buy an SSD, there's no point in buying an hybrid hdd

some random youtube video: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=j84eEjP-RL4

my personal experiencie with an ordinary IDE SSD (nowhere near to today's performance in SSD): https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ofphmUk4ZQE

Can't go with a single SSD with this system. This 320GB HDD currently installed is already too small for the amount of things I keep in the laptop already, and a 500GB SSD is far too expensive for me to spend on a 5-year old budget laptop. A 500GB hybrid HDD should be much more affordable.

My wife had a similar laptop (5741) but it came with an i3-330M as stock. I bumped it up to an i7 640M with 8GB RAM, and it improved the perceived speed of the machine (except boot time) by about 20-30%. I'd guess that adding an SSD would probably make it quite usable for day-to-day stuff, but I couldn't afford it then, and can't justify the expense at this time. In your case, any Core i5 CPU and hybrid drive should make a big difference.

Had a look at the specs, here's a side-by-side comparison

http://www.cpu-world.com/Compare_CPUs/Intel_C … P80617005487AC/

It looks like the main difference between the 480M and 560M is the turbo speed (2.93GHz v 3.2GHz) - doubt you'd see much difference between the two in real world terms, so maybe the 480M is a better bet on a budget.

I have a somewhat similar system:

Core i5-450M
2x2GB DDR3
HD5450
500GB HDD.

I upgraded last year by adding an SSD.
I installed a 128Gb Corsair Force LS SSD instead of the HDD, bought a drive bay to 2.5" inch adapter, threw out the DVD drive and installed the existing HDD in place of that. Works like a charm, very fast, very power-effective - batteries last twice as long now that HDD does not have to spin all the time.

If I were you, I'd look for a cooler CPU. You won't see much difference between 480M and 560M when it comes to performance - both are very solid - but your cooling system might not be up to it.

The P6100, i5-480M and i5-520M are all the same TDP so there shouldn't be any heat issues or power circuit loading issues.
The i5-560m also has a 35w TDP but then it gives a peak almost twice that so said issues would be a probably not - but maybe.

I prefer old school 7200 RPM HDDs in laptops. At least for the "C" drive.
I have never personally 'felt' slowed down by those drives.

If I need more bulk storage I use an external USB-HDD to load/swap things as needed or...
... do what RacoonRider suggested and get a HDD-in-Optical-bay caddy and install a second HDD. (Can swap the Optical and 2nd HDD as needed.)
.

PCBONEZ wrote:

The P6100, i5-480M and i5-520M are all the same TDP so there shouldn't be any heat issues or power circuit loading issues. The i […]
Show full quote

The P6100, i5-480M and i5-520M are all the same TDP so there shouldn't be any heat issues or power circuit loading issues.
The i5-560m also has a 35w TDP but then it gives a peak almost twice that so said issues would be a probably not - but maybe.

I prefer old school 7200 RPM HDDs in laptops. At least for the "C" drive.
I have never personally 'felt' slowed down by those drives.

If I need more bulk storage I use an external USB-HDD to load/swap things as needed or...
... do what RacoonRider suggested and get a HDD-in-Optical-bay caddy and install a second HDD. (Can swap the Optical and 2nd HDD as needed.)
.

When you get used to a SSD performance everyhing lesser seems too slow. I have a 256GB Sandisk X300 (similar to Ultra II) on my desktop (2600K, 16GB, etc) and my notebook crawls in comparison to it even though its hardware is quite OK (3630QM, 8GB - default 5400RPM HDD).

its a common position that most people takes, they dont believe what you say until they experience it. I have a client who spent in a gamer computer (i7-4790k + 16gb + gtx970) but he refused to pay for an SSD and continued to use his older 500GB WD Blue, a total waste of money...

The main bottleneck in a notebook its the HDD and people tend to go for the space more than the reliability and speed (dont get me started with the longer battery life)

PCBONEZ once you taste the forbidden fruit there will be no looking back.

I just refuse to boot systems from anything else anymore, even the PIII relic had to get its SSD.

