64 Gb SSD acceptable?

[Grail]

I just am having trouble justifying the higher prices of larger sized SSDs. I am getting ready to build something for pete's sake as my core 2 duo 2.13 (running at 2.24 - baby overclock) just can't handle WoW too well any longer. Also, I hear my WD 640 Caviar Black constantly seeking and I am sure faster read times would be a real boost. However, 64 GB is not large by today's standards; and if I have to go 120 or 128 (Intel or Crucial), I will for reliability and size. But then we are in the two to three hundred dollar range.

Thanks for any input.

-Grail

p.s.- I would use the SSD for Windows 7 and WoW and as few other programs as feasible. I imagine some others already have this setup. Also, if there is a good thread on this, please feel free to just point me there. I couldn't find it.

[Umbaalo]

It might be a gamble using just a 64gb drive. You are going to lose 5 or 6gb from overprovisioning and if you get Win 7, that's another 26gb used up. The general rule of thumb is to keep your drive from getting 80% full.
I agree with your brand choices, both companies have solid quality. Personally, I'd save up for 100gb+ drives for a little extra buffer space.

[Grail]

Thanks Umbaalo,

I am leaning that way myself. Case in point, I just spent my last three minutes of game time looking at a frozen screen of the inn by the original SW bank while my hd tried to load everything up. Couldn't even post a few more auctions! I just had time to /wave goodbye to Azeroth and then log again.

Of course, I could buy more game time and will in a week or less, but I had planned this little forced hiatus. More time to research new gear!

Thanks to anyone else as well with any info or anecdotes or recommendations on the SSD front.

-Grail

[EaTCarbS]

64g is okay if you use the drive just for wow.

My ssd is 64g and i just have wow with symlink folders on it.

[Ualaa]

I've got a Patriot Torq 64GB SSD.

I've got 1x Warcraft on it.
Plus 1x SC II.
Full installs, haven't bothered with Symbolic Links.

It's not quite large enough for the operating system and warcraft.
But is easily large enough as a gaming drive.

[Ughmahedhurtz]

I started with 64GB Kingston V-series (the one with the Intel controllers). It was fine as long as I kept my installed games cleaned up depending on space. I run two of them in Raid 0 now. What I did was partitioned them to 80% drive size so I'm always <80% even if the drive is full, though I've yet to fill them up. I suppose if you have huge games like Prototype and a few other multi-DVD installs, you might bump the limit. Really, though, I'd probably run a second cheap non-SSD drive for storing big files.

I can't complain so far. As an example, my current RAID-0 setup is ~100GB total. I have:

20GB C:\Windows
10GB C:\games\rift
8.2GB C:\games\eve
12GB in mail, MP3s, app setups, driver installers, downloads, pics and a bunch of other junk in various other spots. Total use is ~61GB reported, so if I kept my non-OS and non-Gaming files on a USB drive or second, slower HDD, I'd be well under the max, even with a 64GB single disk partitioned to 52GB.

[Catamer]

it's been my experience that an SSD is not that great as an O/S drive unless you raid them. If you use it to hold as just WoW it should be fine.

I have 4 on a caching raid controller as raid-0 and the machine smokes. Have the O/S and WoW both.
When I tried just one drive as an O/S drive I got small 1-2 second lock ups during use. SSD is wonderful if you're mostly reading the drive. When it's your O/S drive you end up writing to the pagefile all the time and for some reason you get blazing speed and then as if the cache is full the drive takes a second to clear it's buffer or something. I never liked SSD on my laptop, I couldn't stand the lockups.

[Acidburning]

it's been my experience that an SSD is not that great as an O/S drive unless you raid them. If you use it to hold as just WoW it should be fine.

I have 4 on a caching raid controller as raid-0 and the machine smokes. Have the O/S and WoW both.
When I tried just one drive as an O/S drive I got small 1-2 second lock ups during use. SSD is wonderful if you're mostly reading the drive. When it's your O/S drive you end up writing to the pagefile all the time and for some reason you get blazing speed and then as if the cache is full the drive takes a second to clear it's buffer or something. I never liked SSD on my laptop, I couldn't stand the lockups.

Is this other peoples experience with OS & wow on 1 SSD? I almost at the point to get a new computer built.

But this comment leaves me second guessing the 1 SSD that I was planning on getting for OS & wow.

[Grail]

First let me thank EaTCarbS, Ualaa, Ughmahedhurtz, and Catamer,

I had to be away for a couple of days and the four of you sure opened up a whole new perspective for me. Now I am looking for a good 64 GB ! I don't know about the symbolic links that EaTCarbs and Ualaa mentioned but I will look into it. And I really appreciated Ughmahedhurtz tip on partitioning the active sectors to 80% drive size. Would the same work if one decided to not even format 20% of the drive? What a great idea.
Do these SSDs go on sale regularly? I keep reading about people saying, "I got mine for $99. last week." Right now I am looking at, but I am completely open to suggestions, the Crucial RealSSD C300 CTFDDAC064MAG-1G1 2.5" 64GB SATA III MLC Internal Solid State Drive (SSD) http://www.newegg.com/Product/Produc...82E16820148357

And lastly, I too am curious if Catamer's experience has been the experience of many?

Thanks again, I would not even be able to contemplate all of this seriously without all of you good folks to pitch in your real life expertise and opinions.

-Grail

[Starbuck_Jones]

That sounds like some sort of firmware/driver/power options/trim issue. Did you build or customize this laptop because I find it hard to believe a name brand laptop configured from the factory would do this. If it did then they all would and it would be an easy known issue to find the solution. Its been my experience even the cheapest ssd will outperform the best platter drive and I have not experienced any 1-2 second delay running my OS off of a sdd.