SSD for a Playstation 3?

[Wolfpup]

I bought another Seagate Momentus XT like I have in my notebook for my new Playstation 3...only then it occurred to me that I don't actually need much storage space in a console, and could probably get by with a 40, 80, or 120GB drive just fine. (I mean I'm limping along decently with a 20GB Xbox drive still! really only need a game or two installed plus some demo space.)

So...would and SSD be worth it? It would affect the Xbox more if you could do it, since you can install games completely to the drive, but still, if nothing else it would be quieter and cooler (which might help the system be quieter too, possibly).

The biggest problem I thought of is the Playstation probably doesn't support TRIM (although I suppose it could...don't know why it would be a big deal to add it to the firmware). BUT without TRIM performance eventually plateaus , right? Just at a lower level, once the drive's been filled up (since it's having to do the read/erase/write cycle every time it writes)?

And anyway, the systems don't support defragging, so either way the performance isn't going to be as good as it could.

Any reason not to do this? And if I do, what's a good type? I know Crucial's drives are supposed to really need TRIM, so that's out.

I'm leaning towards Intel, but if someone can recommend a good Sandforce or whatever drive. I don't know which deals with lack of TRIM better, though I know Intel's TRIM-less first gen drives continued running just fine, relatively speaking.

 

[razel]

It's silly, but I have the Intel in mine. Loading/saving games and anything downloadable living off the SSD is fast, but you really don't save enough time. About a year ago when SSDs were expensive it wasn't worth it, but with Mushkin's bargain basement deals where you can pick up a 256GB SSD for $70... then it's worth it.

Don't fret about TRIM in the PS3. In fact don't fret about TRIM or garbage collection at all with current SSDs. The Intel was a G1 and I tested it's sequential read after 6 months of usage. The garbage collection took care of itself just fine.

I've always wondered about the Momentus XTs performance in the PS3. Maybe you can enlighten us?

 

[TheStu]

My understanding was that the PS3 was IO limited by the BR drive. So, although some loads are faster, installs are not significantly faster, and really it is just not worth it.

And where can you pick up a 256GB SSD for $70? Do you have a link to that, cuz that would be amazing!

 

[taltamir]

256GB SSD for 70$? I could use it to completely get rid of spindle drives in my gaming machine!
where is that deal?

@OP: it wouldn't be a good idea on xbox, MS bans consoles that use HDD not sold by them.

 

[jacktesterson]

Last I saw a 256gb mushkin ssd it was 450 bucks

 

[lsv]

256GB SSD for 70$? I could use it to completely get rid of spindle drives in my gaming machine!
where is that deal?

@OP: it wouldn't be a good idea on xbox, MS bans consoles that use HDD not sold by them.

Agreed, I'll take 4. Like right now. heh.

 

[taltamir]

Last I saw a 256gb mushkin ssd it was 450 bucks

which makes that deal 84.4% off. talk about some discount

 

[razel]

Like the sentence says... Mushkin's Bargain Basement deal. I would elaborate more, but I'm too selfish. I want to buy one for myself 1st.

Just kidding, apparently it's real. It's direct from Mushkin so I trust it, but I haven't heard yet from people who actually got the SSDs delivered. I have a feeling they're probably ebay-ed already. So I'm keeping it low to avoid spreading Internet panic and I want to hear confirmation that people have gotten it... and I still want one for myself 1st.

 

[Wolfpup]

Thanks razel (and everyone!) Well...I just ordered a 120GB Intel drive! Stupid/crazy? Maybe, but whatever, it's $230, maybe it'll make my system a bit quieter, and it'll be my first use of an SSD.

Sorry, I never put the Momentus XT in, so I'm not sure how it performs. My thinking was that since for games that have installs, the install is often around 4GB...well the SLC cache on that is 4GB, sooooo....

At worst it would end up being the fastest 500GB notebook drive, so it couldn't be bad.

