Need help with mSATA tech

Hi,
I am currently wanting to buy a Sager NP9170 as cheaply as possible and I was told by one of the sellers on here, MythLogic, to get an mSATA drive. I've heard some good things about it, but I am kind of a bit cautious in spending money on components I know nothing about. Can anyone at least clearly define to me what mSATA is, the pros and cons of it, and how that translates to me wanting to game current generation games at 1080p? Thank you.

 

mSATA is a connector for very small SSD's. An SSD, if you don't know, is a drive that uses flash memory instead of magnetic disks for storage. Basically, an mSATA connection gives you the opportunity to use an SSD as a fast system or storage drive while taking up very little space in your system.

 

Well would an mSATA + SATA3 SSD + 750GBHDD work to improve performance? I am not looking to do any RAID configurations or anything, but I DO want faster boot times and longer reliability.

 

The mSATA drive and the SATA 3 SSD would essentially run at the same speed. Either one as the system drive would give you fast boot times and fast loading times on games installed on them. If you had both, you could use one as a system drive and one as a games drive, but a single SSD, whether it's full-size or mSATA, will serve both of those functions if the capacity is high enough. Remember to leave about 30-40% of the SSD unused, or unallocated to a partition, in order to maintain maximum performance - an over-filled SSD can be even slower than a hard drive.

 

OK. I hope prices drop enough to get a 256GB one. Newegg is selling a Crucial M4 for $199.99 and I know in the past they've had sales of $99 for one. Are there any other features to boot up a computer faster?

 

You can tweak what processes and programs run on startup and gain some time there. There's not much beyond that.

I'm sure 128GB mSATA SSD's can be had for $99.99, but the best price I've seen on the 256GB Crucial M4 (the 2.5" drives, mSATA might be a bit more expensive because it's more of a niche product) was $159.99.

 

You really only need one SSD (fast bootup and launch times). I would suggest you get an mSATA drive and a normal HDD. Install the OS and essential/frequently used programs on the mSATA drive, and keep your data/less used programs on the HDD. Alternatively, if you do not need your optical drive, you can buy a 2.5" SSD and an optical bay caddy to store your old HDD. This way, you have many (cheaper) SSD choices (standard 2.5").

Another thing to note is that the mSATA slot is SATA 2 as opposed to SATA 3 for the 2.5" slot, which is faster. You won't notice a difference in real world use, which is why I recommend going the mSATA route.

Some good mSATA choices are the reliable Crucial M4 256GB mSATA or the Mushkin Atlas Deluxe (both about $200).