Hi guys, I've been meaning to finish this now for almost a month, I thought it might be of interest to all.  I recently brought a 128 gig Samsung SSD 850 pro, which plugs into an external USB 3 port-this "portable" drive, I've been using for all my audio and video recording projects and I'm amazed.  It is a cheap and in my opinion better alternative to any external 7200 spindle drive on the market, and I've used Esata and various other external solutions for over 5 years-since I dropped bulky desktop systems in favor of laptops.  Nothing comes close to bettering the performance-it's even better than an internal drive-again IMO.
 
Here is the review I've done on my blogsite it contains all the details including my rigorous tests.
https://technicallingo.wo...o-850-pro-vantec-case/
 
Please note this is not spam, I'm just an independent "blogger" (ugh what a horrible term, for want of a better one) I have no affiliation with any company mentioned on blog.
Ben
 PS...sorry about the blandness of my blog, still working on this.
 
If your interested in Android Wear smartwatches I've been using the Sony Smartwatch 3 now for over two months and have written about this here https://technicallingo.wo.../02/13/26/  

Very interesting stuff. I have thought about ssd things but somewhere I have heard about ssd:s not being so durable in, iirc, work that requires really numerous write operations. I have not found much evidence to support this on the internet though but it still has made me a bit wary of ssd:s. Also smaller capacity and bigger price have both made me wanting less to get one one of these. Your newly acquired device sounds like a very good product with a great guarantee. Good work on the review.

Hey Antti, yea I read all the stuff about SSD's and reliability too...the difference with the pro is the 10 year and 40 terabyte guarantee...touch wood the drive seems to be reliable.  Don't forget that technology marches forward and the stuff on the net can be obsolete before it is written.
 
Ben

There used to be some concerns about SSD's and recording audio but even with this article in 2009 there does not seem to be an issue.
 
http://www.soundonsound.com/sos/dec09/articles/applenotes_1209.htm
 
I have just built a new machine and I have got a SSD as the C drive.  (At this stage I am running a ITB SATA drive as my audio drive though.)  I believe Samsung make the best SSD's.  Mine is a 250G and it flies.  Windows 7 boots up in no time at all.  And Studio One also boots up so fast I cannot believe it either.  They are pretty cool.

Jeff Evans
There used to be some concerns about SSD's and recording audio but even with this article in 2009 there does not seem to be an issue.
 
http://www.soundonsound.com/sos/dec09/articles/applenotes_1209.htm
 
I have just built a new machine and I have got a SSD as the C drive.  (At this stage I am running a ITB SATA drive as my audio drive though.)  I believe Samsung make the best SSD's.  Mine is a 250G and it flies.  Windows 7 boots up in no time at all.  And Studio One also boots up so fast I cannot believe it either.  They are pretty cool.

Hi Jeff...nice to hear from you again...I'm getting there...not quite as mad as I was...it's amazing what education does to rewire the brain...that and stimulant medication lol...just know I've always enjoyed our chats...
 
SSD's are amazing if you read my review you will notice I'm using it for video editing too, it blew my mind...no more bottle necking...no more crashing rendering with full effects in minutes not hours...of course it could be the 8 core laptop with 16 gig of ram lol but truly amazing.  Latency almost non-existence even with 50 odd tracks of audio and effects/instruments...it was so much fun playing guitar rig over the last track I posted.  And the SSD needs no external power supply and USB 3.  Honestly a truly portable rig...although power is still needed.  But I'm certain if you had to record a full band or orchestra at 96khz 32 bit fp then this hard-drive could do it.
 
I would not recommend any other brand at this stage guys but Samsung 850 pro's are cheap enough and reliable enough now to do away with any other hard drive.
 
Ben 

I am glad the durability issues are not a reality then and your drive has an impressive guarantee anyway so not much to worry. If I ever get enough loose money I will get a puter with a big ssd. Of course this might take a while...

kakku
If I ever get enough loose money I will get a puter with a big ssd. Of course this might take a while...

In the meantime, a 128 gb SSD is more than enough if you keep your projects, samples and loops on a hard drive.
I even have all my samples on my SSD.
 
 

Paul P

kakku
If I ever get enough loose money I will get a puter with a big ssd. Of course this might take a while...

In the meantime, a 128 gb SSD is more than enough if you keep your projects, samples and loops on a hard drive.
 

My desktop comp has a terabyte hard drive and I have dedicated 100 gigs to the system partition and there is only about 9 gigs free on the system partition and about 330 gigs free on the data/program partition. I think that I need more than 128 gigs for the system drive. I have read about hybrid drives. I am not sure how good those are but they have bigger capacities although, ofc, they are not as fast as full ssd thingies. I think one of those hybrids might be good for me. Then again both of my computers suck b***s so I really should get a new i5 desktop puter and an i3 laptop. I am just waiting for a 1000 euros to fall on my hands:)

kakku
I think that I need more than 128 gigs for the system drive.

On my pc with windows 7 ultimate, the C: partition is 55gb used, 33gb of which are for the C:\Windows folder.
Then 10gb for program files and 2gb for program data , 6 gb for Users, 4gb for pagefile.sys and 1 gb for the rest.
 
Still on the SSD, I have a D: partition with 11gb of programs and an E: partition with 24 gb of everything DAW (including samples) that is not projects or loops.
 
All this on my 128 gb SSD and I still have 27gb free.
 
I did move everything I (easily) could that did not require rapid access, to hard drives (no user symbolic links yet).
 
All of the above will obviously vary from person to person, but it shows that you can get by with a smaller, cheaper SSD.
 
TreeSize Free is great for finding out where all your capacity is going.

Paul P

kakku
I think that I need more than 128 gigs for the system drive.

On my pc with windows 7 ultimate, the C: partition is 55gb used, 33gb of which are for the C:\Windows folder.
Then 10gb for program files and 2gb for program data , 6 gb for Users, 4gb for pagefile.sys and 1 gb for the rest.
 
Still on the SSD, I have a D: partition with 11gb of programs and an E: partition with 24 gb of everything DAW (including samples) that is not projects or loops.
 
All this on my 128 gb SSD and I still have 27gb free.
 
I did move everything I (easily) could that did not require rapid access, to hard drives (no user symbolic links yet).
 
All of the above will obviously vary from person to person, but it shows that you can get by with a smaller, cheaper SSD.
 
TreeSize Free is great for finding out where all your capacity is going.

The funny thing is that I have tried to not use c:\ for silliness or stuff that could go to d:\ but still my system drive is too full. I have also tried to use 'tricks' I read from some web sites to ease the pain but not with much luck. I do not know what went wrong with my '100 gigs is plenty' plan. Maybe I will take, with software you recommended, a new look at my drive to find out if something is still left to be done.