The amount and type of storage in your computer impact its performance and, in turn, your productivity. An HDD or hard disk drive has been the traditional go-to storage option. However, SSDs or solid-state drives have become increasingly popular due to their speed and compact design, leading to improved responsiveness during activities like gaming.
How are an SSD and an HDD different?
These two storage options differ in many fundamental ways.
Design & Operation
An HDD has a spinning platter and an actuator arm to access data. In contrast, an SSD uses NAND flash memory. The absence of moving components makes these drives durable and faster.
An HDD can reach speeds between 5,400 and 15,000 RPM or revolutions per minute. Typical read/write speeds are in the 80 to 160MB/s range.
These speeds are much lower than those provided by an SSD, averaging 200 MB/s to 550 MB/s. Ongoing research in SSD technology claims to have reached speeds as high as 14,000 MB/s, although around 3,000 MB/s is standard for NVMe drives.
Benefits
Both storage drives have unique advantages, letting you pick an option that matches your computing needs.
HDDs are cheaper and preferable for storing large volumes of data like videos. The cost per GB of storing data on these drives is lower, which means massive storage in one device — 18GB or more — is also cost-effective. For example, you can find an 8TB SSD for around $500, although a hard disk of this capacity is much cheaper at approximately $150 to $200.
On the other hand, SSDs excel at delivering faster boot-up times. They don’t suffer from excessive heat generation or vibration — a potential pain point with hard disk drives. Another advantage of an SSD is its resistance to accidental drops. These drives are ideal for portable laptops and mobile devices. The energy efficiency of an SSD positively impacts the battery backup.
Form Factors
The form factor is critical because it decides how the drive will connect to the motherboard. Manufacturers make HDDs in 2.5 and 3.5-inch models. Similarly, an SSD is available in two forms based on the interface: SATA (Serial Advanced Technology Attachment) and NVMe (Non-Volatile Memory Express).
NVMe is becoming standard due to higher speeds, although older SSDs may still use SATA. NVMe can facilitate a direct connection to the PCIe lanes of the motherboard, i.e., the peripheral component interconnect express. With PCIe 4.0, you can obtain data transfer at 16 GT or giga-transfers per second.
You can find SSDs in many form factors like 2.5-inch and M.2. An “Add-In Card” is another option, connecting to a PCIe slot on the motherboard. U.2 drives are a form factor preferred for professional environments. It is best to review your motherboard’s documentation before purchasing a new SSD to ensure compatibility.
How to Select a Storage Drive: Benchmarks
Manufacturers typically market speed-based benchmarks for storage drives. These could be sequential or random read/write speeds. Sequential speeds are measured in megabytes per second, while random speeds use input/output operations per second. Although the former is more common, the latter provides a better picture for gamers and multimedia users. Such usage requires access to data not usually found in a sequence.
While upgrading your storage, you may consider synthetic benchmarks promoted by manufacturers. However, I do not recommend relying on them heavily since such tests often get conducted with higher queue depth, i.e., the number of actions performed sequentially, than found in real-life situations.
SSD or HDD: What works best for you?
Since SSDs and HDDs possess distinct advantages, the choice must be well-considered. I recommend a high-capacity SSD if you perform gaming or multimedia editing.
Many premium laptops offer up to 4TB SSDs to let users experience sprightly performance during professional gameplay.
An HDD may mean several wasted minutes in the arena that can make all the difference between triumph and defeat. SSDs also speed up performance in business applications for finance, healthcare, etc.
Some users prefer a hybrid model that combines an SSD and an HDD, using the former to store files related to the operating system and other apps to escalate performance.
There’s no denying the utility of a good old HDD to store your movies, photographs, and other heavy-duty data that can quickly bloat up a storage unit.
With storage needs multiplying manifold, particularly with the rise of artificial intelligence in day-to-day life, technology is striving to match up. Provisions like Intel Optane can accelerate your system cost-effectively (although scaling and practicality concerns may lead the company to discontinue it).
Some industry reports suggest that prices of NAND flash memory may increase in 2024.
However, it seems almost definite that the future will see more memory-dense and affordable SSDs aligned with the rising demand for speedy storage. HDDs may also remain relevant for keeping large masses of external data, making the decision between the two drives personal and subjective.