I have tried out several SSD drives and encountered several failures. Also had a lot of work making sure latest firmware is installed. My latest SSD to give me trouble is a Intel 330 series 180G. This time I have start thinking about getting a Velociraptor 500G instead. I like its guarantee of five years and the bigger size which would enable me to have not only FSX stuff on it. In addition to that I don't have to fear that FSX stuff will fill up the drive. I might point out that a have an older mobo MSI KA780G MS-7551 which only supports SATA II but not SATA III.

What do you think ? Is a WD Velociraptor 500G a better choice than another SSD ?

I tried replacing my 512GB SSD with a 1TB Velociraptor (the newest, fastest there is) because i wanted to expand my scenery even more (photoreal eats up gigabytes easily) but it just didn't work. The immediate result was FSX loading about EIGHTY times slower.... i went from ~30 seconds loading my default flight to a staggering 4 minutes, measured immediately after a reboot so all memory is clean.

 

Like Word Not Allowed said, there isn't much difference once FSX loads up the first time (maybe still 5 times slower) and while flying i didn't notice any difference at all. It all comes down to "can you wait 4 minutes for FSX to load the first time?".

 

I can't after experiencing SSD speed :lol:

As Word Not Allowed mentioned - I used the Samsung SSD drives as well - I bought a pair of 256GB drives - one has my OS the other I used for MSFS... I have a couple of mechanical drives as well - one for bulk storage and the other for programs that don't need a fast response... Samsung seems to make a good product and I've been very happy with them...

 

Regards,

Scott

I own both WD Rap 600GB HLHX and Samsung 830 512GB. I can tell you that Raptor, while being a great drive, doesn't beat an SSD. How could it...

830 has 3 year warranty which is enough for me.

 

On another thread I posted differences, making SSD boot fully loaded 200GB FSX installation about 3-4x faster than Raptor. Once cached (2nd FSX boot), the SSD isn't of benefit any more. While flying, small differences, like snappier texture loading... I got it only for the FSX load, as I do quite a lot of testing and often reboot and fire up FSX...

 

For the normal usage, if you want wait 5min for your flight to load, Raptor is quite enough.

 

I have asked to have my Intel SSD replaced by a 240G OCZ Vertex 2 drive. If you can find a SSD that works it clearly seem to be the best option. But after reading customer reviews it seem that failing SSD is a very common problem which seems a bit strange.

I have a Velociraptor 500GB HD which I used only for FSX till stepping up to a 120GB Mushkin SSD. I prefer the virtual world from FL3XX so do not need a lot of room for scenery. At any rate, as others have said, the SSD is faster than the Velociraptor; however, I cannot say how much faster. You will really only see a difference in startup and texture loads. Here is a website where they professionally tested components for performance in FSX.

Go SDD if you can, it beats Velo. My local computer store have knowlegeable staff and recommanded Samsung 830 for reliability. Works for me

Yeah - I think the feedback for the Samsung on NewEgg is what convinced me to purchase it... It was like 99.9% positive with hundreds of reviews... Seems like a popular brand around here as well...

 

Regards,

Scott

I have Samsung 830 512GB SSD it's awesome.

Would you guys prefer the Samsung SSD or a Crucial SSD? I see they're in the same price range on Amazon (do most of my electronic shopping there since I'm a Prime member)