Getting rid of HDDs

Looking at the GS63 reveal, I keep wondering why we keep having slim laptops with HDDs. They take a lot of space, are slow and noisy, are prone to failure, and don't even provide that much capacity vs a NAS or external 3"5 USB3 or TB3 drive when proper capacity is needed.

I would much rather have one or two m.2 drives (not even PCIe ones, their speed provides little actual benefit in day to day use when price is factored in), if that meant less potential drive failures, upgraded cooling, noise levels, battery life and, dare I say, smaller bezels.

Just doing a quick Newegg search, the cheapest 1TB HDD i found was 52$, and a Sandisk X400 512GB with an M.2 2280 format is only 129$. Getting rid of the HDD and the 128GB SSD that they usually put, that would be a price differential of what, 50/60$ at a supplier level? For so many benefits! I would gladly pay twice that amount...

So please, MSI, it's 2016, get rid of HDDs

 

Consider that other people might want a lot of storage but won't always be around their NAS (If they have one) and don't want to carry around that 3.5" external HDD, wherever they're going. Having an internal, high-capacity storage drive begins to make sense, no?

 

In general, I most definitely agree with you, internal storage is best.

But here, we are talking about the GS series line, which is all about sleekness and portability. I don't mean to presume how much storage capacity people need, but a potential 2TB of SSD storage seems plenty sufficient. Sure, it is pricier, but a 500GB m.2 sata drive is now only a little over 100$. I feel that is plenty enough to start with, and a 1TB one can be had for 250$ for expansion (not to mention prices are falling).

And my argument about the 3"5 drives is that even a USB3 powered external drive would be cheaper and faster than an internal one...

Considering the potential benefits and the marginally higher cost, I really think MSI should consider it. At least on the GS line.

 

I can see the need for companies to continue to use the platter drives right now as they are still cheaper and in mass production. Most have the option of both internally nowadays and I can see manufacturers moving toward all SSD soon.

 

Well yeah. If your data isn't accessible when you need it, then it doesn't do much good. A SAN is fine at home or in the office, but it doesn't do much good on the road. If you do have Internet access to it somehow, it's going to be slow. It's going to be slower than any drive due to going over a network.

Different people have different needs. For most, the theory is you use the slower storage drive for things like MP3s, movies, documents, etc that aren't speed dependent while your OS, apps, games, etc are on the SSD. I'm not sure that having an MP3 or a Word doc load a half second quicker is going to make a huge difference to most people. Money would be better spent on things like RAM or a faster graphics card.

Not sure where you're seeing them that low, either. Prices are getting better, but they're still not commonly around $250 for a 1 TB drive.

Another thing to consider is that SSDs still have limited write cycles compared to HDs. If one is doing something that is heavy on writing, an SSD could wear out more quickly than a comparable hard drive. Enterprise drives are more durable, but you're going to pay a hefty price for that privilege.

I disagree. First off, if your argument is about being thin and portable, why would you want to carry around another device? The whole point is to make it easy to travel on the go - this makes it harder. A 1 TB drive that's already inside provides the needed storage and doesn't make it harder to carry.

Secondly, USB 3.0 caps off at 5 Gb/sec, which is slower than the theoretical SATA III link of 6 Gb/sec. On top of that, you have the overhead of encapsulating the SATA protocol over USB and back each time you want to do a transfer. While it may not be a huge hit, it's still a performance hit. On top of that, if you have other devices on there, such as a video camera, you have to share that bandwidth with the drive which can further degrade performance.

If you buy from a boutique vendor instead of a big box like Fry's, Amazon, etc, you can already customize your laptop with those options. MSI really doesn't need to offer something that may not have a lot of demand. Any more specialized needs to be met thru a boutique vendor or MSI's generous warranty that allows you to add drives, etc, without voiding it.

Many of our vendor friends that hang out here have speed, capacity, and interface options to suit any need. You just gotta be willing to pay.

 

I think when we're close to a price parity we'll see that. We're not quite there yet. They also have to work on the wear limits too.

 

Agreed and well said

 

It still amazes me how far they've pushed hard drive tech over the years.

