# SSD not good for storage?



## Niah2 (Jun 23, 2021)

Hello everyone,

I've recently read somewhere on reddit or quora that SSD are not good for storage since they will likely fail sooner and more frequently than HDD's. I haven't made the Jump to SSD's and granted I would not get SSD exactly for storage but for ruining sample libraries if this statement is true it means that I will also need HDD storage to back up sample libraries.

What have been your experiences with SSD's?

Thanks


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## easyrider (Jun 23, 2021)

The Majority run samples off SSD….and backup to mechanical due to cost.


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## d.healey (Jun 23, 2021)

You should keep backups anyway even if you don't use SSDs.


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## from_theashes (Jun 23, 2021)

Some libraries don’t run properly from HDD, since they are to slow.


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## Wedge (Jun 23, 2021)

Theoretically SSD's should last longer than a platter hard drive unless excessive writes or heat is applied. I think the Easyrider is spot on that most of us run our samples, windows, and everything else off SSDs and use HDDs for back up. The speed difference is insanely worthwhile especially with NVME drives. I can't imagine waiting for BBCSO to load off a spinning drive, yikes. A good SSD should last ten years, they have less mechanical parts to fail and magnets don't effect them the same way either. I don't know about unpowered long term storage, HDDs might be better for that I really don't have a clue. But seriously dude, move to SSDs, it's a quality of life upgrade. And back up everything on a HDDs. You should be backing everything up anyway. I've had several HDDs fail, I lost years of work forever the first time, I'm waiting for my first SSD to fail and it's nine years old. Always back your shit up and then you don't have to worry about it.


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## Polkasound (Jun 23, 2021)

I've had both good luck and bad luck with HDDs. All four HDDs from my 2004 build are still running strong after 16 years, but two internal and one backup HDD from my 2013 build failed after about five years.

I no longer build systems with HDDs, but I do back my files up to external HDDs. It's recommended that you have two backups in case one backup fails. I learned that the hard way. I now have four.


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## Niah2 (Jun 23, 2021)

Thank you for clarifying things and for your advice guys, really appreciate it !


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## Kent (Jun 23, 2021)

Compared to HDDs, SSDs might have a marginally lower tolerance for continual writing/erasing/rewriting/re-erasing, but with sample libraries how often are you rewriting? Get SSDs for your sample library content: it's the single best thing you can do to upgrade your system performance.


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## AceAudioHQ (Jun 23, 2021)

I’ve never broken a single hard drive I’ve had so they’re pretty durable. I have ssd’s for libraries and I backup everything to hdd’s but I’ve started thinking if I should get a tape drive, they’re pretty cheap, the tapes have huge capacity and they’re fairly fast nowadays


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## bill5 (Jun 23, 2021)

d.healey said:


> You should keep backups anyway even if you don't use SSDs.


And backups of backups. I don't mean libraries which you can re-download and install, but your project and song files, which take up comparatively little space and cannot be replaced. I have things backed up on two HDDs and a handful of smaller files on "the cloud" as well.


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## Kent (Jun 23, 2021)

bill5 said:


> And backups of backups. I don't mean libraries which you can re-download and install, but your project and song files, which take up comparatively little space and cannot be replaced. I have things backed up on two HDDs and a handful of smaller files on "the cloud" as well.


what is it they say in IT? Something like:

_'If it doesn't exist in triplicate, it doesn't exist at all.'_


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## ashX (Jun 23, 2021)

from_theashes said:


> Some libraries don’t run properly from HDD, since they are to slow.


What libraries do you mean? Never had problems running libraries from HDD (obviously u need at least 7200 HDD)


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## Technostica (Jun 23, 2021)

kmaster said:


> what is it they say in IT? Something like:
> 
> _'If it doesn't exist in triplicate, it doesn't exist at all.'_


An important part of that is that it must exist in multiple locations.
Having three copies in the same house isn't usually that useful if the house burns to the ground.
I use the Cloud for one backup location for stuff I really value.


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## Manuel Stumpf (Jun 23, 2021)

There are two major use cases:

1) As regular drive
As long as the SSD is used/running in your system (regularly powered on) there is no problem in using it as storage.
It also does not fail more often than HDDs (actually for the everyday usage SSDs are much less likely to fail than HDDs).
If you have a massive write load going to your SSD this would be a problem (video surveillance cameras recording all the time, 24h a day, 365 days a year...).
Absolutely no problem for running sample libraries from SSDs.

2) As long time offline backup
Problematic is when you use an SSD for a long time offline backup (powered on very seldom). In that specific case SSDs could possibly loose some data (especially if it is already worn out with a lot of write cycles).
This is the reason why SSDs are not recommended as long term backup drives.
Writing something to an SSD and then putting it offline into the cupboard for the next 4 years is not the best idea (however if your SSD is rather new you could also get away with it).

No matter if you use HDD/SSD, you should at least have a backup of your important data anyway.


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## Niah2 (Jun 24, 2021)

Thank you everyone.

By the way I'm not sure if I should post this here or open another thread, but is there a difference in performance from an internal SSD to an external SSD running sample libraries?