I *THINK* I'll be fine with 120GB...I think I'd be fine with 40GB. At worst I might have to lose some game saves or whatever if I ever upgrade, since for some reason tons of PS3 save files have DRM (Wii too...it' super annoying).

But splurged on the 120GB since it's just $50 more than the 80, and the 80 besides being larger is also supposed to be about twice as fast as the 40, so...hey

This really would help the Xbox though, for sure! I mean we're stuck with proprietary 5400RPM drives, on a system that can run games directly from the hard drive...that could be pretty cool!

To be honest though I'm very rarely annoyed by load times in games, so upgrading at all is probably silly, just one of those things I'm doing because I can :lol:

 

[taltamir]

looking it up...
1. it is an indilinx barefoot drive: http://www.overclockersclub.com/reviews/mushkin_io_128gb/5.htm
2. it MSRP @540$: http://www.mushkin.com/Digital-Stora...SDIO256GB.aspx
3. Every tuest at 11am eastern time they have a sale on their website: http://mushkin.com/News/Briefs/Barga...-Tuesday!.aspx
4. the deal was direct from mushkin website...but only 3 units of 256GB and units of 128GB drives were available for sale at that price: http://www.fatwallet.com/forums/hot-deals/1052633/
all sold out very quickly (the post I linked was made 7 minutes after the deal went live and was already sold out)

 

[Wolfpup]

I forgot to mention-thanks too for commenting on TRIM, as that did have me a bit worried. I do think the performance levels out (at a lower level) though without it, unless I'm really not understanding things.

 

[taltamir]

I forgot to mention-thanks too for commenting on TRIM, as that did have me a bit worried. I do think the performance levels out (at a lower level) though without it, unless I'm really not understanding things.

it does level out. it drops a bit and then stays at "used" level of performance. TRIM keeps it at "new" level of performance all the time.

 

[BD2003]

I have a momentus XT in mine. It doesnt cut load times as much as you'd think, even when the games are entirely installed to the HDD.

There is often a noticeable boost when reloading a game or level you've loaded before, but again, its not that major, maybe 10-20% if at all.

Often times I'll see the loading light stop blinking yet it will remain at the load screen for a while. My theory is that since the stock PS3 is almost certainly going to be I/O bound from either a BD or a slow HDD, everything is transferred compressed and then expanded into memory after loading. So throwing in the SSD might alleviate the I/O issue, but then you're CPU bound on the decompression, and it ends up not making as much difference as you'd hope.

I cant say I dont recommend a momentus XT as it certainly works fine and wasnt too much of a price premium over a standard 7200rpm, but I'm certain a true SSD would be a near total waste over a good 7200rpm drive.

 

[lstratos]

http://gizmodo.com/5713578/ssd-ps3-cuts-gran-turismo-5-loading-times-in-half

If you've got one of the old-school fat PS3s, you can rev up performance by installing an SSD. The real world improvement, according to one forum user: Gran Turismo 5 loading nearly twice as quickly. Vroooom.

 

[taltamir]

I have a momentus XT in mine. It doesnt cut load times as much as you'd think, even when the games are entirely installed to the HDD.

looking at the reviews, it seems to do nothing for write times, and read times are only slightly improved for only specific things... so it will boot faster and run a few programs a little faster, but it really doesn't seem all that impressive.
I am not sure it is worth the extra money. but an SSD certainly is.

 

[BD2003]

looking at the reviews, it seems to do nothing for write times, and read times are only slightly improved for only specific things... so it will boot faster and run a few programs a little faster, but it really doesn't seem all that impressive.
I am not sure it is worth the extra money. but an SSD certainly is.

Its undeniably slower than an SSD, but the point is that on the PS3, there's very little benefit to the SSD to begin with. Write times are irrelevant since thats bottlenecked by the BD drive. GT5 is the only game I know of that shows truly huge gains in load time from the SSD. Everything else I've seen has been measurable but fairly irrelevant. And most of the time just simply throwing a 7200rpm drive gets you as significant a difference as the SSD. And with the XT on the ps3, there is absolutely a noticeable boost when youre loading something out of the solid state cache.

