Just setup a SSD boot drive, how should I configure it?

2

Possible Duplicate:
Best SSD tweaks for Windows 7

I finally broke down and purchased a 30GB SSD to use as my boot drive on my Windows 7 machine.

What changes do you recommend to get the maximum performance out of my SSD? So far I've turned off the Disk Defragmenter and disabled the page file.

I had planned on having the SSD hold only the OS and my hard drive hold applications and data. Currently I have Mozilla and IE installed on the SSD, should I remove them and install them on my HD?

The SSD is using 10.8 of 30 GB at the moment.

Abe Miessler

Posted 2010-06-22T14:12:16.453

Reputation: 1 933

Question was closed 2010-06-24T12:18:59.793

Answers

1

The browsers are fine on the SSD. However, consider moving the C:\Users\youruser\ folder to your HDD, since browsers use that for cache, etc, it gets a lot of read and write.

Here is a Wiki about this.
However, just USE it. Don't care about these writes/reads stuff. It'll survive for a long time no matter how you tease it. (Okay if you rewrite the whole SSD 5-6 times a day, it'll die in a few years). So basically I wouldn't worry about it. Also, the new generation is on the way with 512Gb size, not tiny 32, 64, 128. You should just use it. :)

Apache

Posted 2010-06-22T14:12:16.453

Reputation: 14 755

Heh, yeah i'm not too worried about life span. Hopefully these guys will be dirt cheap in a few years. My sole priority is performance. – Abe Miessler – 2010-06-22T15:12:50.480

Then keep that profile folder on the SSD, and also, keep the default stuff like pagefile there. (Notice, both can take up huge space. !!! One thing you can turn off is system restore, or reduce its max size.) | Also, programs and features, and remove what you dont need. I usually ONLY keep the Internet explorer + differential in the whole list. – Apache – 2010-06-22T15:46:26.857

0

There's a nice post on the Engineering Windows 7 blog about SSDs. Among other things, they do recommend having the pagefile on the SSD (although with only 30 GB, space may be an issue for you):

Should the pagefile be placed on SSDs?

Yes. Most pagefile operations are small random reads or larger sequential writes, both of which are types of operations that SSDs handle well.

In looking at telemetry data from thousands of traces and focusing on pagefile reads and writes, we find that

  • Pagefile.sys reads outnumber pagefile.sys writes by about 40 to 1,
  • Pagefile.sys read sizes are typically quite small, with 67% less than or equal to 4 KB, and 88% less than 16 KB.
  • Pagefile.sys writes are relatively large, with 62% greater than or equal to 128 KB and 45% being exactly 1 MB in size.

In fact, given typical pagefile reference patterns and the favorable performance characteristics SSDs have on those patterns, there are few files better than the pagefile to place on an SSD.

coneslayer

Posted 2010-06-22T14:12:16.453

Reputation: 7 494

I still have 20GB of free space. Do you really think that space will be an issue for me? – Abe Miessler – 2010-06-22T15:25:50.360

If you have space for it, you have space for it. (OK, you probably don't want to fill every single byte, but with 20 GB free you certainly have room for any reasonable pagefile.) – coneslayer – 2010-06-22T15:32:29.333