Suggestions on SSD tweaks

[Ritwik7]

So my Corsair GT 120 GB SSD finally arrived today. Intend to plug it into my new rig and do a clean install of WIndows 7.

However, I'm confused as to what to do after. There seems to be a great deal of contradicting information regarding posy-installation tweaks. Should I:

1. Turn off Hibernation File?
2. Short stroke the SSD Drive by 25%?
3. Turn off paging file?
4. Turn off system protection?
5. Turn off drive indexing?

Keep in mind that I will be plugging in my current 1TB HDD for storage purposes after I install the SSD.

Thanks in advance.

 

[dividebyzero]

So my Corsair GT 120 GB SSD finally arrived today. Intend to plug it into my new rig and do a clean install of WIndows 7.
However, I'm confused as to what to do after. There seems to be a great deal of contradicting information regarding posy-installation tweaks. Should I:
1. Turn off Hibernation File?

Yes. An SSD loads fast enough that you don't really need to waste the space keeping the hibernation file

2. Short stroke the SSD Drive by 25%?

No. Current generation SSD's have wear levelling built in. I doubt you'd gain any additional capacity via over-provisioning

3. Turn off paging file?

Yes and No. 8GB RAM should be enough to allow you to turn off the page file and grab back some SSD capacity, but if you use RAM intensive programs (video editing, Photoshop etc.) that max out RAM usage then the answer is no. Run the most RAM intensive programs you have- if you don't come close to maxing the RAM then you can turn off the page file.

4. Turn off system protection?

Yes. System Restore tends to interfere with TRIM operations

5. Turn off drive indexing?

Yes. Drive indexing is primarily for mechanical harddrives where lowering seek/access time is quite advantageous. SSD's are near as quick as it gets, so drive indexing for them is useless.

You might also want to
-disable Prefetch and Superfetch,
-enable high performance power option
-disable the Recycle Bin

 

[Leeky]

@dividebyzero Out of curiosity, I've always used something like SSD Tweaker to do this for me on a new install, but is it actually better to do this manually, or with a suitable application?

If manual is the way forward, what's the check-list recommended?

 

[slh28]

Also turn off the disk defrag schedule and make sure TRIM is turned on.
In terms of pre-installation make sure the SATA mode is set to AHCI.

 

[dividebyzero]

@Leeky
I can't say I've used an overarching app to optimize SSD's, so I can't really make a quantative assessment. My experience comes largely from being built up over a few years- discarding and adding as the tech evolves. Since most of my SSD installs are for new client systems, I tend to tailor the optimization for the individual- and if I'm dealing with a relative novice I tend to retain Recycle Bin and System Restore functionality until they are confident that they can do without them. Some people prefer to have the safety net.
I don't see the power settings option in the SSD Tweaker app you linked to. Is it included? I see it does include the registry edit options (NTFS memory usage/disable name creation and clearing page file at shutdown/ large system cache) which I neglected to include - I'll put that down to excess Guinness uptake last night.

@slh28
AHCI should be enabled by default in the ASRock UEFI. Good catch on the defrag - it should also be disabled by default for SSD's, but I have heard of instances where that has not happened.

 

[Leeky]

@dividebyzero

I don't see any mention of power settings (although I always run with the high performance power option and disable the HDDs from sleeping (the lag firing up my 2TB is annoying when accessing files otherwise)).

This is my current settings:



Unfortunately it looks like some of the settings you've referred to are part of the (paid for) licensed version and come under "Advanced Tweaks:"



The obvious things like defrag and system restore have been disabled, plus all of my home directories are linked to one of my mechanical disks, so everything tends to collect of them and not on the SSD.

I've always just hit "Auto Tweak Settings" and then rebooted for them to take effect. Would enabling some of the available options in the first picture make much difference?

 

[dividebyzero]

Not too sure how much difference (capacity/perf.)- that might come down to the system setup.
I just Googled for an SSD optimization guide, and found this. It looks very thorough, and costs $12.99 less than SSD Tweaker Pro

 

[Ritwik7]

Ok guys. I have so far:

1. Disabled Hibernation
2. Disabled Superfetch / Prefetch
3. Disabled System Protection
4. Turned off drive indexing
5. Disabled Scheduled Defrag

My WEI jumped from 5.9 on the old HDD to 7.9 on the SSD. Is that a good start?

Also, I did not find any ACPI 2.0 option in the UEFI BIOS. Will that cause any problems? My motherboard is the ASRock Z77 Extreme 4.

Now, the last bit. I need to plug in my 1TB Seagate HDD for storage. It has Windows 7 installed on it. I want it to be a fresh formatted drive without any OS/data. What's the best way to do this?

 

[Leeky]

Thanks DBZ. I'll have a good read of that later.

@Ritwik7 I'd just plug it in like normal (but make sure you boot from the SSD) and then when in Windows just format it like normal. No special steps are required as long as the Windows installation on it isn't neccessary to run the computer you'll be fine.

 

[slh28]

My WEI jumped from 5.9 on the old HDD to 7.9 on the SSD. Is that a good start?

WEI isn't exactly an accurate benchmark for SSDs, run AS SSD and see what numbers you get.

 

[Darth Shiv]

Yes. System Restore tends to interfere with TRIM operations

Hadn't heard this one before. Will have to keep an eye on this. Thanks for the info.