With newer generation drives those factors have been mitigated or eliminated completely. Still, some PC users may need to check on their SSDs from time to time to make sure that they provide the same performance and reliability as in the beginning.

SSDLife Free is a Windows software program that can check the life expectancy of a solid state drive. It interprets the SMART data of the drive. The free version of the program supports only one connected SSD. If more than one drives are connected only the first will be analyzed and displayed.

When you start the program for the first time data about the first SSD of the system is collected and then displayed on the screen. This includes a general drive health rating at the top with the estimated lifetime of the solid state drive. The information are more detailed in the middle of the window. Here you see your drive’s model, the total drive space and free space, the work time in hours and days and the times the drive has been powered on.

The program displays furthermore if TRIM is supported by the drive, and the estimated life expectancy in more detail. Lastly, it also displays how much data was written in Gigabyte in the SSD’s life.

The expected lifetime is handy to know, as it allows users to make preparations to replace the drive when the time of “death” comes nearer.

SSDLife Free can display the SMART data of the drive in an online report in the web browser.

Users with one Solid State Drive installed on their computer can download the free software from the developer website.

Users of previous versions of the Intel Solid-State Drive Toolbox will notice that the new installment ships with a redesigned interface. The start screen display information about all hard drives connected to the computer. The drives are separated by Intel SSD and Other Drives tabs. Information about the drive model, firmware version and serial number are displayed here next to drive health and estimated life remaining bars.

Linked from here are the drive details section and the SMART details section of the program.

Probably the biggest new feature in this version is the new firmware update button that checks online for new firmwares for the SSD and informs the user if new versions are available. Users can install the new firmware right away from within the program interface and Windows. Intel surprisingly though only recommends to minimize system use during the operation and not to create a backup of the data on the drive prior to installing a new firmware.

Another issue here is that the update screen lacks information about the changes in the new firmware version. The new firmware version is however displayed on the screen so that a manual search for the version should reveal the update information. It is highly recommended to check the changes before installing the firmware update.

The program still offers to run the Trim command regularly on Windows operating systems that do not support it to retain the performance levels.

Windows 7 and newer users who can make use of the built-in Trim functionality can use other features of the toolbox that have already been available in previous versions of the application. Among them the System Tuner which runs a quick check to see if operating system features such as the disk defragmenter, ReadyBoost or Superfetch and Prefetch are configured optimally.

The Secure Erase feature on the other hand can be used to remove all data from the drive which can be handy before selling, lending or giving it away.

Windows users can download the latest iteration of Intel’s Solid-State Toolbox from the Intel website.

This includes among other things to make sure that automatic defragmentation of the SSD is disabled or that Trim is enabled on Windows 7. (Users of other [Windows] operating systems need to run software like Intel’s Solid State Drive Toolbox to run emulate the trim command.

For more optimization related tips check out Optimize Slow Solid State Drives, Optimize Windows For Solid State Drives Usage and Use A Ram Disk To Reduce Writes On Solid State Drives.

SSD Fresh is a free software program for the Windows operating system that can be used to optimize the computer automatically for using SSD hard drives. You are asked to register the program (free) by entering an email address and name.

The software displays an overview of all connected SSDs on the system after startup. Information include the drive’s name, type, size, number of partitions, file system and the pie chart visualizing the drive’s used and free diskspace. A drive’s S.M.A.R.T. information are displayed with a click on the Smart data button.

A click on Optimization displays the list of suggested optimizations. The program scans the system automatically and displays the optimization status for each suggestion automatically.

Each optimization is listed with its name, status, description and link to activate or restore the suggested feature.

Here is the list of all suggestions that are currently available in the program:

Indexing (disable search indexing)
Defragmentation (disable automatic defragmenting)
Timestamp (disable access time logs)
Prefetch (disable prefetching)
Defragmentation of boot files
Windows event logging
Systemrestore
8.3 name creation

The program can be used to enable or disable a specific feature or to optimize all of the settings at once. It is recommended to check all suggested optimizations manually before making the suggested changes. It is for instance not recommended to disable the operating system’s System Restore feature unless other forms of backup and restoration are available.