My main PC had an SSD as a system drive and I do know the difference. My secondary PC (the one I'm using right now) uses an HDD, and while it IS slower, it runs just fine. The laptop struggles much more, though. Thing is, this is a cheap budget laptop and I just wanna give it a little level up - If I wanted to spend a good amount of money I'd rather just buy a new one, It seems, though, that HDDs/SSDs/SSHDs keep their value a LOT more than processors: even the i5 560M is a lot cheaper than a used hybrid SSHD, and storage media is one thing I won't dare get a second-hand part: SSDs have limited write cycles and mechanical disks are usually the first thing to go in a well-cared machine.

To fit two drives, you can have a plate that fits a extra HDD/SSD in place of the DVD, and put the DVD into an external case - depending on how much you use the DVD - if 500Mb total would do, then you could pair the 320 HDD with a 240 SSD

Yes. These things.
http://www.ebay.com/itm/200864679320
You can find them for PATA or SATA and I think even some that convert PATA and SATA.

Really? - This is a retro site and you are afraid of used drives? - HAHAHAHA 🤣 🤣 🤣

I could care less about SSD. - My primary concern is capacity, not speed.
I don't game in the fashion most of you do (or care to) -- and I can only type so fast.

My desktops & NAS use 1Tb enterprise class drives in RAID which in bulk cost me on average $35 or less anymore.
When they come up with RAID capable 1Tb SSD's for $35 in quantity and with long original warranties I might consider them for desktops.
But, by the time that happens I will probably be needing 2Tb or 4Tb drives so I don't see it happening.
(2Tb and 4Tb NAS drives are dropping below $35/TB as new so the option is getting attractive.)

Yeah. I know some idiots use SSD in RAID. If you dunno why that's stupid then you shouldn't be recommending drives to people.

In my 'modern' laptops I use WD Blacks exclusively. The 500Gb versions cost me about $35.
I went on a stock-up binge last year and bought 20+ WD 320Gb and 500GB WD Blacks used.
Only 1 dud out of all of them and the seller replaced it free.

I haven't bought a 'factory new' drive since about 2003. - I choose the used ones very carefully though.
According to the various review/complaint sites my DOA rate is 1/2 or less than what it is for the same drives brand new.
I have had zero drive failures (attributable to the drive) for any that have passed my receipt testing, which is almost all of them.
(IOW if they are good when they get here they don't bust later without outside help. Like power surges or drop-tests.)
-Choosing-
I choose only high-end drives based on the original warranty length. I look for drives with an original 5 year warranty.
I look for drives that are still under the factory warranty. So, less than 5 years old and NO OEM (Dell, HP, etc) versions.
I also don't buy from sellers that think formatting is a way to test a drive.
If the ad does not say how they were tested and what with I ask before I buy to filter out idiot sellers.

I only recall ever having two drives that failed due to wear-out.
Both were smaller older WD PATA drives that had been in near constant 24/7 use for 9 years.
I lost no data because of the RAID.
.

I have just the OS and some apps (and games that really benefit from faster loadings) in the SSD. All my other files, games and etc lie on a "auxiliar" 2TB drive. My other stuff is kept into other 1/1.5/2/4TB SATA drives. But it all comes down to you storage needs - I have 25TB+ of stuff archived.

If you have a reasonably new main PC (anything Core 2 Quad and up) you'll definetly notice the difference. For older rigs probably not so much since the hardware will be a bottleneck on newer OSes.

I agree on the enterprise-grade disks part. Problem is: if you buy them used, a lot of them have had heavy use (40K+ hours with less than 50 spinups/downs) and aren't that reliable. I had a 500GB Constellation (HP OEM, IIRC) that kicked the bucket after less than one year of normal use (on a client's PC, it had about 38K hours before being installed there). Caviar Blacks are a great modern option anyone looking for high-performance/reliabilty on a new drive without the enterprise price tag.

Assuming that was aimed at me....

Snayperskaya wrote:

I have 25TB+ of stuff archived.

You are a bit ahead of me there, but not much.

Snayperskaya wrote:

If you have a reasonably new main PC (anything Core 2 Quad and up) you'll definetly notice the difference.

My main rig sports dual quad Xeons.
I don't game (much) so drive speed loading games isn't a concern for me.
The only time I wish the drives were faster is when I have to back-up a whole server to work on it.

Snayperskaya wrote:

I agree on the enterprise-grade disks part. Problem is: if you buy them used, a lot of them have had heavy use (40K+ hours with less than 50 spinups/downs) and aren't that reliable.

