Storage SSD or Mechanical

[JamesMay82]

Hey Guys!

Might be a stupid question but can I use a SSD drive as my main external for storing and editing on? I heard they aren't as reliable in the longterm versus a tradinaly mechanical drive?

I will keep be keeping my 200 gig music library, 1.5TB home movies and 300 Gig Lightroom library on there. I then do another back up to a Drobo as my back up plan.

My Lacie 2big was doing this job but its just failed on me :-( I was thinking of going for one of those Samsung T5 drives.

Thanks

 

[sgtaylor5]

I hope you had a backup of your external drive! An SSD is great, but when it dies, it's harder to get the data off. Best to have multiple backups of your data, one of which is not connected when not being actively backed up. SuperDuper is great for this.

 

[Ifti]

I have around 18TB worth of external SSD storage available to me (not all a single drive, but multiple RAID and non-RAID drives) and I believe they are much more reliable then mechanical drives due to no moving parts etc. I have been using external SSD storage for several years now and have never had any failures or mishaps. Its the way forward, and I welcome it.
Thats not to say mechanical drives no longer have a place. They do indeed. I still have a NAS system with 48TB worth of storage in it, which I use as a means for backing up all my data, both my own laptop and external SSD's, as well as others in the household. However, mechanical drives will start to phase out as pricing for SSD continues to drop and become more affordable.

I remember buying a 1GB USB thumb drive for over £400GBP around 2001/02! lol

 

[MarkC426]

Personally I would have a separate storage drive and an editing drive.
It is overkill to have an ssd just for storing iTunes content imho, you will not see any difference in performance and you can get a much bigger drive for the price.

Not sure what sort of mac this is connecting to....?

HDD definitely not going away yet......the 2019 Mac Pro uses Promise Pegasus storage modules.

 

[Juicy Box]

You will be fine with a SSD.

Usually the biggest issue with using an SSD over a HDD is that SSDs are more cost prohibitive.

I heard they aren't as reliable in the longterm versus a tradinaly mechanical drive?

SSD drive is perfectly fine for storage, and is more likely not to fail versus a HDD.

The issue you probably heard about is that SSD failures are much harder to predict, and once it has failed, it is usually gone forever.

HDDs have a higher chance to failure due to the moving parts, but is often predictable when it might fail. A HDD can show signs of failure for a long time before they fully fail, sometimes even over a year.

During that time you can attempt to back up all your files and have another storage solution in the works.

For SSDs, there is usually no warning, they just go dark.

Just a good rule of thumb no matter what drive you use, always have a back up, or maybe two.

 

[HDFan]

I believe they are much more reliable then mechanical drives due to no moving parts etc.

Is more likely not to fail versus a HDD.

HDDs have a higher chance to failure due to the moving parts,

In difficult environments (dust, heat, vibration) SSD's clearly have a reliability advantage. But in a controlled environment that is no longer true. SSD's will wear out:

SSDs: 30-80% test developed bad block in their lifetime
Hard Disk: 3.5% developed bad sectors comparatively

SSD vs HDD | What Is the Difference? | ESF

Understand the balance of cost, performance, capacity and reliability when when choosing between SSD or HDD. Learn more here.

www.enterprisestorageforum.com

(There are conflicting reports).

It also depends on the SSD type, QLC or TLC. A Samsung TLD 860 EVO has a 5 year warranty or 600 Terabytes Written (TBW). Their 860 QLC has just a 3 year warranty or 360 TBW.

In contrast a Seagate Exos X16 hard disk has a 5 year warranty for 550 TB/year or 2750 TBW, more than 4 times that of the 860 EVO, almost 8 times greater than the 860 QLC.

SSD Product Warranty | Support | Samsung Semiconductor Global

Samsung ensures the best quality in all products and services beyond customer expectations. Warranty policy, conditions for Internal and Portable SSD.

www.samsung.com