Other SSD Benefits
Many have written in regarding different benefits of SSD performance. Some are using SSD drives in virtual machine environments resulting in greatly enhanced performance. Others are even running database builds, etc.
The SSD used in this kind of configuration is very different from the ones you may find in an enterprise configuration. They are very inexpensive in comparison; and intentionally thrown away. If an SSD lasts 3 years on a laptop, that is pretty close to the lifecycle of a laptop used in development on a daily basis.
I personally have a Dell Mini 9; one of the first tiny tablet size laptops from Dell, operating on 100% SSD drives to reduce power consumption. I purchased it three years ago. It is now starting to degrade since my daughter has been using it to watch Netflix for the last year.
Here’s some comments from our readers…
Peter:
I have an HP laptop with 2 drive bays. I use an SSD for my OS and apps and virtual machines, then store all data on a 1TB Sata. My laptop screams along. I run 6 to 8 windows server 2008 vm’s and even with the RAM and CPU maxed out on my laptop, the vm’s hum right along. SSD is the ONLY way for me now. I am a network infrastructure engineer and I run entire environments on my laptop for testing before starting on a live environment. Before the SSD, I was forced to use VMware on a SAN through a VPN back to the datacenter. Now I am 100% portable. I use an OCZ Agility SATA3 120GB on a SATA2 system. I can’t wait to see what it is like when I upgrade the laptop to SATA3! 🙂
SSD is a new passion of mine and I try to convert everyone I know.
Ken:
I just read your article on SSD Drives. I think that I have had a different experience, and I would like to get your thoughts. I appreciate your anecdotal story on your friends laptop slowing down and performance improving by replacing the SSD drive. I have heard that from others also, but I have not had that same experience.
We have a 7 man development shop and we have been using VM’s for all development. It has really improved productivity as we can easily get back up and running when we change machines. About 2 years ago, I decided to try using an SSD as a data drive, and I put the virtual machines that I use on that drive. (Actually I only put one machine on it, since it was 64GB). Once I saw the how much performance improved, I upgraded to a 256 GB SSD and the other 6 Developers all switched to keeping the Virtual Machines on the SSD drives.
I have one in my laptop and one in my main machine. The biggest improvement is in the database performance. One of our database upgrade routines, deletes all the views, SPs, Functions, Indexes, then rebuilds them from scratch. On a typical database that routine takes about 2.5 minutes. On the ssd, it takes about 12-14 seconds. The first time I ran it, I thought it did not run.
There are times where one of us will somehow start up a VM whose files are stored on a "Spinning" hard drive, and as you start studio, you can immediately tell that it is not on the SSD.
Another case in point, one of our clients who uses our product has a database in the 120GB range. They installed a Compellent SAN about 2.5 years ago. That particular SAN will allow you to mix and match drive types. It is actually an intelligent SAN, as it monitors the files that are used the most and moves them into the fastest drives. They installed 4 256GB SSDs and within a few days, the SAN software had moved all of the database files into the SSD space. After 2.5 years they are still seeing the huge performance gains.
I would assume that that files in a VM change dramatically, but I could be mistaken.
Like I said, I have heard that SSD’s degrade over time, but that has not been my experience, however, I have not done any actual tests. I can tell you that for the price of about $400 for 256GB, I have reaped bigger savings over the time that I have used the drive. In fact, if the drive was to fail today, I would immediately go and purchase another one. The performance gains are that valuable to me.
David:
As a Photographer with almost 1Tb of images, I need SSDs to know my data is safe and secure. I have had many external hard drives die on me and have heard stories that DVDs are not a good long term solution as well. I do use BackBlaze for $5 a month to store my images in the cloud. It is time that SSDs come down in price to match that of hard drives and get rid of the moving parts. Thanks!
If you have more to share regarding your experience with SSD please send your comments to btaylor@sswug.org. I’ll be moving on to other topics tomorrow, but will gladly share anything you have to add as well.
Cheers,
Ben
$$SWYNK$$
Featured White Paper(s)
All-At-Once Operations
Written by Itzik Ben-Gan with SolidQ
SQL supports a concept called all-at-onc… (read more)
Featured Script
dba3_conditional_tablecheck_DesignProblems
This illustrates implementation issues not addressed in the article "An Elegant Solution to Drop a Table" see: (http://www.ss… (read more)