SSD lifespan and installing other OSs (DONT!) |
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 Nov 14 2007, 14:46
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#1
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Diehard  Group: Posters Posts: 350 Joined: 8th October 2007 Member No.: 308,966 Device(s): ipaq 3630|Nokia 6210i|BooTooth  |
Went to ebuyer to push the buy button and saw some reasonable comments by Sam Bartle
http://www.ebuyer.com/product/135074/show_product_reviews Which prompted me to google around... But it looks like Xandros created an OS the way I built mine years since we both use compact flasd based SSD for the root OS. Hence the reason to not swap and disk write. I reckon you DONT install any other OS on that SSD unless you USB install it. |
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Nov 14 2007, 15:06
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#2
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 The Main Man  Group: Admin Team Posts: 19,929 Joined: 6th November 2002 From: Norwich, UK Member No.: 1 Device(s): HTC Advantage |
Bear in mind however that a XP version with the same drive will be available, and there's a guide on how to reduce disk writes in XP in the manual...?
P -------------------- Paul O'Brien - Microsoft MVP, Mobile Devices, MoDaCo.network Founder. Check out my Blog! £10 off a £20 spend at eXpansys - click for details |
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Nov 14 2007, 15:17
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#3
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Diehard Group: Posters Posts: 350 Joined: 8th October 2007 Member No.: 308,966 Device(s): ipaq 3630|Nokia 6210i|BooTooth |
Yeh it could just be hoo haa.
My OS build uses 64Meg of compact flash for the root OS and has been up for 5 years... but it's just a note of caution as I don't have the device nor do I know of how the apps (firefox et al) manage their caches. The apps will still write to disk. :/ |
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Nov 14 2007, 19:12
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#4
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 Newbie  Group: Posters Posts: 29 Joined: 26th May 2004 Member No.: 44,556 Device(s): Atom Life |
Oh well, if it does die, surely just boot off external media/sdhcs/etc thus keeping the device. SHDCs will get bigger n bigger.
-------------------- Orange SPV -> Orange e100 ->SPV c500 -> c550 -> c600 -> e650 -> Atom Life
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Nov 14 2007, 19:16
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#5
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 Moderator - Boing! Group: Admin Team Posts: 8,557 Joined: 12th December 2002 From: Guildford, UK Member No.: 993 Device(s): HTC TyTN II |
Certainly bigger than 4GB ;p
-------------------- This months MoDaCo WinMo Week device: the MWg Zinc II! Ask your questions HERE and download the show here! 2.25GB of backup storage online for free with Mozy! - https://mozy.com/?ref=VQ664H |
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Nov 16 2007, 16:59
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#6
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 Addict  Group: Posters Posts: 843 Joined: 26th November 2002 Member No.: 140 Device(s): VARIO III |
Seems that ebuyer have discontinued the eee pc so I can't look at the review in the link. I do know that CF will eventually fail when there are excessive writes done to one block, but does the eee pc have a CF based disk or is it a proper IDE type solid state disk? There is a difference, a proper solidstate harddrive has a much more intelligent controller than a CF card, there are also reduntant memory blocks built in. In use the drive tries to ensure that the write load is spread evenly across the entire memory space, and when something is written to the disk it is immediately read back to check for errors. If there is an error that block is mapped out and replaced with one of the redundant memory blocks. In practice this means that a solidstate harddrive has a much longer MTBF than a regular harddrive.
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Nov 17 2007, 08:53
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#7
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The Main Man Group: Admin Team Posts: 19,929 Joined: 6th November 2002 From: Norwich, UK Member No.: 1 Device(s): HTC Advantage |
I read somewhere that it spreads the write load as you suggest, it was in a review somewhere but I don't know which one!
P -------------------- Paul O'Brien - Microsoft MVP, Mobile Devices, MoDaCo.network Founder. Check out my Blog! £10 off a £20 spend at eXpansys - click for details |
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Nov 17 2007, 09:05
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#8
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Diehard Group: Posters Posts: 350 Joined: 8th October 2007 Member No.: 308,966 Device(s): ipaq 3630|Nokia 6210i|BooTooth |
QUOTE(Paul (MVP) @ Nov 17 2007, 08:53)  I read somewhere that it spreads the write load as you suggest, it was in a review somewhere but I don't know which one! P I read that too which is what raised the alarm bells in the first place.Why go to the extremes to do that unless you have hardware concerns. This post has been edited by Subliminal Aura: Nov 17 2007, 09:07 |
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Nov 17 2007, 10:16
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#9
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Addict Group: Posters Posts: 843 Joined: 26th November 2002 Member No.: 140 Device(s): VARIO III |
QUOTE(Subliminal Aura @ Nov 17 2007, 09:05) I read that too which is what raised the alarm bells in the first place.Why go to the extremes to do that unless you have hardware concerns. If a SSD didn't spread the write load intelligently and have the ability to swap out bad blocks for good then it would need to be protected by the operating system. Embedded OS builds such as (XPE and NTE before it) need to have write filters enabled when they are installed on CF cards since the CF cards don't have the ability to protect themselves. The write filters basically map out an area of RAM to treat as the spare space on the CF card, the big disadvantage (or advantage if you like) of this is that when you reboot an embedded system equipped like this you go right back to initial installation conditions. SSDs are designed to be direct hard drive replacements and do not need any special considerations from the OS to protect themselves, the load leveling and bad block mapping/swapping happens invisibly. From what I can remember there is about 25 to 30% of the total drive space reserved to replace bad blocks when they appear; this, coupled with the lack of moving parts to wear out/heads to crash into disk platters, is what makes a SSD more reliable than an equivalent hard drive. In summary, if SSD manufacturers did nothing there would indeed be hardware concerns, but these concerns have been addressed and the end user should have nothing to worry about. -------------------- |
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Dec 1 2007, 08:09
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#10
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Newbie Group: Posters Posts: 6 Joined: 22nd January 2007 Member No.: 224,100 Device(s): Dash |
Does anyone know if it would be possible to have the bootable OS on an SHDC but have all files saved to the SSD? I will be getting an Eee in the near future, not sure if I will wait for the 2nd gen which are supposedly going to have better processors, and I don't know which OS I want to use. Beyond that, I know that there are some worries of other OS's causing the aforementioned problems with the SSD (whether they are true or not, I know with my luck mine will break right before I hit the save button on my Masters thesis in a few years). Also, I love linux but every once in a while come across a need/urge to be running Windows (or even OSX, though that has yet to run well on the Eee). It would be awesome if I could have different SHDCs with different operating systems that all use files from and save files to the SSD. I am, however, new to most of this and while I have successfully installed linux to my current laptop and gotten ndiswrapper to work (which was quite a feat and a big jump into linux for me) I do not know how I could have the data and OS on different drives. Could it be possible to have the system running like this, saving the on board SSD from constant writes from the OS and give multiple operating systems access to the same files? I'm guessing it has something to do with partitioning the SSD as fat32, but I don't know how I would go about that or if any other problems would come about since the OS is on one drive and the files are on another. Thanks!