Experienced users can disable all of the suggested features manually, and maybe even faster considering that the software needs to be registered before it can be used. The program fails to address some important optimizations that include the Windows pagefile or the location of the temporary files folder on the system.

Another issue is that it is not possible to make optimizations only for select solid state drives. The changes that you make in the software affect all SSDs on the system.

Interested users can download the SSD optimizer from the Abelssoft website. The program is compatible with 32-bit and 64-bit editions of the Microsoft Windows operating system.

You computer now may well have 2/4/6 or even 16Gb of RAM, but Windows is still using the swap file, primarily now for application compatibility.  With this file always growing and shrinking in size on your hard disk it’s building up a fragmentation problem that will eventually slow down file access to your hard disk and that, potentially, could lead to data corruption.

Now, both of those scenarios with modern hardware are worst case, but it’s always a good idea to manually manage the Windows swap file.  Why do I say this?  Because while I can’t guarantee an unmanaged swap file will cause slowdown and data corruption, I can positively guarantee that a properly managed swap file won’t.

You access the swap file properties in the Control Panel by selecting the System panel.  In the left hand panel (Vista and Windows 7) click the Advanced system settings link.

In the Window that appears, you’ll see the Advanced tab open by default.  In the Performance section you need to click on the Settings button.

At this point a new Window will appear.  Under the Virtual Memory tab click the Change button to set the virtual memory manually.

At the next Window (seen below) there are several things you need to do.

1. Untick the Automatically manage paging file size for all drives option.
2. Choose the Custom Size option
3. Set both the Initial size and Maximum size options to the Recommended value at the bottom of the window. NOTE: both values must be identical.
4. Press OK to finish.  The changes will take effect the next time you restart your computer but there’s no need to do this immediately.

Some people have questioned whether you should keep your paging file on the same disk as Windows is installed in your computer if that hard disk is an SSD.  The reason for this is that a paging file makes many millions of read and write requests over the lifetime of that copy of Windows, many more times that of any other file.  The argument is that this can significantly reduce the lifetime of your SSD which has a maximum lifespan of so many read and write requests.

Conversely, other people will say that moving the paging file away from the SSD will slow down Windows and undo some of the good of having it installed on an SSD in the first instance.

This is a decision you’ll have to make for yourself and it comes down to a personal choice.  I’m not convince that moving the paging file away from Windows will affect performance adversely and on my own computer the power management powers-down the hard disk after a period.  This means that when I come to access a file from it I always suffer a delay while the computer spins it up again.  Having the swap file on the hard disk and not the SSD would get around this secondary issue.

On the image above you can see on my own computer the Windows 7 partition is highlighted.  It’s here that I’ve got my own swap file stored.  Before moving the file to another disk simply click on the appropriate hard disk or partition in the list that you see.  The next time you reboot the swap file will be moved to this other disk instead.

I have reviewed several programs to link and move folders, applications and games from a Solid State Drive to another drive to free up space. This includes Steam Mover and the portable program Junction from Sysinternals.

SSD Boost Manager offers a similar functionality on first glance. Windows users can configure directories that they want to move and create symbolic links for so that everything works as if the folder would still be in its original location on the drive.

But instead of just doing that, it offers to swap the folder back to its original location on demand. That’s for instance very handy for gamers who do not want to uninstall games, but need storage space on their SSD for a new program. They can use SSD Boost Manager to move the folder and create a symbolic link to free up the space, install and play the other game, uninstall that game and move the old game back to its original location (or instead of uninstalling move and create a symbolic link for that second game as well).

Most users should switch the interface language from French to English by clicking on the flag button in the app.

A click on the Add button opens the configuration menu.

Here you can define a name and the directories of the Solid State Drive and the other folder you want to use. It is optionally possible to create a profile for each subdirectory of the selected folder, which can be handy if you have a games folder on your drive with multiple games installed.

The default action that is selected is to move the data from the SSD to the HDD. This can be switched easily to restore the HDD data back to the SSD.

The idea to swap apps and games back and forth could be interesting for users who do not want to uninstall the applications or games when they run out of space. The English version of the interface could use some tooltips and explanations on how to use the program properly. Another problem that non-French speaking users can run into is the French installation of the game.

