There was a time when I used to scoff at the thought of having an SSD in my computer because “faster boot speeds” seemed like a ridiculous excuse for me to spend a lot of money on a storage device that would still not equal my hard drive in terms of capacity. I still remember the day I upgraded to an SSD, and even though it was just 500GB, at that point, I realized what I was missing. Everything was ridiculously faster than before and with absolutely no spinning noise.
I used that SSD for years until I finally decided to upgrade to a PCIe NVMe SSD, and it felt like my computer had a brand new life because things felt even faster than they did on the SATA-based SSD. Ever since then, I have completely converted to solid-state storage on all my computers, and I know for a fact that this is the way forward.
However, despite advocating SSD storage for years, people still ask me just how many SSDs they can have, and well, the answer is always the same, but I am here to give you an understanding of SSDs.
Understanding SSDs
Okay, so a lot of people would wonder why they need to have an understanding of SSDs, in the first place. To be honest, it is crucial that you develop an understanding of the storage devices that are easily the future of computing.
Solid state drives are available in a number of form factors, and on top of that, have different standards. You get your simple SATA-based drives that are either available in 2.5-inch variants or M.2 variants. Then you have the PCIe NVMe SSDs that are available in either M.2 offerings or in the shape of PCIe cards.
The NVMe/PCIe drives are always more expensive due to the fact that they are faster. However, at the same time, they do have a limitation as to how many you can install. Most modern motherboards have up to 4, and that is considered a lot. However, most motherboards also let you use a PCIe expansion card to add even more storage devices, so you can have a lot. But considering how these devices use the PCIe lanes, there can be a limiting factor as to how many you can add. You can go as high as 12, but again, it varies from chipset to chipset based on just how many PCIe lanes you have.
As for SATA-based SSDs, that again depends on just how many SATA ports on your motherboard there are. For example, if you want to buy a prebuilt gaming PC under $1000, the PC can have up to 6 or even 8 SATA ports, which would then allow you to plug in that many SSDs in your PC without any issues.
However, this again introduces a new limitation. For instance, for you to add upwards of 8 SATA-based SSDs in your computer, you are going to need a case that has enough space for all the SSDs. For instance, my case can house up to 4 SSDs on the back and more if I use the caddies provided by the manufacturer. Your mileage may vary depending on the case.
Last but not the least, the number of SSDs you can have inside your PC will also vary on how many ports or slots you have on your motherboard. The cheaper the motherboard, the fewer the number of slots and ports. So, be sure that you check your motherboard’s manual or just physically inspect the motherboard.
Why You Should Use SSDs Instead of Hard Drives
A common issue that people face all the time when choosing between a storage device is that they are not really sure about which device they should go for, and that is the reason why they end up making the wrong decision, to be honest. Honestly, if you think about it, choosing an SSD over an HDD is a no-brainer, but still, the confusion is there for a lot of people.
That is why I have listed down some of the advantages of why you should use SSDs instead of hard drives. This is for all those people who are still confused about making the jump for one reason or another—sometimes people are put off by the higher price of the SSD, and other times, people are under the impression that the difference is not all that much. We are here for you, so let’s not waste time and have a look.
1- SSDs Offer Better Durability
Now, this is one thing that a lot of people don’t know much about, but when you are going for SSDs, you will realize that they offer better overall durability as compared to their counterparts. Now, why does that happen? Well, there are a few reasons behind that. For starters, unlike a hard drive, an SSD does not come with any moving parts. You are getting a storage device that is smaller, without moving parts, and stores all the data on flash memory. This makes SSDs a lot more durable than your average hard drive that you find in the market.
2- You Get Really Fast Speeds
Hard drives are limited by the speed that SATA provides, and SATA itself is an outdated protocol and doesn’t provide the speeds that you would want. However, SSDs are based on modern-day protocols, and considering how you can also get NVMe PCIe SSDs, the speeds that you can get are limitless.
The latest generation of SSDs can deliver up to 7,000 MB/s, which is insane because you are going to be able to copy all your data in a jiffy. The same goes for read speeds, as they are also blazing fast.
Now, this might not make sense to those who are just planning on using their PC and then forgetting about it, but you will realize the speed difference in a lot of different things, such as your PC booting up, your Windows loading, the apps you run, file transfers and more.
3- Better Longevity
Now, this is going to die into the first point I made. SSDs offer better longevity as compared to traditional hard drives. Since you are not looking at any disks inside an SSD, there is no wear and tear as you write data. Sure, SSDs have their own lifespan that is measured in MTBF (Mean Time Between Failures) or TBW (Terabytes written over time), but honestly, these are still much longer than the ones that you get on your traditional hard drive.
So next time you find yourself wondering if the SSD is going to eventually die, I can guarantee you that your storage device will last longer than the hard drive that you have installed.
4- SSDs are Better at Power Efficiency
Another thing that most people often don’t talk about SSDs is the fact that they are more power efficient. Simply put, if you are looking to ensure that your SSD is working just fine and that, too, without any issues that might otherwise come in the way, then you will not have to worry about it at all, and you will be fine.
Not just that, since modern NVMe/PCIe SSDs take their power from the slots, you do not have to run into the issue with any cables since they only use connectors and connect directly onto the motherboard, making the process a whole lot easier and straightforward.
These are all the common benefits of an SSD that will ensure that you are getting better performance than their counterparts. With SSDs, you can bring new life into your computer and ensure that you are never running into performance issues.
Conclusion
I have said it before that SSDs are the future of storage, and to be honest, there was a time when these storage drives were a lot more expensive than they used to be. Now, they are slowly coming down in price because there is just so much to choose from. While they still remain just a little bit more expensive than hard drives when you look at price-per-gigabyte, but in the long run, SSDs are just better.
The last remark that I would give in this situation is that although SSDs are the obvious winners, we simply cannot discount hard drives and call them useless. For anyone building a network attached storage (NAS) hard drives are excellent because you can get a lot of storage for really cheap.
