SanDisk ReadyCache

[MaHoTex]

I added a SanDisk ReadyCache to my system and all I can say is this thing is awesome. My boot time went from just shy of 2 mins to just under 30 seconds. If you have a sluggish computer that has SATA ports, I would strongly suggest you consider adding one of these devices. For $50 it is money well spent.

[billofrights]

I hadn't heard of those until now, looks pretty nice. Definitely a great upgrade if you don't already have an SSD.

[epilepticninja]

I'm going to get one and install it in my desktop box. Thanks for the 411 on this as I was thinking of going full SSD, but wanted to wait until I built a whole new system. Now, I think I might get a few more years out of this box.

[MaHoTex]

I am so impressed with this thing I think I will get one for each of the other desktops in my house.

Make sure you have a spare SATA port before ordering one. Also note, it DOES come with a 3.5" bracket for mounting. I made the mistake of purchasing an extra mounting bracket. I guess I should have paid a bit more attention to the "what's included" when I placed my order.

[Peter.Steele]

Hm. Wonder if I could get away with tossing one of these in my workstation at the office ... it's already fast, but this could really up the ante by quite a bit ...

[asymmetricalwarfar3]

Windows 7 only? Why?

[Merc1138]

Windows 7 only? Why?

Because windows 7 has better SSD support(not sure if these caching drives require TRIM and everything else)? Companies are tired of writing drivers for old operating systems(xp and vista are old, even 7 isn't the latest anymore)?

[Jel]

Very cool product. If I didn't already have SSD's in my PC's I would pick this up in a heartbeat.

[kermit315]

cool, I might have to pick up one of these.

[Peter.Steele]

Okay, so next question ... any idea if this would do any good in a USB 3.0 enclosure? I don't have a second drive bay in my laptop, and it's getting it's *** handed to it in some things that have a lot of drive access, since it's only got a 5400 rpm drive ...

[Merc1138]

No. You'd need to just swap the slow HDD with an SSD in your laptop.

Fortunately if you don't need tons of storage space, 120GB SSDs are getting cheap, and even 240GB is pretty reasonable.

[Jel]

Okay, so next question ... any idea if this would do any good in a USB 3.0 enclosure? I don't have a second drive bay in my laptop, and it's getting it's *** handed to it in some things that have a lot of drive access, since it's only got a 5400 rpm drive ...

I would swap out the old drive and put in a dedicated SSD. Best upgrade I've done to my laptop after upgrading the RAM. 120GB SSD's are coming down in price. If you happen to have a DVC/CD drive bay that is removable, like on the Lenovo T series, you might be able to get a drive carrier and put your old HD in it and put in place of the DVD Drive.

[dynamomark80]

its worthless, its 32Gb a ssd but im sure all the software does is copy your most accessed files and reroute traffic to it. you would be better off just getting a larger ssd. I recently replaced my laptop hard drive with a 64Gb ssd for $50 but it had a $20 rebate. so I ended up spending less then $1/2Gb which isnt bad at all.
my route would far better suite most anyone that wanted faster booting and better system performance.

for my a laptop i can getaway with running a smaller ssd but on a home desktop I would definitely get at least a 120Gb for the OS and run other hard drives for storage. If you really want speed get a few of the same ssd's and run them in raid 0

[MaHoTex]

Dyna, it is far from worthless. I have been running it for a week now and am totally happy with the performance increase. Additionally, the data on the SSD is duplicated on the traditional HD. In the event of a corruption on the SSD the system is still on the HD and will operate just fine. SSDs, particularly the less expensive ones, have a fairly low MTBF when compared to a traditional HD.

While I agree that 32GB is a tad on the small side, SanDisk has done their homework and released a product that is excellent. I will presume that you know motherboard manufacturers have been putting dedicated ports on the motherboard for just this application. Additionally, HD manufacturers are also doing exactly the same thing built into the drive as a Hybrid.

The SanDisk ReadyCache is an inexpensive way to upgrade a desktop PC and get the best of both worlds: SSD Speed and traditional HD data integrety.

[dynamomark80]

Ok its not worthless but it would be better to spend money on a larger SSD like I have.
On the plus side it looks really easy to install and to setup. Replacing an older drive with a new SSD and transferring all he old data over (cloning) can be a little more involved. It is cheaper then getting a large SSD too. If the system was ok and snappy but now seems slow people should look to what programs are running and bogging down the system. I have seen pc's with 15-20 programs running in the background and that can slow you down to a snail's pace.