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## Technostica (Jun 24, 2021)

Niah2 said:


> Thank you everyone.
> 
> By the way I'm not sure if I should post this here or open another thread, but is there a difference in performance from an internal SSD to an external SSD running sample libraries?


There is. Speeds vary a lot and there are many factors involved. 
Whilst internal drives typically are faster, that isn't always the case.


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## easyrider (Jun 24, 2021)

SSD typically have read and write performance of around 500 mb using a port say thunderbolt will not increase the speed of an SSD.

However using a USB 2 port over a USB 3 port will be slower.


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## toomanynotes (Jun 24, 2021)

Technostica said:


> An important part of that is that it must exist in multiple locations.
> Having three copies in the same house isn't usually that useful if the house burns to the ground.
> I use the Cloud for one backup location for stuff I really value.


I think If your house burnt down, that would be the last thing on your mind.


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## toomanynotes (Jun 24, 2021)

I will never put anything I care about on a SSD. They fail. It happened to me. Never again!! It was a Crucial SSD for anyone interested. Cost me £500 to rescue...it wasn't worth it.


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## easyrider (Jun 24, 2021)

toomanynotes said:


> I will never put anything I care about on a SSD. They fail. It happened to me. Never again!! It was a Crucial SSD for anyone interested. Cost me £500 to rescue...it wasn't worth it.


That’s because you didn’t have a backup….the ssd was not to blame….your lack of robust backup measures cost you £500


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## Technostica (Jun 24, 2021)

toomanynotes said:


> I think If your house burnt down, that would be the last thing on your mind.


Not if you lost all the copies of your recently finished book or album, meaning that you had incurred losses of tens of thousands just at a time when you needed money due to the fire.
For a professional creative person that could be a bigger loss than the house burning down.


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## cet34f (Jun 24, 2021)

Are you talking about hot storage or cold storage?

Using SSD for cold storage is insane.

Using SSD for hot storage is always OK, as long as you don't mind the extra cost. I don't know if you consider mechanical failures as a lifespans factor, but if you do, SSD arguably has longer lifespans than HHD.


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## EvilDragon (Jun 24, 2021)

Samsung > Crucial.


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## Kent (Jun 24, 2021)

toomanynotes said:


> I will never put anything I care about on a SSD. They fail. It happened to me. Never again!! It was a Crucial SSD for anyone interested. Cost me £500 to rescue...it wasn't worth it.


Wait...what? Everything fails eventually, thanks to entropy.

Thus we get the bathtub curve:







I'm sorry you had a traumatic and expensive experience, but that has _nothing_ to do with SSDs and everything to do with the fact that you got a lemon in that first third on this graph—which applies across industries, across products, and even to people, planets, stars, galaxies, and beyond.

You should give SSDs a chance. But also remember what I quoted above:



kmaster said:


> 'If it doesn't exist in triplicate, it doesn't exist at all.'


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## Technostica (Jun 24, 2021)

EvilDragon said:


> Samsung > Crucial.


Sometimes. 
The 840 and 840 Evo had a major design flaw that took them over a year to resolve. 
The QVO drives tend to be over priced. 
They make some good drives but you are often over paying because the name has cachet, which is partly because they were ahead of the pack about 6+ years ago. 
I think they are a fairly safe bet but you pay for that.


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## ThomasJ.Curran (Jun 24, 2021)

I store all my projects and music files in 3 locations: my SSD where all my sample libraries are on, a back up HDD and most importantly the cloud.


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## cet34f (Jun 25, 2021)

kmaster said:


> _'If it doesn't exist in triplicate, it doesn't exist at all.'_



For the third copy, I assume you use cloud backup. What is the best cloud backup service? I tired Backblaze once but it's so slow.

I have been using cloud syncing services as band aids, but they are not the same.


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## babylonwaves (Jun 25, 2021)

Niah2 said:


> I've recently read somewhere on reddit or quora that SSD are not good for storage since they will likely fail sooner and more frequently than HDD's.


Apple seems to have enough faith in it to ship every single computer, iPad and iPhone with this type of memory. Everything is based on Flash memory.

I had zero SSDs failing SSDs since 2015 and about 4 failing HDDs in the last 20 years.


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## toomanynotes (Jun 25, 2021)

kmaster said:


> Wait...what? Everything fails eventually, thanks to entropy.
> 
> Thus we get the bathtub curve:
> 
> ...


Thanks,
I do, I put it down to some freaky bad luck, I do back up everything now. I’m all samsung now, I just can’t trust Crucial after what happened, I hardly used the *itch When it tanked on me. I’ll never attemp to record audio on a ssd again..pretty sure that’s what did it. 

Talking of which, is Samsung 980 1tb Nvme a good replacement for a 870 evo plus Nvme? It’s cheaper. Just to store music libraries. Thanks


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## toomanynotes (Jun 25, 2021)

babylonwaves said:


> Apple seems to have enough faith in it to ship every single computer, iPad and iPhone with this type of memory. Everything is based on Flash memory.
> 
> I had zero SSDs failing SSDs since 2015 and about 4 failing HDDs in the last 20 years.


