in market has 160TB to 200TB service life. Then, we think the lifetime of 480GB SSD as 160TB. The daily writing volume is about 20GB which ordinary users are far less than and the writing amplification rate is also calculated as 2.0. Then the usable time of 480GB TLC hard disk is 160x1000/(2x20x365)=10.1 years.

In fact, TLC SSD has been popular in the consumer market for many years, there has been no large-scale damage issue and other problems we were worried about. Of course, there is some cases of failure and damage, so we should form the habit of backup. After all, it is possible for events with small probability to occur, and even HDD can't be used in the face of some events with small probability.

Based on the principle of experience priority, I tend to recommend SSD with its more satisfying performance and experience. And the most reason is SSD fast speed.

Based on the above situation, I will give you three suggestions according to the specific condition.

1, if you don’t need super capacity, you can buy SSD. HDD out of the 1.5TB you really do not necessarily use in a short time, although it is abundant, it is wasteful if not used.
2, If there is a really high capacity requirement, I recommend you buy an additional SSD to install the system. If you don’t have much money, you can buy a SSD with 256GB capacity after division can installing commonly used softwares. At least, 128GB SSD can also be available.
3, Only when the budget is really super tight and the demand for capacity is particularly high, in this case you can only installed SSD firstly. But I still suggest you can buy a SSD to install system when you have some money. Moreover, according to the current market, SSD will also reduce prices.