Install FG and AppData on a SSD?

[JohnD]

I'm looking at a new system after 8+ years. SSDs seem to be pretty popular now.

Are there any negatives from installing FG on a SSD and/or locating the AppData directory on one?

[Zacchaeus]

FG is installed on my SSD and I have not noted any issues.

[Valyar]

Absolutely no negatives, only positives :)

[Nylanfs]

Other than it being a high re-write application and SSD's have a lower threshold for write times & when they fail, they give little to no warning when they do. I recommend setting up a RAID.

[LordEntrails]

Reliability of new/current SSDs is much better than it was, but they are still less than rotating drives.

Regardless, to quote what someone elsewhere recently said; "There are two types of people: those that have had a hard drive failure, and those that will have a hard drive failure."

[Maasq]

JohnD, are you talking about an external SSD?

If it is an internal SSD (and especially if it is your boot drive) the only difference you will notice is the blinding access speeds. Do a backup once a week onto an external drive, and that'll alleviate any fears you may have about reliability. I got a 128 Gb one a long time ago - at least 7, maybe 8 years - and I have had no catastrophic failure yet :)

I am building a new system this year and it will definitely have an SSD as its main drive.

Maasq

[Trenloe]

and I have had no catastrophic failure yet :)
Oh, oh! :o

[L. R. Ballard]

My old computer, a 2003 Dell, took a few minutes to boot up in its last days. In 2014, I built a computer with an SSD as its main drive. I'm able to start working in 20 seconds or less. Fantasy Grounds is installed on the SSD and runs like a champ.

Two things: 1) my SSD is 220GB, but it's already running out of space. Get more drive space, especially if you're a PC video gamer; 2) Visit Linus Tech Tips (https://www.youtube.com/user/LinusTechTips) when researching. Linus offers helpful--often short--videos about computers, and he describes the basics. I consulted his site when building my computer. Glad I did.

[damned]

Fantasy Grounds itself is not likely to see a great benefit from the SSD.
Fantasy Grounds largely loads things into RAM and plays from there.

Windows will totally benefit from being installed on the SSD though.

[JohnD]

JohnD, are you talking about an external SSD?

If it is an internal SSD (and especially if it is your boot drive) the only difference you will notice is the blinding access speeds. Do a backup once a week onto an external drive, and that'll alleviate any fears you may have about reliability. I got a 128 Gb one a long time ago - at least 7, maybe 8 years - and I have had no catastrophic failure yet :)

I am building a new system this year and it will definitely have an SSD as its main drive.

Maasq

I was thinking about a 500 GB internal drive, one with the new technology (forget M.2 or something...). The OS would go on there, plus my more used programs is what has been suggested to me (and there isn't a program I use more than FG...).

On the other hand, damned makes a good point. The new system would have at least 16 GB of ram as well, so I would probably be just fine installing on a regular HD. I was simply wondering if there was any kind of a big advantage (or disadvantage) to putting FG on it as well.

Thanks everyone.

[damned]

I was thinking about a 500 GB internal drive, one with the new technology (forget M.2 or something...). The OS would go on there, plus my more used programs is what has been suggested to me (and there isn't a program I use more than FG...).

On the other hand, damned makes a good point. The new system would have at least 16 GB of ram as well, so I would probably be just fine installing on a regular HD. I was simply wondering if there was any kind of a big advantage (or disadvantage) to putting FG on it as well.

Thanks everyone.

It wont hurt - FG will probably load quicker - but FG prolly wont run faster. Many other things will benefit more.
Either way - SSDs are great.

[Valyar]

In the (unlikely) event of memory depletion on this 16GB machine, SSD will significantly reduce the performance penalty related to swapping :)

[Xemit]

For long term survivability, it was recommended to keep at least 15% of a HDD free for defragmentation and other house cleaning. For an SSD, you no longer do defragmentation, but the flash nature does mean it has a more limited number of write cycles than a HDD (before failure). However, you won't really run into that problem unless you also run the SSD at nearly full capacity and do high volumes of delete and write. So it a best practice to keep an SSD at 30% free space.

I used to write low level drivers for flash based storage a decade or so back. The technology has way better performance now, but also way better controllers to handle the flash erase/write durability and maximize lifespan of the hardware. Most will now spread the writes around uniformly on the hardware to prolong life span. For that to work well, you need to leave more free space.

The read performance of SSD is much higher than a HDD and the seek performance is all but instantaneous. This makes loading files very fast, so a PC will boot in 10-20 seconds instead of 3 - 5 minutes. Opening/starting any program will definitely see an improvement, but once in DRAM, the SSD is no longer going to help (until the next file system access).

High performance HDD sustained read speed is around 210MBps, Sata SSDs are around 550 MBps for read speed these days. Moving into the M.2 form (particularly NVMe) can gain performance of 3200 MBps. However the motherboard needs to support the NVMe format for the fastest performance.

Most manufacturers of SSDs also have some maintenance software that you can install. This will check firmware and upgrade it as well as give you an overall health indication showing how much 'life' expectancy is left. Since you also frequently back up your computer, having a failure is usually only a minor inconvenience (a great time to put faster and larger SSD in). Combined with the monitor software, there really is no down side to an SSD, except maybe cost relative to a HDD.

[L. R. Ballard]

So it a best practice to keep an SSD at 30% free space.

Thanks for that info. I either didn't know that or had forgotten.


The read performance of SSD is much higher than a HDD and the seek performance is all but instantaneous. This makes loading files very fast, so a PC will boot in 10-20 seconds instead of 3 - 5 minutes. Opening/starting any program will definitely see an improvement, but once in DRAM, the SSD is no longer going to help (until the next file system access).

I started Fantasy Grounds from my SSD after reading damned's comment about SSD load times for FG. It took 15 seconds for me to have access to FG files in the chosen campaign.

[Beemanpat]

Ok sorry to rez this thread but wanted to ask a question. Ok here is the situation. I currently use a laptop for running fg on. I often take it with me to prep campaign stuff while I'm at work. I have recently built a desktop. Would it be ok to store/run from a portable hard drive (i.e. passport)? So I can work on fg campaign stuff while away from home on laptop but when I'm home connect the portable drive to desktop to run sessions. Thank in advance.

[LordEntrails]

Ok sorry to rez this thread but wanted to ask a question. Ok here is the situation. I currently use a laptop for running fg on. I often take it with me to prep campaign stuff while I'm at work. I have recently built a desktop. Would it be ok to store/run from a portable hard drive (i.e. passport)? So I can work on fg campaign stuff while away from home on laptop but when I'm home connect the portable drive to desktop to run sessions. Thank in advance.
I've done it in the past, I don't do it now. Just make sure you are not running FG when you connect or disconnect your drive. Make sure you eject your drive properly. Make sure you have a backup as external drives are more likely to fail than internal.

[Beemanpat]

Ok thanks. Yes always do those things. Thank you for the advice