SSD vs HDD Which Should You Buy? The Complete Guide

While moving to buy a new laptop or desktop usually you have two storage choices, Hard Disk Drive (HDD) and Solid State Drive (SSD). Both are the physical storage devices, and the prime component of the computer system. Both are doing the same job - storing data. But each device has its own highlights.

So, it is a big challenge for you select the right one. Walk through differences between Flash storage vs Hard Drive, together with Advantage and disadvantages. Let's discover which one befitting for you.

What is Hard Disk Drive - HDD

HDD - Hard Disk Drive popularly titled as a Hard Disk. It's become used since 1956 when introduced by IBM. It is non- volatile storage type which means the Information on it won't get off when you turned off your system, Whereas RAM is of volatile storage type. 

It's a mechanical device. Because of it has some mechanical moving parts like magnetic platters, motor, and arm.

Magnetic Platters stores all the information which you inserted into Hard Drive. Physically platters are round in shaped coated with a magnetic plate over it. Each one platter is organized into circles, known as tracks. Tracks are separated into logical units called sectors. As result of each track and platter form unique address that used to locate and organized the data with pointer method.

Motor work is to spins the platters which calculate in an rpm - (Revolution Per-Minute) rate. In Hard Disk, standard rpm rates are 5400, 7200 and 1000. Higher the rpm rate faster the read and write speed.

A triangle-shaped arm has read and write head. Arm read and stores the magnetic information on platters while it's spinning.

Advantages

HDD is not only an affordable but also offers more storage capacity In Terabytes which not by an SSD. Data recovery is an easy process In HDD. Nowadays, 1TB of hard disk commonly seen in every computer devices. The lifespan of HDD is long last than SDD.

Disadvantages

In HDD, there are more cons than pros it has. Due to moving parts the speed of reading and writing data is very slow. It produces a bit of noise due to continues running as it relies on moving platters. There risk of crashes, mechanical damage, and data loss when it falls down from a distance of 2-3 meters, So it's less durable. HDD use magnetic storage, so it susceptible to data corruption when the magnetic property increased. It is quite bigger in size 3.5 inch which makes it heavier. 

The critical issue with Hard Disk is it consumed more power. Normally HDD offers 3-4 hours of battery backup on your laptop, however, 4-10 hours of long last battery backup you will get with Solid State Drive SSD.

What is Solid State Drive - SSD

SSD stands for Solid State Drive. It is the latest technology over Hard Disk Drive. The SSD invented in the 1970s. The organization Dataram acquire its name for selling the first SSD with a name BULK CORE for DEC and DATA GENERAL. The recreational truth is the SSD size was only 2mb!

It also a non-volatile storage device like HDD. There are no mechanical moving parts platters, motor, read and write head as is in HDD.
 
SSD uses NAND-based flash memory. It works on the same principle which used by your smartphone, but it delivers faster and reliable data transfer speed from normal disks.

There are no perishable mechanical parts inside SSD. It has cache area which improves the performance by reduced the loading time. The data gets cleared in each power cycle from RAM when you closed the program but not from the cache of SSD since it is non-volatile. This mechanism is called as SSD caching. Because of this mechanism, SSD loads applications instantly.

Inside SSD, there is a controller which also referred processor. It is an embedded processor that executes firmware-level software. Managing data, communicates with the computer, accessing the data is handled through a controller.

Advantages

Due to an absence of mechanical moving parts, It can uphold higher shock than traditional HDD. And prevent the data loss, crashes problems when a laptop accidentally dropped. The durability of SSD is longer than HDD. SDD does not produce any vibrations and noise since there are no moving parts internally.

SSD dramatically reduced loading time for applications, games and other media than traditional Hard Disks. And It delivers instant loading time to boots up your computer.  

Reading and writing speed of SSD is much faster compared with HDD, 250mbps - 500mbps. It doesn't produce heat as Hard Disk Drives as it's non-mechanical.

SSD require lower power draw since it uses flash memory instead, a magnetic disk. Offers longer battery life.

Because of small in mass, it's easy to portable.

Disadvantages

The cost is relatively higher than HDD. Another issue with SSD is limited storage capacity. Although in SSD, the chance of data loss or corrupt is zero if it is, Data recovery is more complicated compared with HDD.

Overview

  Internal mechanism of Hard Disk Drive (HDD) vs Solid State Drive(SSD)

Performance

It is clear in every manner SSD beat traditional spinning HDD. Intel claimed SSD is 8 times faster compared with HDD.

I have Upgrade my HP 15-AY503TX Core i5 6th generation, 8GB RAM with SSD of 256GB. Review the performance on my laptop HDD vs SSD

Pricing

Of Course, the new technology SSD overcome HDD in every factor. Solid State Drive is 6 times expensive than heavy Hard Disk. Normally 1TB of HDD cost from $45, with the same capacity of SSD cost around $250.

The price per gigabytes of HDD is much less than SSD. Since it is older and widely used technology.

Concerning with price, Hard Disk is the better choice. But Inadequacies what I told you will find in that. From the last, prices of SSD come down. In future, the SSD will affordable.

Which Should You Pick?

You might notice, In high-end and long durable battery laptops SSD is pre-Inserted. For example - Apple Mackbook, Dell XPS, HP Envy and Spectre Series.

If you don't want to wait while and need a swift operation. Well, you love watching multimedia online rather than storing. And don't want to charge laptop 3 times in a day.

When you're the folks who really looking for quality than quantity, SDD is befitting for you. 

If you're a general user, You have the forbearance to wait for minutes to boot up your laptop. If you are crazy folks for multimedia, to store files locally. When you're a heavy downloader and budget buyer Hard Disk is choice for you.  

Last Line

You will suffer continuously from dispair lag unless use SSD. No matter how fast processor and powerful ram you're using. To evade delay, you should upgrade HDD with SSD. Are you really looking for performance? Only prefer laptops having SSD.

In a line I'll say, my recommendation is to use SSD as a boot drive and HDD  for mass storage, when you have low cost budget. The term HSSD (Hybrid Solid State Drive) is also now available in the market. It's in between SSD and HDD.