[dead, back to $150] Intel 320 80gb SSD $80 after ($50 rebate + $20 coupon) (+ tax on $130 for some) free ship @ Newegg

I use a 64gb as my main drive, ~15gb free. Only have BF3 and Skyrim installed for games. Use an external for the rest of my stuff.

Quote from yoake : Does anyone know what the fee for the "No-Wait Rebate" is?

"Choose our No-Wait-Rebate service. We will mail your Rebate payment via 1st class mail within 5-7 business days from the date of approval of your claim for a small fee of $5.00 which will be deducted from your Rebate payment. If you are in no rush and do not mind waiting 8-10 weeks and at no cost, we will mail your Rebate payment to you via 1st Class mail after we have received your Rebate documentation and have approved your claim."

Cool, thanks guys.

Quote from dadueler : Tempted to get this as an OS drive for my laptop (I have 2 HD bays, SATA3), but not sure if I should jump or wait for a 120GB/128GB SATA3 at around ~$100 or $120... This would be my first entry into SSD's, so I don't know too much about them... I've read that SATA 2 vs 3 doesn't make a whole lot of difference in real world use, but since my laptop supports SATA3, I'd prefer having it. Any advice? I would use this for the OS, Games and Applications... 80GB is going to be very limiting, ideally I'd like about 40GB just for games... Thanks!

Windows 7 64-bit takes about 30GB (20GB requirement but I'm counting room for updates and hibernate/page files, which might still be useful and would have to be on the SSD if this is the only drive you'd have).

I don't know what your applications take up, but a basic Office + multimedia playback + browsing loadout would only need 6GB to be generous. More storage needed if having multimedia editing apps (as in video editing, photoshop, 3d modeling).

Add in storage for your documents/media, if you're not doing it from USB flash drive/external.

And games, well, depends on the game. Some of the newer ones take like 10GB for full install, and even old games like Oblivion with texture pack mods can take 20GB. Many mainstream games come in between 5-10GB installed. Save files can take up a lot too if you save a lot without deleting (I wound up with like 30GB of Fallout 3 saves at one point on desktop HDD, maybe more; fortunately it's only usually RPGs that have big save file folders).

You can work with 80GB but you'd have to be okay with 3-6 games at most (mainstream games from say 2010 onward).

Quote from doughboy : I use a 64gb as my main drive, ~15gb free. Only have BF3 and Skyrim installed for games. Use an external for the rest of my stuff.

Quote from mangodrink : Windows 7 64-bit takes about 30GB (20GB requirement but I'm counting room for updates and hibernate/page files, which might still be useful and would have to be on the SSD if this is the only drive you'd have). I don't know what your applications take up, but a basic Office + multimedia playback + browsing loadout would only need 6GB to be generous. More storage needed if having multimedia editing apps (as in video editing, photoshop, 3d modeling). Add in storage for your documents/media, if you're not doing it from USB flash drive/external. And games, well, depends on the game. Some of the newer ones take like 10GB for full install, and even old games like Oblivion with texture pack mods can take 20GB. Many mainstream games come in between 5-10GB installed. Save files can take up a lot too if you save a lot without deleting (I wound up with like 30GB of Fallout 3 saves at one point on desktop HDD, maybe more; fortunately it's only usually RPGs that have big save file folders). You can work with 80GB but you'd have to be okay with 3-6 games at most (mainstream games from say 2010 onward).

Thanks, awesome response, wish I could rep you again!

Quote from doughboy : I use a 64gb as my main drive, ~15gb free. Only have BF3 and Skyrim installed for games. Use an external for the rest of my stuff.

On a side note, it's not even necessary to have Skyrim load from your SSD drive. I have an SSD boot drive, but loaded Skyrim on my crappy (performance-wise) 2TB green power hard drive. The game plays fast as hell, and if anything, one thing I love about Skyrim is how fast load times are.

Quote from biggiep : On a side note, it's not even necessary to have Skyrim load from your SSD drive. I have an SSD boot drive, but loaded Skyrim on my crappy (performance-wise) 2TB green power hard drive. The game plays fast as hell, and if anything, one thing I love about Skyrim is how fast load times are.

doughboy was responding to dadueler, and dadueler asked for a laptop. dadueler implied that it would be his only drive. I assumed doughboy was also on a laptop since he is using an external for his other stuff.

Based on youtube clips though, yeah, games generally don't benefit from being installed on SSD (maybe save 2-4 seconds off a 5-10 second load). I've seen videos of significant load time savings for Oblivion w/ heavy texture mods though (and I assume other games that do heavy texture mods), and I imagine someone who deals with a lot of loads can also get less annoyed by even a few seconds shorter load times (like me when I play Starcraft 2 campaign).

Maybe a good rule of thumb is to install games on HDD and only consider doing an SSD test if the load times really annoy. Oh god did those Starcraft 2 campaign loads really bug me. Oblivion/Fallout 3 loads at zone edges and towns kinda bugged me too.

I wonder if Morrowind would also benefit from the SSD, I remember maxing out running speed w/ silly super spells and also doing that super ridiculous jump spell (with levitation parachute), but being disappointed by having to pause for zone load every 2-3 seconds for 1-2 seconds at a time (probably a *slight* exaggeration). (give me this, w/o such long loads, over instantaneous fast travel [youtube.com])

Just to clarify, I do have 2 hard drive bays in my laptop, so I can use an SSD as well as an HDD...

Sorry if that wasn't clear earlier, thanks for the ongoing discussion...

These are great drives, I bought the 120GB version on BF 2011.

Quote from dadueler : Just to clarify, I do have 2 hard drive bays in my laptop, so I can use an SSD as well as an HDD... Sorry if that wasn't clear earlier, thanks for the ongoing discussion...

Yes you can.

Don't forget your free 2 day ship if you got Shoprunner.

is this rebate good for me and others, if I already sent in 2 rebates (the limit) on the intel ssd deal during Black Friday?

lol @ 80GB. Might as well be 40GB. Just enough room for your operating system.

Nice find, I've been waiting for reliable SSD SATA-II drives to drop in price. Thumbs up + 4 reps!

Anybody know if these in RAID0 with Win7 escape the inherent "foibles" such as lacking garbage collection, not being installable, so on?