-sullitf |
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Dec 1 2007, 14:45
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#11
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Moderator - Boing! Group: Admin Team Posts: 8,557 Joined: 12th December 2002 From: Guildford, UK Member No.: 993 Device(s): HTC TyTN II |
I think the majority of your post can be answered with two short statements:
1: You can boot from SDHC (or USB) 2: SDHC and SSD are both flash memory (kinda), surely they're both as suceptible to multi-write failure as each other? HTH 
-------------------- This months MoDaCo WinMo Week device: the MWg Zinc II! Ask your questions HERE and download the show here! 2.25GB of backup storage online for free with Mozy! - https://mozy.com/?ref=VQ664H |
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Dec 2 2007, 02:47
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#12
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Newbie Group: Posters Posts: 6 Joined: 1st December 2007 Member No.: 327,962 Device(s): Asus EeePC 4G |
I have an extremely hard time believing that the SSD isn't well-designed enough to last just as long as a standard HD, if not longer.
Obviously it's going to vary user-by-user, but even at the most basic level, since there's no moving parts, it's not going to be nearly as susceptible to damage and/or data loss by dropping or other user error. Regardless, only time will really tell how well it does. In any case, I definitely won't ever be using the standard OS. I'm a regular Linux user, but I hate that distro. I'm much happier with XP on my EeePC, whether it "shortens the life" of my machine or not. |
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Dec 3 2007, 11:00
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#13
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Newbie Group: Posters Posts: 1 Joined: 11th September 2004 From: Taiwan Member No.: 56,284 Device(s): HTC Hermes |
The SSD controller of the EeePC is a regular CF card controller (SM223), nothing more.
This post has been edited by Luzofan: Dec 3 2007, 11:01 |
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Dec 14 2007, 12:39
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#14
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The Main Man Group: Admin Team Posts: 19,929 Joined: 6th November 2002 From: Norwich, UK Member No.: 1 Device(s): HTC Advantage |
SD is slower than the internal SSD tho...
P -------------------- Paul O'Brien - Microsoft MVP, Mobile Devices, MoDaCo.network Founder. Check out my Blog! £10 off a £20 spend at eXpansys - click for details |
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Dec 14 2007, 13:11
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#15
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Diehard Group: Posters Posts: 350 Joined: 8th October 2007 Member No.: 308,966 Device(s): ipaq 3630|Nokia 6210i|BooTooth |
QUOTE(Paul (MVP) @ Dec 14 2007, 12:39) SD is slower than the internal SSD tho... P Paul whats the speed of the SSD ? hdparm -tT /dev/XXXXXXX (whatever your disk it is) |
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Dec 14 2007, 13:41
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#16
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Diehard Group: Posters Posts: 350 Joined: 8th October 2007 Member No.: 308,966 Device(s): ipaq 3630|Nokia 6210i|BooTooth |
Hmmm the SSD in the eee PC doesn't seem that fast...
http://forum.eeeuser.com/viewtopic.php?pid=47039 But fast considering the price of it
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Dec 14 2007, 14:39
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#17
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The Main Man Group: Admin Team Posts: 19,929 Joined: 6th November 2002 From: Norwich, UK Member No.: 1 Device(s): HTC Advantage |
Can't tell you as I i'm waiting for my new one to arrive!
 P -------------------- Paul O'Brien - Microsoft MVP, Mobile Devices, MoDaCo.network Founder. Check out my Blog! £10 off a £20 spend at eXpansys - click for details |
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Dec 14 2007, 14:55
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#18
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Diehard Group: Posters Posts: 350 Joined: 8th October 2007 Member No.: 308,966 Device(s): ipaq 3630|Nokia 6210i|BooTooth |
QUOTE(Paul (MVP) @ Dec 14 2007, 14:39) Can't tell you as I i'm waiting for my new one to arrive! P LOL ! Details ? Colour and Supplier ;) |
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Dec 14 2007, 15:19
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#19
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The Main Man Group: Admin Team Posts: 19,929 Joined: 6th November 2002 From: Norwich, UK Member No.: 1 Device(s): HTC Advantage |
Black, 8GB, Taiwan, eBay... bought it for the same price as I got for my 4GB on eBay
P -------------------- Paul O'Brien - Microsoft MVP, Mobile Devices, MoDaCo.network Founder. Check out my Blog! £10 off a £20 spend at eXpansys - click for details |
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