As a web developer, if you're anything like me, you stay current on software trends, but hardware goes a bit unnoticed. Seeing that I don't really do anything graphic intensive (other than the occasional Photoshop website "cut-up"), I assumed that staying on the cutting edge of processing power doesn't make financial sense.
My assumption was wrong in the case of Solid-State Hard Drives. A couple weeks ago, the hard drive in my desktop computer failed. So, I decided it was time to step it up with a new Lenovo ThinkPad. I'm a big fan of the little red tracking point, and you just can't go wrong with a ThinkPad.
What I didn't plan on purchasing was a solid-state drive. But, when the upgrade screen came along in my checkout, I saw that it was only an extra $100 for a 160GB Solid State Hard Drive. So, I figure, why not?
Some colleagues of mine had been using solid-state for video processing for over a year, and they didn't report any failures. In fact, they raved about them, especially as a scratch drive for their editing work.
If you are a web developer, you no doubt close and reopen different programs constantly throughout your day. One of the big ones for me is photoshop. If I need to make a quick design adjustment, I open photoshop, make the adjustment, then close it.
Previously, on my traditional hard drive, loading photoshop was the longest step in that process. Nearly 15 seconds just to load the program.
With my solid-state drive, 3 seconds.