Interested users can download SSD Boost Manager from the project homepage, which is also only available in French. The program itself is compatible with 32-bit and 64-bit editions of the Windows XP, Windows Vista and Windows 7 operating system.

A recent study of the Department of Computer Science and Engineering at the University of California came to the conclusion that individual file sanitizing techniques were ineffective on SSDs and that built-in disk sanitizing techniques were effective if implemented correctly which was not always the case.

But this article is about encryption and Solid State Drives, read on how the findings impact encryption as well.

The makers of the open source encryption software True Crypt for instance recommend that “TrueCrypt volumes are not created/stored on devices (or in file systems) that utilize a wear-leveling mechanism (and that TrueCrypt is not used to encrypt any portions of such devices or filesystems)”.

They basically ask their users to use True Crypt on conventional hard drives only and not on Solid State Drives and other Flash storage devices.

Why are they recommending that? For that, we need to take a look at how data is saved to SSDs.

Solid state drives use a technology called wear leveling to extend the lifetime of the device. Storage sectors on Flash drives have limited write-cycles which means that they cannot be written to anymore eventually. Wear leveling is used to avoid heavy use of specific sectors. With Solid State Drives it’s not possible to save data to a specific sector of the drive. The wear leveling mechanism makes sure that the data is evenly distributed on the drive.

This means that it is theoretically possible that data is stored multiple times on the drive. If you change the TrueCrypt volume header for instance it can be that the old header is still accessible on the drive as it is not possible to overwrite it individually. Attackers could exploit this if they have found the old header. A basic example. Lets say you have encrypted your SSD and found out that a trojan recorded the password or keyfile that you use to access the encrypted data.

All you need to do on conventional hard drives is to create a new password or keyfile to resolve the issue and protect the data from access. On solid state drives however it may still be possible to extract the old header and use it to access the data with the stolen password or keyfile.

But what if the drive is empty before you use it? What if you plan to erase it securely if it is compromised?

Even this may not be sufficient. First, we already established that some “secure erase” tools offered by manufacturers of SSDs implement the technology incorrectly which means that the data may still be accessible after the operation.

TrueCrypt recommends the following precautions prior to encryption a blank Solid State Drive.

Before you run TrueCrypt to set up pre-boot authentication, disable the paging files and restart the operating system (you can enable the paging files after the system partition/drive has been fully encrypted). Hibernation must be prevented during the period between the moment when you start TrueCrypt to set up pre-boot authentication and the moment when the system partition/drive has been fully encrypted.

Even then the makers do not guarantee that this “will prevent data leaks and that sensitive data on the device will be securely encrypted”.

What’s the conclusion then? It depends. The security implications are probably nothing that home users need to worry about as it requires some technical background and equipment to attack encrypted drives. If you run a business, are a government official or an individual with data that needs to be protected at all costs, then you need to avoid drives with wear leveling for now.

Have a different opinion? Let me know in the comments.

Most solid state drive manufacturers offer tools to aid the user in tasks that are specific to SSDs. Intel for instance has created the Intel Solid-State Drive Toolbox which has been released in a new version a few days ago.

I have reviewed the software previously here in an earlier version (see Intel Solid State Drive (SSD) Toolbox for the review). Intel has added two new modules to version 2 of the SSD software that justify a closer look at this new version.

The software basically can be used to manage Intel Solid State Drives. It comes with SMART monitoring options for other hard drives connected to the computer system, but the SSD tools are only available if an Intel SSD is connected.

Three Intel SSD Management Tools are offered in the latest version of the application. The Intel SSD Optimizer is the only program that has been available in previous versions of the software as well. It basically offers TRIM functionality if the operating system does not support it by default. Windows 7 users with TRIM working do not need this (see Verify That TRIM Is Enabled In Windows 7 to find that out). Other Windows users may need to run the optimizer regularly to keep the performance as high as possible.

The two new modules on the other hand are interesting for all users regardless of the operating system they use.

The Intel SSD System Configuration Tuner checks if system settings are optimized for SSD usage. It checks Superfetch and Prefetch, ReadyBoost, DIPM and the Defragmenter. A Tune It! link is displayed next to each entry that is not optimized.

