Tuesday, October 2, 2012

Tips to Speed Up Startup With a SSD or Hybrid Drive


The cheapest way to get the 50% startup speed boost is by buying a small SD card and using it to host just your startup files. Unfortunately, this method may also require reinstalling Windows which is too much work for an article that promised you wouldn’t need to change any settings.

The most expensive way to speed up your startup by 50% is to buy a full Solid State Drive (SSD). Then all you need to do is plug it into your computer and copy over all of your files, including your hidden boot sector. Your computer can do this overnight while you sleep using the free program, Clonezilla. After the files copy, you simply remove your old hard drive and use just the SSD.

In between those two prices are the hybrid hard drives, which cost less than the full SSDs but require the same simple setup procedure.

Hybrid hard drives do have a few warts. The main problem is that they combine two different hard drives into a single virtual hard drive, which means that when one part fails, the whole drive fails. Since magnetic hard drives and SSDs have different weaknesses, the combination hybrid hard drive is twice as likely to fail.
However, most hybrid drives should work for several years before they fail, which may be infrequently enough for you.
Whatever solid state-based drive you choose to speed up startup, note that it shouldn’t be defragmented which is the topic of our next section. Defragmenting a solid state drive slightly reduces its lifetime.




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