W700ds purchase need advice

[proaudioguy]

Just purchased a system with dual 128GB Samsung SSDs (Lenovo OEM). Is there any speed benefit to RAID 0 (or 1) with these drives? Would the access speed be twice as fast as a single drive?

If not, I was thinking I would go ahead and use one of the SSDs in the Tablet. So I need advice. Is it beneficial to put the page file on one of the spindle drives on a small partition, say 10GB or so(?) while using the SSD for the OS? I was also considering keeping all my regularly accessed files on another partition on the 7200RPM drive, and loading a 500GB 5400RPm drive in place of the blue ray drive (which I don't need and may sell immediately). That drive would then hold the 300GB music folder and maybe some movies for the road as well as a backup of the SSD. Thoughts? I'd like any particular advice on optimizing the SSD in both systems for the best performance and longevity with the emphases on performance.

Is the video optimized for gaming or CAD and what is the difference? I read something about the W500 being no good for gaming. Is that also true for the W700?

Hopefully that can get this thread going and I'm sure I'll have more questions.

Ps, what is the blu ray drive worth on the open market, say ebay? It will be considered used even though it hasn't been used yet. I intend to use my DVD burner on the occasion I need an optical drive which is next to never. I don't own any blu rays, I don't intend to ever own any blu rays, and I have no desire to back up data on optical discs of any kind so it's really useless to me.

[proaudioguy]

Perhaps I need to post this in a more generic forum. I don't think most of my questions are W700 specific. Any suggestions? I was hoping to have 15 or 20 replies by now.

[QFoam]

I don't know which graphics processor you have, but the NVidia Quadro FX 3700M uses CAD-optimized drivers. It's twin, the NVidia GeForce 9800M GTX uses gaming-oriented drivers. If you're more interested in gaming, you may be able to use hacked GeForce 9800M GTX drivers, although I haven't researched that. The W-series machines are more oriented toward engineering apps than gaming, although the Quadro FX 3700M is a killer GPU with a top-notch cooling system in the W700. Go here for more info on W700 GPUs, including links to benchmarks, etc. That same web page lists reviews that describe gaming tests of the W700.

If you search in this forum on discussions regarding using SSDs in RAIDs, you'll probably find the answer is that you don't want to do that. I'll leave that as an exercise for the reader.

On optimizing operation for SSDs, see:

http://www.tomshardware.com/forum/24728 ... ook-solved
and look for "The SSD Stuttering Problem" on the following page:
http://forum.thinkpads.com/viewtopic.php?f=48&t=79684

Because the lifespan of SSD memory is limited by number of rewrites, you may want to avoid swapping a page file to an SSD (if you have a choice of swapping to a separate hard drive). Since hard drive sustained transfer rates can vary substantially depending on where the data is stored on the disk, you probably want to choose a partition near the beginning (i.e. outer tracks) of the 7200 RPM disk for swapping.

[matt1985]

but the NVidia Quadro FX 3700M uses CAD-optimized drivers. It's twin, the NVidia GeForce 9800M GTX uses gaming-oriented drivers

[proaudioguy]

Sorry It's the 3700 gpu. I read the thing about the W500 drivers after I ordered the machine. I had no idea the drivers could be different for one vs another. very strange. I would think if it works for games it will work for A-CAD.

Not sure how to figure out WHERE a partition is closer to the edge, etc. If you think 10GB of a 320GB 7200RPM let me know.

[QFoam]

Partitioning software and backup software always list partitions in a particular order, so you'd want your swap partition to be the first one in the list. When partitions are displayed graphically, that usually means the partition on the left or at the top.

Size of the pagefile will vary depending on what you're doing on the machine. Most rules of thumb suggest 1.5x to 2x the amount of physical RAM that you have in the machine, although you don't want to run out of swap space.

[proaudioguy]

Partitioning software and backup software always list partitions in a particular order, so you'd want your swap partition to be the first one in the list. When partitions are displayed graphically, that usually means the partition on the left or at the top.

Size of the pagefile will vary depending on what you're doing on the machine. Most rules of thumb suggest 1.5x to 2x the amount of physical RAM that you have in the machine, although you don't want to run out of swap space.

This part of the process is done for now. I'll have to do it over when I get windows 7 installed IF the DISC ever shows up? I have no way to test it. Can someone direct me to a comprehensive method of formatting the SSDs so they are correct? I'm going to clean install windows 7 64bit on the W700, and 32bit on my tablet. So far the SSD is a solid performer with vista. Boot times are smoking fast compared to before (on the tablet).

Do I need to ZERO OUT the SSDs?