Secure Erase is the second addition to Intel’s Solid State Drive Toolbox 2. It can be used to erase all data on a selected Intel SSD. The tool only works on secondary SSDs that are not bootable or with a partition.

The software furthermore offers to run fast or full diagnostics on Intel SSDs. Intel’s Solid-State Drive Toolbox 2 is available for download at Intel’s Download Center. The software that is compatible with Windows 7, Windows Vista and Windows XP requires the Microsoft .NET Framework 2.0.

I won’t repeat what the article says here, but it’s extensive and he’s gone into some depth.  I would like to add my voice to a choir though.

I built myself a new desktop PC back in July 2010 around an Intel Core i7 860 running at 2.80GHz, 6Gb of DDR3 RAM and an Intel X25-M 80GB SSD.  I bought this particular SSD on the recommendation of PC Pro magazine here in the UK who had only the month before group tested a great deal of them.

I also bought a Samsung Spinpoint F3 1Tb hard disk, a couple of them actually, for data storage as they too had come recommended in a group test.  Both of these components I selected for sheer speed.

Now I can attest that not only is booting Windows 7 from an SSD significantly quicker than from any conventional hard disk, but running it from the SSD is also significantly quicker day to day.  If that is, you buy the correct SSD!

One of the things that the PC Pro group test revealed is that the wrong SSD can be as slow as a normal, ordinary middle of the road, mechanical hard disk.

If you intend to buy an SSD it’s worth checking the computer magazines and online to see group tests that compare the current crop of disks side-by-side as the differences in read/write and general access times can vary dramatically.

So have a look at Ed’s article as it’s extremely informative, but before you rush out to buy yourself an SSD, do your homework and make sure that you’re not throwing your money away on an expensive gadget which will provide no real-world benefits.

The main cause for this, besides the obvious that an SSD was purchased that uses a controller that is not capable of delivering blazing fast speeds, is that the SSD was not connected correctly. This is most of the time not the user’s fault. See, Solid State Drives should be detected as such by Windows. The operating system then changes several system settings which are optimized for SSDs. This includes TRIM for garbage collection, disabling the defragmenter schedule and disabling prefetch and superfetch if the SSD is installed as the main Windows drive.

The core reason for improper detection of the drive as a solid state drive is that the BIOS is not set to Advanced Host Controller Interface (AHCI) but to Integrated Drive Electronics (IDE).

There are several ways to find out if a solid state drive is connected properly to the PC. One of the easiest options is to launch the free benchmarking software AS SSD Benchmark.

Just select the drive from the pulldown menu and make sure that msahci is displayed beneath the drive name and firmware. The program may require elevated rights to display the drives of the system properly.

What if it is not displaying msahci? Then it is definitely not connected, or at least recognized properly by Windows. This is usually the case if AHCI is not enabled in the BIOS. SSD that are connected to the computer with AHCI disabled will not be recognized as such by Windows which means that Trim and other solid state drive specific optimizations will not be made by the OS.

The only option available is to enable AHCI in the BIOS for the controller the SSD is running on. Users need to make sure to change a Registry entry in Windows first as the operating system would fail to boot otherwise.

Open the Windows Registry editor by pressing Windows-R, typing regedit and hitting the enter key. Then navigate to the key

HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SYSTEM\CurrentControlSet\services\msahci

Take a look at the START parameter there and make sure it is set to 0. Once done restart the PC and enable AHCI in the BIOS. It is recommended to backup all important data before doing so. Windows will install the AHCI drivers on next start which may require the Windows DVD.

Now Intel has published a software to migrate data from a hard drive to Intel solid state drives as well. The Intel Data Migration Software was developed by Acronis for Intel, to offer Intel SSD owners an option to migrate from their old hard drive to the new Intel solid state drive.

The migration tool is limited to migrating to Intel solid state drives, and can only do so if the SSD has at least the same storage size as the source hard drive. The program offers three features:

• Copy drive contents from a hard drive to an Intel Solid-State Drive
• Create a Bootable Rescue Media
• Use the Acronis DriveCleanser to erase data on drives and partitions

The tool supports an automatic mode in which the migration software will handle everything, and a manual mode that gives the user better control over the process. Please note that existing contents on the target Intel SSD will be erased in the process.