True, if I knew who apple source theirs from..then that would be the ticket


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## easyrider (Jun 25, 2021)

toomanynotes said:


> I’ll never attemp to record audio on a ssd again..pretty sure that’s what did it.


🙈

Nonsense….

I‘ve never noticed an SSD have the personality to decipher the difference between 0 and 1 embedded within certain file types…😂


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## toomanynotes (Jun 25, 2021)

easyrider said:


> 🙈
> 
> Nonsense….
> 
> I‘ve never noticed an SSD have the personality to decipher the difference between 0 and 1 embedded within certain file types…😂


Don't pretend to care about the SSD, it defo doesn't care about you. It will hurt you..but i'll be here if you ever need to talk.


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## easyrider (Jun 25, 2021)

toomanynotes said:


> Don't pretend to care about the SSD, it defo doesn't care about you. It will hurt you..but i'll be here if you ever need to talk.


Any drive in my SSD pool could fail and I would not care…the data is backed up to two servers that mirror each other an external drive and the cloud.

If you’re sat at your computer and worry about data loss or using an SSD for writing audio then you don’t have the correct backup solution.


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## toomanynotes (Jun 25, 2021)

easyrider said:


> Any drive in my SSD pool could fail and I would not care…the data is backed up to two servers that mirror each other an external drive and the cloud.
> 
> If you’re sat at your computer and worry about data loss or using an SSD for writing audio then you don’t have the correct backup solution.


I do now mate. Everything is backed up. So would you recommend Samsung 980 1tb Nvme?


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## easyrider (Jun 25, 2021)

toomanynotes said:


> I do now mate. Everything is backed up. So would you recommend Samsung 980 1tb Nvme?


its fine…


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## Niah2 (Jun 25, 2021)

What do you guys think of Western Digital? I've had good experiences with WD HDD's, however I see indeed many people recommending Samsung SSD's.


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## Solarsentinel (Jun 25, 2021)

Niah2 said:


> What do you guys think of Western Digital? I've had good experiences with WD HDD's, however I see indeed many people recommending Samsung SSD's.


The last WD Black nvme SSD pcie 3 -4 are pretty good. At least be carefull with the temp.


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## toomanynotes (Jun 25, 2021)

Niah2 said:


> What do you guys think of Western Digital? I've had good experiences with WD HDD's, however I see indeed many people recommending Samsung SSD's.


sorry to hijack your thread!


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## Kent (Jun 25, 2021)

toomanynotes said:


> True, if I knew who apple source theirs from..then that would be the ticket


Toshiba, Samsung, SanDisk, and others.


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## Niah2 (Jun 25, 2021)

toomanynotes said:


> sorry to hijack your thread!


No need to apologize this is all useful discussion and information.


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## mussnig (Jun 25, 2021)

Niah2 said:


> What do you guys think of Western Digital? I've had good experiences with WD HDD's, however I see indeed many people recommending Samsung SSD's.


I've had several SSDs and NVMEs. The only one which caused a lot of trouble was a WD My Passport external NVME. It seems that the problem was not a faulty drive but the behavior of some memory controller. Also, WD support was virtually non-existent. But I guess there are plenty of others who had great experiences with WD (including myself many years ago) ...


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## thevisi0nary (Jun 25, 2021)

Haven't used an HDD for more than 6 years for anything that isn't backup. You're good.


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## thebeesknees22 (Jul 19, 2021)

Niah2 said:


> What do you guys think of Western Digital? I've had good experiences with WD HDD's, however I see indeed many people recommending Samsung SSD's.


I had a WD Passport 2TB SSD. It lasted about 8 months before it died.


It would disconnect, and reconnect like 50 times a day. (not exaggerating) 

I sent it back. We'll see if they replace it. I can't say I'm impressed though.

I now have a samsung T5 and it's been flawless so far. Zero issues.


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## Wedge (Jul 19, 2021)

mussnig said:


> I've had several SSDs and NVMEs. The only one which caused a lot of trouble was a WD My Passport external NVME. It seems that the problem was not a faulty drive but the behavior of some memory controller. Also, WD support was virtually non-existent. But I guess there are plenty of others who had great experiences with WD (including myself many years ago) ...


Sounds about right. I just had a 4TB WD My Passport die, couldn't even wipe the drive before recycling. Didn't lose anything though, I sure did back in the 90's when an internal WD drive died though - I lost many years of tracks. So my experience has been hit and miss with WD but it's been hit and miss with Seagate too. But more hit than miss with both. Haven't had any problems with my Samsung SSDs( 860s and they're six or seven years old) and Samsungs NVMEs have been solid too, so I think I'll stick to them until something happens.


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## cygnusdei (Jul 20, 2021)

As evident in the price levels, not all SSDs are made the same. In single level cells (SLC), cells are only written as necessary in write operations. Multi level cells (MLC) store twice as much information per cell, but the tradeoff is that the whole cell has to be rewritten even if only half the information is changed, ditto with triple level cells (TLC). The end result is cheaper SSDs get twice (or multiples) as many write operations, hence the shorter lifetime compared to enterprise grade SSDs.

But all this still falls within the normal, expected usage scenario apart from manufacturing defects.


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