I've been using used enterprise class drives since IDE and because of how I choose them (read up) that has never actually been a problem for me.
Basically I buy used, not old. There is a difference.

Snayperskaya wrote:

I had a 500GB Constellation (HP OEM, IIRC) that kicked the bucket after less than one year of normal use (on a client's PC, it had about 38K hours before being installed there).

Even enterprise class OEM drives only carry a 1 year warranty which is one reason I avoid them.
Also you have to RMA through the OEM which is a PITA or impossible.

Snayperskaya wrote:

Caviar Blacks are a great modern option anyone looking for high-performance/reliabilty on a new drive without the enterprise price tag.

I used a few of those until 1TB REs got cheaper than 1TB Blacks.
Since then WD has made Blacks incompatible with some RAID cards so I quit looking at them and stay with REs.
REs give me a warm fuzzy. 🤣

Snayperskaya wrote:

... If you have a reasonably new main PC (anything Core 2 Quad and up) you'll definetly notice the difference. For older rigs probably not so much since the hardware will be a bottleneck on newer OSes ...

Even a cheap SSD handicapped by PIII era hardware is still orders of magnitude faster @ 4K than any modern HDD.

Not to mention the access times.

alexanrs wrote:

Can't go with a single SSD with this system. This 320GB HDD currently installed is already too small for the amount of things I keep in the laptop already, and a 500GB SSD is far too expensive for me to spend on a 5-year old budget laptop. A 500GB hybrid HDD should be much more affordable.

Then buy a regular spinning 7200RPM drive. Those SSHD hybrids are mostly a waste of money.

TELVM wrote:

Even a cheap SSD handicapped by PIII era hardware is still orders of magnitude faster @ 4K than any modern HDD. […]
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Snayperskaya wrote:

... If you have a reasonably new main PC (anything Core 2 Quad and up) you'll definetly notice the difference. For older rigs probably not so much since the hardware will be a bottleneck on newer OSes ...

Even a cheap SSD handicapped by PIII era hardware is still orders of magnitude faster @ 4K than any modern HDD.

CrystalD SSD Corsair F40 - 440BX Pentium III Tualatin 1400-S 003.png

AS SSD Bench - HDD WD Black Caviar 1TB 001.gif

Not to mention the access times.

Yeah.
Comparing SSDs in RAID-0 to a single SATA drive is fair.

His point about older rigs was that how fast the drive can talk to the controller doesn't make a lick of difference when it has to pass through a conventional PCI bus that maxes out at 133Mb/s.
Even a plain 1.5Gb/s SATA drive will saturate the PCI bus in under 90 ms. After that you are bottle necked at 133Mb/s. Actually less because PCI bandwidth is shared.
.

🤣 You got it wrong, that's one single SSD, the Promise raid card is there just for providing a SATA header to plug it into. As you said above, SSDs in RAID-0 make little sense.

Even though the 133 MB/s PCI bus severely handicaps this SATA II SSD, sequential speeds are much better than 440BX native ATA33, and it still destroys any MODERN HDD on 4K speeds and access times.

TELVM wrote:

🤣 You got it wrong, that's one single SSD, the Promise raid card is there just for providing a SATA header to plug it into. As you said above, SSDs in RAID-0 make little sense.

Though not my favorite anymore, I've been using Promise cards since ATA33 was the fastest PATA available. So, ~18 years.
I still use one in my Windows happy home theater setup but in RAID1. It identifies as Promise 1X2/RAID1 - because it's in RAID 1 mode.
Yours identifies as Promise 1+0 Stripe/RAID0 - because it's in RAID 0 mode.
Promise cards will not go into a RAID mode with only one drive attached. The firmware won't let them.
With one drive it should say "single disk" or "JBOD" or similar.

I will say it again.
Bragging about the speed between the drive and the controller is pointless when the controller has to transfer through a 133MB/s bus on it's other side.
Absolutely NOT "orders of magnitude faster" as you stated on PIII era hardware.

TELVM wrote:

Even though the 133 MB/s PCI bus severely handicaps this SATA II SSD, sequential speeds are much better than 440BX native ATA33, and it still destroys any MODERN HDD on 4K speeds and access times.

I'm so happy that you are so happy about something that is over with in under 90 milliseconds. After that it's bottle-necked sequential or not..
.