Start the Software and Migrate your Data

1. Double-click the Intel Data Migration Software shortcut icon on your desktop.

2. Complete the registration form when prompted.

3. Click Register Now. After registering the software, the Intel Data Migration Software screen will appear. Optional)

4. Click Start Now. The Intel Data Migration Software automatically detects your drives and gives you the option to copy all of your data to your Intel SSD.

The Data Migration software works with Intel SSDs only. If you receive an error message, make sure that you have an Intel SSD connected to your system. If you have an Intel SSD connected to your system and still receive an error message, contact Intel support. The software identifies your SSD and verifies that the used space on your old storage device is the same or smaller than the available space on your SSD Click Clone Now. The data migration process starts. During this process, you will be prompted to reboot your computer.

6. Click Reboot. As your computer reboots, the software loads a pre-operating system where the migration process
continues. View the progress bar to see the status of the data migration. The length of the procedure corresponds to the amount of data on the drive being transferred.

7. Once the operation completes, you are prompted to shut down your computer.

8. Once your computer shuts down, switch the placement of your drives.

Switch your Drives

1. After the data migration onto your new Intel SSD is complete, switch the placement of your old hard disk drive with your new Intel SSD.

For desktop computers, you can either physically remove the old hard disk drive and replace it with your new Intel SSD or keep the hard disk drive in your computer and change the boot order of the drives in the system BIOS . Refer to your computer’s original instructions to determine how to safely switch the SATA positions of your original hard disk drive and new Intel SSD.

For laptop computers, remove the old hard disk drive and replace it with your new Intel SSD. Follow the instructions included with the Intel SSD.

2. After switching your drives, start your computer. A notification that the migration process completed successfully will appear when your operating system starts.

Intel SSD owners can download the Intel Data Migration Software and a pdf with instructions from the Intel Download Center [link]. Intel’s solution is not as sophisticated as Paragon’s. Considering that Paragon Migrate OS To SSD is currently freely available it is suggested to use this software to migrate to a solid state drive. Its core advantages are that it works with all solid state drives, and that it can migrate data to a smaller drive.

Still, some early adopters cannot resist the temptation and buy SSDs, despite their price tag and relatively low storage capacities. Sometimes, users buy a SSD for their old system, with the intention to replace the current hard drive the system is installed on.

Those users face a problem. How can they migrate the operating system from the old hard drive to the new and faster Solid State Drive.

Paragon Migrate OS to SSD offers a solution for those users. The software is currently in testing, and available for all early adopters at the Paragon website. All it takes is to enter some registration information and the product keys and download links will be delivered to the email account entered in the registration form.

After program installation, launch the tool using the program list in Windows start menu, or by clicking the corresponding shortcut on your desktop.

On the wizard welcome screen, read the warning about data on the second disk drive. According to the program logic, all data on this drive will be overwritten by copying data from the source drive. Before you click next, make sure you have saved any important data on the second drive to an outside source.

Clicking the Learn more link in the bottom left corner opens a program tip-window with useful information about the tool.

Click Next>, and the program analyzes the disk configuration of your computer and searches for any system volumes.

In the next screen, you will be presented with possible migration scenarios. You can either agree to perform the operation, or cancel it.

In the next window, specify which files and folders to exclude during migration. This option is very useful if you want to reduce the space you will use on the final partition, or copy the system to a smaller drive than the original one.

After migration, shutdown the computer and remove the source drive. Make the remaining drive bootable in BIOS and restart the computer. Your newly migrated system will boot after the system finishes processing.

Paragon Migrate OS to SSD will detect all operating systems installed on the hard drives automatically, and prompt the user to pick one of the systems that have been discovered.

The user is then asked to pick the target drive for the OS migration, which in this case is the SSD. If the SSD has a larger size than the data on the OS partition all data can be transferred. If the target drive has a lower size then the user is asked to select data that is then excluded from the migration.

Paragon Migrate OS to SSD’s biggest strength is that it is very easy and convenient to use. In addition, users do need a deeper knowledge of partitions and system disks, as this is mostly handled by the program.

