Intro for non-experts, to upgrading from spinning hard drive, to SSD or M.2 drives
I checked out a couple of threads on upgrading a system to an SSD and/or M.2 chip, and they all got fairly quickly into discussions of special accelerators, cache placements, and other stuff that went beyond and above what I suspect a lot of basic video users (especially users of Premier Elements) really need. So, I'd like to at least try to create a thread for non-IT experts, on the basics. If any experts want to chip in, and either post some corrections, or additional useful info, please do, but please accept and respect the basic premise, goal, and "target audience" of this thread.
Briefly, computers have reached the following point:
Storage devices currently come in three main flavors:
HDD: A Hard Drive Disc (Slow, cheap, mass storage)
SSD: A Solid State Drive (Fast and a little expensive)
NVMe [NOTE -- NOW MAINLY CALLED M.2 CHIPS/DRIVES] Non-Volatile Memory Express (Super fast and expensive)
Typical SSD drives can be seen in links like this:
https://www.amazon.com/Samsung-500GB-Internal-MZ-76E500B-AM/dp/B0781Z7Y3S/ref=sr_1_3
They are 2.75 inches wide, 4 inches long, and about 1/4 inch thick. They have standard SATA connectors (i.e., a narrow cable for data, and a wider cable for power). They can be put into any computer with a mainboard that can handle SATA transfers (i.e., any mainboard less than about 10 years old, when the faster SATA replaced the old and slower IDE systems). A top-quality 500 Gb unit (not trying to advertise, but the local computer store guys told me the Samsung "EVO" line is currently the best and most reliable brand) costs about $80, and a 1 Tb unit costs about $140.
By contrast, an M.2 chip (which handles "non-volatile memory express" data, NVMe) is about 1 inch wide and about 3 inches long, and it looks like this:
https://www.amazon.com/Samsung-970-EVO-Plus-MZ-V7S500B/dp/B07M7Q21N7/ref=sr_1_8
Although certain types of "cards" can be inserted into a desktop mainboard, to handle an M.2 chip, if you want REAL speed, you should never use one of those cards, and will need to buy a mainboard which has an M.2 socket built directly into it. We've reached a point where M.2 chips are only about $20 more than SSD drives of the same size; but, you also need to factor in the cost of a new mainboard, which will also need new and faster RAM chips. I went in to replace a failing system, and the new components (kept the old case, old spinning drives, old graphics card, etc) cost me about $750. But, it turned out to be a SUPER-fast system. Takes roughly half the time to boot up Windows 10, compared to a 7200 rpm spinning drive.
Okay - that's enough for part 1 of this thread.
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