If we're talking about whats worth the money in the context of the PS3, I dont see how you can say that the SSD is worth it where the momentus XT isnt. There's never been a proper straight comparison across a bunch of games comparing the stock, a 7200rpm, a hybrid and an SSD. On a desktop SSD crushes everything, but a console is so very different.

 

[taltamir]

Its undeniably slower than an SSD, but the point is that on the PS3, there's very little benefit to the SSD to begin with. Write times are irrelevant since thats bottlenecked by the BD drive. GT5 is the only game I know of that shows truly huge gains in load time from the SSD. Everything else I've seen has been measurable but fairly irrelevant. And most of the time just simply throwing a 7200rpm drive gets you as significant a difference as the SSD. And with the XT on the ps3, there is absolutely a noticeable boost when youre loading something out of the solid state cache.

If we're talking about whats worth the money in the context of the PS3, I dont see how you can say that the SSD is worth it where the momentus XT isnt. There's never been a proper straight comparison across a bunch of games comparing the stock, a 7200rpm, a hybrid and an SSD. On a desktop SSD crushes everything, but a console is so very different.

Sorry, I meant SSD in general is worth it, not specifically to the PS3. I went on a tangent.
My point was that I don't see the momentous XT is worth the premium over a regular spindle drive, I do see a real SSD as worth the premium... for a PS3 specifically, I have no idea with SSD is worth it, but I tend to doubt it. Just use a large spindle drive and be done with it.

 

[fluffmonster]

Not so long ago it seems that PS3s would not take anything other than 5400rpm drives...maybe a couple years ago? Anybody know when that changed? I got an older fat 80GB (stock) PS3 and a scorpio black drive waiting to be useful. Will older PS3s take 7200rpm drives now?

 

[AzNPinkTuv]

yes, i put a 7200rpm black in my ps3 60 gig stock.

you might not want to try a TB though as its a little tight

 

[sxr7171]

Not so long ago it seems that PS3s would not take anything other than 5400rpm drives...maybe a couple years ago? Anybody know when that changed? I got an older fat 80GB (stock) PS3 and a scorpio black drive waiting to be useful. Will older PS3s take 7200rpm drives now?

I put a 7200RPM in mine and didn't have any problems. In fact I wasn't aware of any compatibility issues with PS3 and 2.5" SATA drives.

 

[fluffmonster]

It was a while ago I read it. As my wife often points out, I could simply have been wrong.

 

[Bman123]

Putting a ssd in a ps3 is stupid, it's not gonna make a difference like it does in a pc

 

[Soulkeeper]

This article suggests a much as 2x decrease in time spent loading/installing stuff

 

[Infrnl]

To those of you wondering about the Mushkin Bargain bin: Its only on Tuesdays; they have different items, and they only come with 30 day warranties.
I believe this is what he is talking about. You can find some killer deals, but the 30 day warranty can be scary.

I saw a thread about it on the mushkin forum

 

[InterClaw]

I'd like to revisit this topic.

I _am_ getting an SSD for my PS3 - end of discussion.

I'd like a recommendation for the best suitable SSD for the job based on some criteria:

120-160GB
Resilient
Suitable for [installed] games
Doesn't break the bank

What I've come up with is the Kingston SSDNow V+100 128GB (http://www.anandtech.com/show/4010/kingston-ssdnow-v-plus-100-review/). It fits quite well into those criteria. It is _very_resilient without the TRIM support and it's got very good sequential performance, both which are factors very well suited for gaming in a 3Gbit/s, non-TRIM environment. Regarding the price, well, SSDs are expensive any way you turn it, but at least it's not the most expensive one.

Do you agree with this choice or do you have any other recommendations? What about SandForce for instance, if I can get something dirt cheap?