"Best" size for boot SSD (with 1 or 2 games on it)

[Deleted]

Hello folks

Well to make it short: Im looking for a SSD (building a complete new gaming system). Im tending between the Sasmung 840 Series with 120GB and 250GB.
What do I need it for....only my Win7 64Bit and 1 or 2 games (WoW and LoL). Other games will be installed on a normal harddrive (because there i dont care if i have a slightly better ping).
Will the 120GB be enough or should i go for the big brother with 250GB?

[Deleted]

You wont get a better ping, you will just get faster loading screens.

OT: I would go for the 250 if your budget allows it. Reason: Bigger is better

[chazus]

120 is enough for wow, lol, and OS... However I would still install games on the SSD. Every program should go on there, really. If you cant fit that on 120, get the 250.

[vesseblah]

As big as you can afford, and put everything except your music and movie files on it. That way everything you do on the computer will run faster.

120GB would be enough for what you're asking but I really don't recommend it since the price difference is getting rather small and you'll rather have more SSD space to install one more game year from now than not.

[MickoLis]

i read somewhere that anything under 120g can compromise the speed slightly.
120 will be more than enough.

[Keny]

I have Samsung 840 120gb and Its enough for Wow and your OS, I HIGHLY SUGGEST THAT YOU WONT Take a 64gb one,
Its too small , you will have alot of problems Installling OS + OS Programs.

[russ555]

Don't bother installing LoL on an SSD since you have to wait for the slowest person to load and most people play LoL on a calculator.

[Twoddle]

The sweet spot these days for an SSD is 250Gb.

[Deleted]

Don't bother installing LoL on an SSD since you have to wait for the slowest person to load and most people play LoL on a calculator.

This is really something worth considering.

SSDs will only really affect your load-times, nothing else. It won't affect your ping or even your FPS/performance. If you have online games like LoL that require you to wait for others having an SSD is really a waste of resources.

That said, EVERYTHING benefits from being on an SSD. Every program becomes more responsive and leads a lot faster. Only media files like movies and .mp3 don't benefit a great deal from SSDs and also tend to take up a huge amount of space.

Honestly if you can live without a massive amount of storage space then you can easily get by without a conventional HDD nowadays.

I built a PC last year just using a 256 GB SSD and haven't looked back since. The only downside is that you need to delete old Steam games quite frequently if I want to try a new one. But I do that anyway.

[Deleted]

I have a 64gb one for OS and wow (after debating if its worth putting it on a SSD or not)
However, I have edited registry to make it so that my user profile and programs install directly on to a separate drive, as well as removing the Hibernate and the windows swap file to another location.

So it is possible to do it on a 64gb drive. I however would not recommend it. its a lot of pissing around to save disk space. Get a 128gb or above and you will have no issues at all.

[Deleted]

120gb is enough but bigger is always better

[Deleted]

Don't bother installing LoL on an SSD since you have to wait for the slowest person to load and most people play LoL on a calculator.

There is no reason NOT to install it onto the SSD unless you're running out of space which doesn't seem it would be the case here. Also if you disconnect, crash etc. you will be loading back in faster which in return has nothing to do with how slow or fast the rest of your team loads.

120GB is enough but I would recommend 250GB just because it's less micromanaging.

[chazus]

I would get an SSD even if it didn't improve game load times. The quality of life improvement in general of the system is just fantastic.

[Deleted]

if just OS + wow + lol i don't see how you'd need anything beyond 90gb?
just pick a 120/128 and call it a day. (you could even move around some games if you'd start to play one or another less)

[vesseblah]

if just OS + wow + lol i don't see how you'd need anything beyond 90gb?
just pick a 120/128 and call it a day. (you could even move around some games if you'd start to play one or another less)

What I said in post #4...

rather have more SSD space to install one more game year from now than not.

Also over 120GB seems to be where the $/GB is lowest which is another big reason why aim higher than that.

[vesseblah]

does anyone mind if i jump in here and ask what the best SSD (preferably around £70) would be? there are so many and i'm getting a bit flustered trying to memorise all the numbers.
i've seen some people swearing by ocz and some other people selling their children to avoid ocz.. only good things about samsung, but a lot of 'tricky' similar names for very dissimilar drives..

Short version:

- Intel is expensive but reliable
- OCZ is cheap but has relatively high failure rate (more of these break during first six months than any other brand but you get replacement fast), older models also had major problems requiring flashing the software on the drive which is also why people are avoiding these now
- Crucial M4 and Samsung 830/840 models have good balance of price and no reported widespread problems or abnormally high failure rates
- Corsair has confusing amount of models from cheap and slow to expensive and fast, also some older models had the firmware problems mentioned with OCZ

All other brands are so small/random that there simply isn't any data available.

[chazus]

The Samsung 840 (Not 840 Pro, or 830) is probably your best bet.

[Kegler]

I have a 128GB SSD and a 500GB HDD, and its been perfect.

[Papi]

Once you get into Samsung's 840 PRO with the 256GB or higher, youll get faster read/write than the 128GB.

[chazus]

Once you get into Samsung's 840 PRO with the 256GB or higher, youll get faster read/write than the 128GB.

...Yes and no.

The read speeds, which is the important part of SSD's. Their main feature. Are all the same. 840, 840 Pro, 120-250gb, whatever.

Write speeds are better on larger drives, and Pro drives, however are not the important factor, and a waste of money.

Get the 840 non-pro.