Is it worth upgrading to a 120 GB SSD on my laptop?

[DeadlyTitan]

So recently the 500 GB HDD in my laptop died so i was looking to replace it and then i came across the SSD's available for same price but much much lower capacity.

This is a 4 year old laptop with an i3-3217U (I guess) with 2 x 4 GB (8 GB) DDR3 ram, that i bought when i entered the university back then. Nowadays i just use it to read news/articles and watch some videos and maybe a quick editing of work related files if really needed and not much else. So do you think its worth going to a 120 GB SSD over 500 GB HDD? i dont want to spend too much on this as i already have my i7 8700k gaming rig with GTX 1080 Ti and 2 x 1 TB SSD's.

So yea my work on it is very minimal and limited. The thing is i am a data hog and i tend to gather soo much data over time that i have over 12 TB drives full of data. just backed up. My current gaming rig have around 6 TB Storage and 4 TB offline backup. I am a hobby game modder so there is a lot of data that i often back up and i dont usually uninstall games once installed cause i'll be working on modding multiple games and just leave them there.

The thing is i feel like if i go for the 120 GB SSD i might regret the lack of storage knowing me, but then the thought of having fast boot times and faster accessing times is very enticing. This question might sound too obvious but am only asking to help clear my mind.

One more thing, i have a few old games that i often play with my friends on lan that refuses to boot when on SSD so that's also a reason for backtracking.

 

[Gasaraki]

Yes. Totally. Go with a 256 one if possible. They are only about $70.

 

[djisas]

Indeed, it's is the best thing you can do for it, massive performance increase, minimum 5X your old HDD performance, windows 10 will take seconds to boot...

 

[enxo218]

I don't mean to be blunt but you said it yourself you are a data hog, as a modder you will need the space for the files and finally if you mostly play older titles then all that ssd performance will not translate into notable gains vs a hdd because the game size will be smaller and it won't take long to load...so just get a high performance hdd I don't think you'll regret that.

 

[bonehead123]

just do it & get with the times, because hardly anyone uses hdd's as their primary drive nowadays....on that machine, ANY performance improvements will be welcomed and noticeable for sure...

and if necessary, use a large capacity external spinner (or an internal in a usb case) for your data storage..

 

[John Naylor]

I wouldn't waste my time with anything of that size. In most builds, we put in a 250 GB SSD and a 2 TB SSD.

We conducted blind user tests in my office using two identically configured laptops. They were used by engineers who brought out to field (AutoCAD) or on the road and being the nerds that they are, play video games on their own time. One lappie had a 120 GB SSD and a 2 TB 7200 rpm HD. The other a 2 TB 7200rpm SSHD ... after 6 weeks no one was able to tell which was which. As time wore on, I noticed however cause I was always handed the laptops when disk was full. The 120 GB SSD had to be routinely "cleaned" up as the drive would get near full.... (85% of capacity is recommended to maintain desired performance levels. Unless you are an astute windows user, comfortable with changing all Windows default settings, cleaning out Windows system files and cleaning out other stuff, I don't recommend anything under 250 GB

When ya realize that a 120 GB SSD only fits 111.6 GB of files, thanks to marketing departments redefining storage as base 10 instead of base 2 in the 1990s, .. and then take 85% of that leaves space for only 94.9 GB of files ... That is inadequate for most folks.

A decent 500 GB HD will costs ya about $45 - $50 ...a 1TB SSHDD will cost ya $60..... 2 TB will costs ya $90... a 500 GB SSD of decent quality... $100 - $125

Given your statement ...

"The thing is i feel like if i go for the 120 GB SSD i might regret the lack of storage knowing me, but then the thought of having fast boot times and faster accessing times is very enticing. This question might sound too obvious but am only asking to help clear my mind. "

Tested boot time results:

256 GB Samsung Pro SSD = 15.6 seconds
2 TB 7200 rpm Seagate SSHD = 16.5 seconds
2 TB 7200 rpm Seagate Barracuda = 21.2 seconds

As for other impacts, SSD's give great benchmarks, and they will impress doing certain tasks such as video editing and rrendering, but unless you copy / pasting 100s of GBs on a daily basis, you will be hard pressed to tell the difference... no one in my office could. And in Gaming, THGs testing showed that the SSHD was 50% faster in gaming than the WD Black and more than twice as fast as WD Blue.

Obviously, the SSD + SSHD provides the best of both worlds, but when budget limited, or for use on a secondaty box as is the case here, we generally recommend that users doing their original builds with the SSHD and then, when budget situation improves, put in the SSD if so desired. In this scenario, the original OS install is left on the SSHD as a backup. As often as not it seems, when there's money in pocket and ready to upgrade, they're interested more in new GFX then upgrading their storage. This is changing, given recent price trends, timewise, large cpacity SSDs do not seem that ar away from general affordabiliyty.

So if it was me, given your history and stated needs, I'd grab A 500 GB Samsing Evo for $125 (cheaper options available down to $100 but for the price difference, I'm more comfy w/ Samsng Evo.... or I'd by the 1 TB SSHD for half that.

 

[DRDNA]

is there room for two harddrives in that mystery laptop? If so i would use the 120 for os and then get another cheaper harddrive for data files and apps.
I have several laptops that take three drives some that take one and some that take two.....so....

 

[RejZoR]

Yes. I've had 128GB Crucial M4 in old weak laptop and it would be useless few years ago if I didn't give it SSD. With it, it was still surprisingly usable.

 

[AsRock]

Sure it is, like others have said it will speed up the laptop, size well this all depends on what you do with it and if you can add a second drive too.

Even putting a old SATA2 drive would improve it a fair bit over a HDD, Totally worth it.

 

[Toothless]

Honestly pick the size that suits your needs. I ran my laptop on a 120GB which was more than enough for my needs.

 

[Komshija]

I would go for at least 240 GB SSD, because 120 and 128 GB are too small these days, especially if you are using it as a backup PC.

I replaced 320 GB 7200 RPM HDD in my laptop with 480 GB Team L3 Evo SSD and I certainly noticed some improvements.