Hi, I’m considering adding an SSD into my laptop (where the CD drive is) to get samples to load faster. At the moment, I’m using a USB3 HDD (5400RPM), and the biggest library takes about 2 minutes to load (in Kontakt).
I’m wondering how much faster would an SSD be? To me it looks like it could be anywhere between 2 and 20x faster. But how much faster might that 2 minute library load? Like in 5-10 seconds?
Thanks 
Hi Milo,
I’m using SSDs only. The factor is as you describe means: it depends. Kontakt doesn’t seem to be able to use the full potential here. Dunno if this is by design or caused by fragmentation of the library files.
To give you a scetch: Mark I (Fender Rhodes Emulation from Scarbee) took about 30 seconds with HDD. With SSD it is done in about 4.
My biggest library in Kontakt is Session Horns. Took several minutes before, now about 25 seconds.
My whole setup is a mixed bag of 34 plugs. Besides Kontakt I have several instances of Halion, Omnisphere and one Synthogy Ivory as sample content players inside. Loading evetything for a complete show takes 60 seconds.
Hope this can give you an impression.
Regards, humphrey
7400 rpm hard drives transfer around 100 (mbs?) the 5,400 rpm drives transfer around 60 (mbs?) and SSD’s transfer around 400 (mbs?). So my guess is around 6 or 7 times faster.
I have large racks that load many plugins including Chris Hein Horns, sampled horns. My best guess is that the rack only takes about 10 seconds or so to load.
I am looking forward to rebuild my rig with a M.2 drive which transfer at around 2,000 - 4,000 (mbs?) or about 5 - 10 times faster than SSD’s. Then everything will be almost instantaneous, although my current setup is very adequate. I can’t imagine a 5,400 rpm drive.
John,
I had never heard of an M.2 drive before seeing you mention it here. They seem quite amazing, and a perfect solution to sample loading!
Thanks for the heads-up!
Terry
Great info! Thank you all so much! @humphrey thanks for the detailed examples, it helps put it into context. I’ll look into the M.2 drives too.
This is the M.2 Drive I would get:
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16820147467&cm_re=samsung_950_pro--20-147-467--Product
It is VERY unlikely that your laptop has an M.2 connection.
Reads up to 2,500 MBps and Writes (not as important) up to 1,500 MBps
A motherboard that is compatible is required to get Max Throughput. About 5+x faster than an SSD.
If I were to build out my “Live Performance PC”, right now, I would use this board:
Finding boards Mini ITX boards with M.2 is not too easy yet, there should likely be many choices in the future.
And this case:
Damn the web!!!.. With just a little research it looks like my Asus Gryphon Z87 micro ATX board will handle the new M.2 Samsung 950 Pro card with this Pcie adapter card.
Now I need to spend $300 to make my PC boot twice as fast.
My notebook has an M.2 drive and it’s blisteringly fast. So yes if you can afford one and your machine will accept it I’d say it’s a worth while upgrade.