 

I definitely feel wear would not be a problem for a consumer laptop. Sure, if you were doing heavy duty writes, but even Dell with their XPS 15 (which is a professional-targeted laptop) and Alienware with the Blade sell their laptops just with SSDs. I don't see anyone complaining.

All of you are right, HDDs still have some merit, but on the GS line, not so much. I just dream about a thin and light 15 inches GS60 with upgraded internals thanks to no 2"5 inch drives. Imagine a gamer oriented XPS 15 with a GTX 1060/1070. Now that would be nice...

 

MSI needs to stop gimping their GS63 line. Ironically, it used to be the GS70 series that was the red-headed step child. Now MSI's improved that at the expense of the GS60.

 

The reason I still like HDDs is because they're cheap mass storage. I cannot have less than 2TB of storage in my daily computer. So I can either use a 240GB SSD for my OS and important files/games/programs and have a 2TB HDD for the less important stuff, or I can move completely towards SSDs. However, the difference is that I can get a 240GB SSD and 2TB HDD for less than $200. 2TB of SSDs? I don't need to spend $500+. I'll keep using HDDs until the price of SSDs come down low enough that I can get 2TB worth of SSD storage for a few hundred.

 

1 x SSD + 1 x HDD is perfect combination for majority of users unless one has lots of money sitting around doing nothing and doesn't mind throwing a lot for such investment (pure SSD only).

 

I'd be happier if MSI offered more configuration options directly in general. But as was pointed out, boutique resellers like XoticPC and GentTechPC will spec out your MSI laptop with more/bigger SSDs if you'd like. I'm considering getting an MSI GS43VR from one of them and swapping out the stock 128GB SSD in the M.2 slot with a 500GB 850 Evo... it won't be PCIe like the stock SSD, but as mentioned earlier, real world performance won't really take a hit.

 

Until very recently this was how I ran all my machines at home, and it is still a very good option because of how practical it is. We'll see that continue until SSDs are closer in $/GB to HDDs, though that should be sooner rather than later.

 

Good pick, the Evo's still my favorite SSD out there right now, even with the newer PCI models.

 

How many SATA slots are available in the GS63? I usually move the hdd to the dvd reader area and then place the ssd in the main sata slot but seems that gs63 doesn't have a dvd reader...

 

Just one.

 

Bad news... Thanks for the info.

 

It does have an M.2 slot though, so you can leave the drive there and configure with an M.2 SSD if you want to keep the mechanical.

 

But the M.2 slot is not occupied by a 128 GB ssd?

 

Depends on the model variant you have, some do and some don't.
If you can provide a model number then we can probably check it for you.

 

Just put an M.2 SSD + a 2.5" SSD in there. 2.5" SSDs are pretty cheap these days.

Sent from a 128th Legion Stormtrooper 6P

 

Which brand/model of SSD did you install into your system?

 

I have 512GB crucial and sandisk lying around in 2.5" form factor that were in other notebooks I've owned. Also sandisk, Samsung, and micron m.2 2280 SATA that I've used in my Blade.

Only using the 512GB micron m.2 m600 at this point.

To be clear I don't and haven't owned MSI, but as long as the drive is the correct interface and form factor any should work fine unless there's some rare firmware incompatibility. That's extremely rare though.

Sent from a 128th Legion Stormtrooper 6P

 

Yup, true to that.

 

So are pretty much all of this generation's M.2 intefaces PCI-E x4 capable? Or is this still more of a chipset limitation?

 

I would rely on the specs of the unit.

Sent from a 128th Legion Stormtrooper 6P

 

I've been looking at what the boutique vendors offer. Issue is that MSI may be going cheap on the SSD with just M.2 SATA while the interface itself is capable of both - hence the question.

 

Makes sense as the pcie nvme drives are significantly more expensive. Most people probably wouldn't notice the difference in performance day to day. But you know how it is.

Sent from a 128th Legion Stormtrooper 6P

 

1. Chipset limitation.
2. Cost factor/Feature variance.

 

If someone is interested, the gs63 is being sold in Spain ( http://www.pccomponentes.com/msi_gs..._i7_6700hq_16gb_2tb_512ssd_gtx1060_15_6_.html) but I think the info is wrong, 2 TB 5400rpm and 256ssd mvn *2?? is that possible?