Power supply and SSD questions

[VampD]

Back in the day ( 3.5 years ago ) my Corsair 620 watt HX PSU had 3 12v rails and I was told this was a good thing. I noticed a lot of PSUs now adays only have a single rail and according to the end of this article: Power supply rail - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

thats a better thing? Not sure I understand why exactly except for the fact that they removed the safety requirement and having more rails means the PSU is more likely to fail if any one of them is overloaded.

Also concerning SSDs, is there any one that is more then 150 gb at under $250? Is it worth it to get a SSD or a 10k rpm drive if you want a high performance hard drive for the OS and gaming.

 

[patonb]

On the psu thing. A single rail has its advantages and multi rail has its advantages...

If you buy a quality built psu, like the hx, you will not have an issues if its mukti or single rail.

I don't think its more likelyh to fail.. but i think its more likely to overload a rail when split up as each rail only can power a small amount. If you buy a quality psu, this has been thunk of and built into the psu.

Buying a quality psu is key, no matter the rail design is the best factor. Also, you don't add the Amps up on a multi to get total Amps. (a 40A single is about equal to a 45A multi)

 

[Puddle Jumper]

Also concerning SSDs, is there any one that is more then 150 gb at under $250? Is it worth it to get a SSD or a 10k rpm drive if you want a high performance hard drive for the OS and gaming.

It's absolutely worth it to get a SSD, 10k rpm hard drives on the other hand are a waste of money.

You won't be able to get a SSD that size for $250 but you can come pretty close. Either of these drives would be an excellent choice.

Newegg.com - Intel X25-M SSDSA2MH120G2K5 2.5" 120GB SATA II MLC Internal Solid State Drive (SSD)

Newegg.com - OCZ Vertex 2 OCZSSD2-2VTXE120G 2.5" 120GB SATA II MLC Internal Solid State Drive (SSD)

 

[VampD]

It's absolutely worth it to get a SSD, 10k rpm hard drives on the other hand are a waste of money.

You won't be able to get a SSD that size for $250 but you can come pretty close. Either of these drives would be an excellent choice.

Newegg.com - Intel X25-M SSDSA2MH120G2K5 2.5" 120GB SATA II MLC Internal Solid State Drive (SSD)

Newegg.com - OCZ Vertex 2 OCZSSD2-2VTXE120G 2.5" 120GB SATA II MLC Internal Solid State Drive (SSD)

Is there going to be a problem if I have a SSD with the OS and games, along with a standard hard drive for data?

Also 120 gb doens't seem like much I mean doesn't the OS take like 60 gb which just leaves like 60 gb for games? I have a 150 gb 10krpm raptor drive and that's pretty much full already.

 

[patonb]

Yha... Most people don't install all their games at once on their ssd.

 

[memory]

The OS does not take up 60gb's. I have the OCZ Vertex 2 120gb with Windows 7 Pro 64bit installed along with BFBC2 and several other small programs. So far I have 81gb free of 111gb.

You can also use a second drive to install some of your lesser used programs.

 

[Slaymate]

You actually want to use a standard HDD for your page file, temp files or large infrequently used files.

When you get your SSD don't forget to run through the SSD Tweak Guide.

 

[Puddle Jumper]

You actually want to use a standard HDD for your page file, temp files or large infrequently used files.

When you get your SSD don't forget to run through the SSD Tweak Guide.

IMO the page file is debatable, if it is actually used it will perform much better on the SSD at the expense of increasing writes to the drive. Although I would think most of us who are running 4+gb of ram wouldn't see that much page file usage in the first place but I could be wrong.

 

[kjlambert]

Hey,

Just built a new build (see sig). I had a problem with my first SSD but whether it was the SSD itself or a problem with the install is hard to say. I would recommend only plugging in the SSD to the first (0) port on the MB and installing the OS first, then adding the HDD.

Now that it's working, it's awesome. I use the SSD for my OS (Win 7), antivirus, a few smaller tool apps, and WoW. Great load times and 20G to spare.

The HDD works nicely for pics/music/vids, etc.

Just my 2 cents.

 

[veedubfreak]

Always make sure to upgrade the firmware on your SSD before installing it. Currently i run an intel 80gb for my OS and a 120 Vertex for games. Everyone knows my system, and going to SSD was the best upgrade I've made.