Even inexperienced users can migrate an operating system to a SSD with the program comfortably.

Only the Intel SSD Optimizer was included as a management tool in previous versions of the toolbox (see Intel Solid State Drive (SSD) Toolbox for a full review). The latest release however has seen two additions that add to the value of the free software program.

Both the System Configuration Tuner and Secure Eraser are new management tools that have been added in the latest release of Intel’s Solid State Drive Toolbox.

intel solid state drive toolbox

System Configuration Tuner

The tool checks if the system configuration is set for the best performance, endurance and power efficiency with Intel SSDs. The status column indicates if the system is optimized, and will notify the user in red text if it is not. The recommended action in this case is to run the tuner to optimize the system for Intel SSDs.

A click on run displays the settings that are checked by the Intel SSD System Configuration Tuner. A red notification again indicates a setting that can be optimized for SSDs.

The tool detected that Superfetch was enabled on our test system, and recommended to disable it.

intel ssd system configuration tuner

Additionally, the tuner will check if prefetching, Readyboost, DIPM and defragmentation is enabled. A click on Tune It changes the unoptimized settings to suggested ones. On our test system this meant that Superfetch was disabled by the tool.

Secure Erase

Secure erase is the second new tool that has been added to the toolbox. It can unfortunately only be used to erase all data on secondary Intel SSD. This means that the tool cannot be used on bootable SSD, or SSD with a partition.

This limits the use significantly. Only users with multiple solid state drives, or one that they do not longer need will benefit from this.

Verdict

The new tools do not add unique features to the Intel Solid State Drive Toolbox, as it is possible to make the changes manually as well to optimize the system for SSDs. Still, having them available in a tool makes things a lot easier, especially for users who run the tool regularly for its TRIM capabilities.

Intel SSD users who do not use Windows 7 or Linux may want to consider configuring the program to run the TRIM command regularly. And while they are at it, run the system tuner once to optimize their PC for the SSD. Download it here.

Before TRIM, SSDs degraded in performance over time due to the way they handle write operations. Some manufacturers countered this with reset tools, which had to be run regularly to keep the performance at an acceptable level. Finally, some added garbage collection to the controller. This basically meant that the data on the drive would be defragmented, or that the TRIM command would be issued based on the findings of the garbage collection.

Now, the difficulty with TRIM is that it is only supported by Windows 7, Windows Server 2008 R2 and Linux at the moment. Users who do not run those operating systems do not have access to TRIM.

Windows users need to make sure that TRIM is working properly, especially if they notice that the performance of the Solid State Drive seems to drop significantly over time.

We would like to introduce two options to find out if TRIM is enabled in the operating system.

Drive Controller Info

The portable software program performs a scan of all drives and will report if Windows Filesystem Delete Notification (ATA TRIM) is enabled or not. All it takes is to execute the program, wait some seconds for the scan to complete to see the results in the main program interface.

trim windows 7

Drive Controller Info can be downloaded by clicking on this link.

Administrator Command Prompt

The second option requires no third party software. Users need to start a command prompt with elevated rights. This is done by clicking on the start orb, then All Programs, Accessories, right-clicking on Command Prompt and selecting Run as Administrator.

Now execute the command fsutil behavior query DisableDeleteNotify and take a look at the result.

trim enable windows-7

Two results are possible:

• DisableDeleteNotify = 0: This indicates that TRIM is enabled and working on the operating system.
• DisableDeleteNotify = 1: This means that TRIM is not enabled, and that SSDs will therefor not benefit from it.

If TRIM is not active on the system, which can be the case if the SSD has not been properly recognized, if it is to slow or if drivers have not been properly installed.

TRIM can be enabled with a similar command if it is not enabled in Windows 7. To activate TRIM issue the command fsutil behavior set disablenotify 0.

SSDs work differently than platter-based hard drives, especially when it comes to read and write processes on the drive. The most effective way to securely delete platter-based hard drives (overwriting space with data) becomes unusable on SSDs because of their design.

Data on platter-based hard disks can be deleted by overwriting it. This ensures that the data is not recoverable by data recovery tools. This method is not working on SSDs as it is not possible to specify the location to overwrite.

