Hard Drive or SSD?

When buying laptops, many consumers favor the ones with the most storage, memory and the fastest processor. However, there is another consideration many people aren’t aware of. It’s probably the #1 reason some laptops are painfully slow out-of-the-box.

Many laptop computers still come with spinning-disk hard drives. Manufacturers are packing 1 terabyte (1TB) of cheap storage into laptops, making average consumers think it’s a desirable feature. In reality, most people couldn’t use 1TB of storage if they tried. To put this amount of storage space into perspective, you would need more than 500,000 High Definition photos to fill it. For the average user, that’s simply not necessary.

How to Choose What’s Right For You

When purchasing a laptop, the question to consider is whether you need 1TB of storage. Ask yourself if choosing a lesser amount of storage will be faster, more energy efficient and durable piece of hardware for your needs. In the case of portable computer systems, your answer will most likely be you don’t need a 1TB computer.

SSDs (Solid State Drives) are more expensive than traditional hard drives, per unit of data, but the benefits are definitely worth some careful consideration.

Solid State Drives require less power than traditional hard drives because they don’t have a physical disk to spin up to 5400+ RPM and a mechanical arm to read data. This technology also allows for faster data transfer, which means your computer will operate exponentially faster. Furthermore, your battery charge will also last longer.

Other Factors To Consider

Another important factor for storage media in portable computers is movement during operation. Laptops are built to be moved around, and sometimes they are dropped accidentally. In a laptop with a traditional-style hard drive, this could result in a “crash”. Technically, this happens when the head of the arm touches the disk’s surface. Unfortunately, computer crashes often render a computer unusable. Thus, making important stored data unrecoverable.

SSDs have no moving parts. This feature makes it impossible for a computer to “crash”. Failures are still possible in SSDs, as with any technology, but they are not typically movement-related. Data backups are always recommended with either storage device.

If your computer is slow and has a standard hard-drive, upgrading it to SSD technology could seriously improve its performance. Almost any computer can be upgraded. If you’re interested in upgrading, give us a call or stop in at Awesome Computer Repair in Mandan. We’d be happy to give explain your options and decide what works best for you.