That’s highly problematic for computer users who want to give their computer away or sell it to a third party as data on the SSD could be recovered by the new owner.

Several suggestions have been made on how to delete data on solid state drives permanently. We have decided to test those methods on an old OCZ Core Series II SSD to see how effective they are.

• Delete the files
• Format the SSD
• Encrypt the whole drive
• Issuing a secure erase command with HDDErase

The efficiency of the methods will be tested by running the data recovery software Recuva after each method. An effective method should leave no recoverable files behind.

Test System

• Windows 7 Professional 64-bit
• OCZ Core Series II SSD
• File recovery software Recuva

Deleting the files

This is a direct way to delete files on the Solid State drive. It is the only option in the article that can be used to delete files and folders selectively.

Deleting the files directly in Windows Explorer is not sufficient to protect the data from recovery software. Recuva found almost 100% of the files that have been deleted in Windows Explorer.

delete files directly

Deleting files directly in the operating system is therefor not an option to delete data permanently on solid state drives.

Formatting the Solid State Drive

This is the easiest option as it can be executed directly without additional software requirements. Windows users need to locate the SSD in Windows Explorer, right-click it and select Format from the available options.

format solid state drive

It is important to uncheck the Quick Format option to ensure that all data on the drive will be formatted.

format drive

Windows Explorer does not list any files on the drive after the full format completes.

It is now up to Recuva to find out if files can be restored from the drive after a full format. Recuva is easy to use. All it takes is to select the solid state drive letter and click the scan button. A deep scan is proposed and should be accepted. This scan might take a while depending on the size and speed of the SSD.

ssd file recovery

The scan did find a total of 243 files of which were all ignored and not shown in Recuva. Ignored files are mainly zero byte files, in our case all files that were found were 0-byte files.

The full format did delete all files on the drive with the exception of unrecoverable files. The ignored files that were shown as recoverable had no filename, were all 0 byte files and note recoverable.

Alternative Format Software:

Darik’s Boot and Nuke is an option for users who only have the SSD connected to their computer or use another operating system.

Encrypting the Solid State Drive

Encrypting the whole SSD should in theory be enough to make the files unrecoverable. We have decided to use the encryption software True Crypt to encrypt the Solid State Drive. True Crypt if available for Windows, Linux and Mac.

Here are the steps to encrypt a drive with True Crypt. Click the Create Volume button in the main True Crypt interface. This opens the TrueCrypt volume creation wizard.

true crypt

Encrypt a non-system partition/drive is the option to encrypt a drive other than the system drive. Select standard TrueCrypt volume in the next window and the select device button in the next. Pick the Solid State Drive partition from the list of connected hard drives.

encrypt drive

Selected Create encrypted volume and format it on the next screen, keep the default values in the encryption options on the next screen, click next on the volume size screen and pick a password thereafter. Keep the default settings from that point on by clicking Next whenever available.

A click on the Format button in the end will spawn a warning window in True Crypt stating that all data on the drive will be deleted when the True Crypt volume is created. Continue by selecting “Erase any files stored on the partition by creating a TrueCrypt volume within it”.

true crypt format

True Crypt will then format the drive and display a notification window afterwards stating that the encrypted volume has been created successfully.

Recuva was not able to scan the drive stating that the boot sector of the SSD could not be read. Additional recovery programs were not able to recover files as well. Cautious users could format the drive after it has been encrypted and run the file recovery software afterwards to test the effects. This yielded the same results as the plain drive format did.

Issuing a secure erase command with HDDErase

The secure erase command resets all NAND locations to an erased state which effectively removes all data from the drive. The command is mainly used to restore factory settings of drives that see reduced performance levels over time.

This method is for advanced users only, largely because it requires BIOS configuration and the creation of a boot disk.

HDDErase is one of the tools supporting the secure erase command. The latest version is HDDErase 4 which is not compatible anymore with Intel SSDs. Intel users need to download HDDErase 33 instead.

A bootable disk needs to be created. HDDErase will only work if AHCI is disabled in the computer BIOS.

Secure Erase scans the drive to verify that it supports the command.

sec erase 2

A full walkthrough of the steps required to use HDDErase to securely erase the SSD is available at IISHacks.

No data was recoverable after the secure erase command was issued in DOS.

Recommended method to erase data on solid state drives

Format, encryption and the secure erase command have made the data on the drives unrecoverable. A lot speaks for formatting the Solid State Drive as it is the easiest method of the three. It is usually not necessary to encrypt the data on the drive before formatting it as it yielded the same results as a standard format.

It is highly recommended to test the result with file recovery software to make sure that no data left-overs can be recovered.

Do you know of other methods to delete data on solid state drives permanently? Let us know in the comments.

We have also covered tips to optimize Windows for Solid State Drives in the past which suggested among other things to move caches from the SSD to another drive.

That tip was problematic, especially for users with only SSDs connected to their computer.

A workaround for those users is to use a ram disk for caching purposes. Ram disks, sometimes also called ram drives, are storage devices that use computer memory to store the data.

This is obviously only a feasible alternative if the PC has enough system memory that can be spared for the ram disk. Any PC with three or more Gigabytes of computer memory should be able to run a ram disk for caching purposes.

This article covers the creation of the ram disk and explains how to move the cache from the SSD to the ram disk.

Windows users can select from a variety of Ramdisk applications. We have covered Ramdisk.sys in the past for instance but will use the Dataram Ramdisk software this time.

The free version of the program supports ramdisk up to a size of 4 Gigabytes. This is sufficient for moving the cache to the ram disk and for most other uses as well.

Start the Dataram RAMDisk Configuration Utility after installation. The tool is listed in the Dataram Ramdisk start menu entry.

ramdisk

The ram disk is configured in the Settings tab. The size, file system and boot sector settings can be defined in here. How much memory should you turn into a ram disk? That depends on the memory installed and the required size of the caching directories.. Users with four or more Gigabytes can use at least a One gigabyte disk.

One option to find out how much of the memory can be used is to open the Windows Task Manager by pressing Ctrl-Shift-Esc, switch to the performance tab and look at the physical memory section. Using half of the ram under the available section is usually a safe bet.

The file system can either be Fat16 or Fat32. Users who prefer NTFS or another file system need to select unformatted and format the disk in Windows after it has been created.

A click on Start RAMDisk will create the disk and assign a free drive letter to it.

ram disk

The f: drive in the screenshot above is the newly created ram disk.

The second step of the process is to configure the applications and operating system to make use of the ram disk by changing the cache directories to a location on the new ramdrive.

We give examples for the Windows temporary file folders, Firefox and Internet Explorer caches.

Windows Temporary Folders

The Windows temp directories are stored in the system’s environment variables. The easiest way to open the configuration window is by pressing Windows-Pause on the keyboard and selecting Advanced System Settings from the sidebar of the window that opens.

Locate the Advanced tab in System Properties and click on Environmental Variables. Here we have user variables and system variables.

environment variables

Candidates here are for instance the TEMP and TMP system and user variables. They can be edited by selecting each one of them and clicking on Edit. Simply enter the new path in the variable value field and leave the variable name as it is.

changing windows temp folder

Changing Firefox Cache

Open the Firefox web browser and type in about:config in the Firefox address bar. Enter browser.cache.disk.parent_directory in the filter field and double-click the parameter.

Now enter a location on the ram disk to make Firefox use that as the caching folder.

firefox cache location

Internet Explorer Cache

Open Microsoft’s Internet Explorer and click on Tools > Internet Options. The Internet Options are also accessible from the Windows Control Panel.

Click on Settings next to browsing history in the General tab and on Move Folder in the next window to move the temporary Internet Files folder to the ram disk.

temporary internet files

There is another benefit of using a ram disk for caching locations. The ram disk will automatically be cleared on shutdown which makes recovery of those caching files afterwards impossible (unless a snapsnot of the ram is taken shortly after shutdown).

Solid State Drives benefit from the reduced write operations and it might even speed up some operations marginally.

The second feature or process is usually referred to as Garbage Collection. This basically optimized the Solid State Drive again for write processes.

The Intel Solid State Drive Toolbox is a Windows software program that can be used to optimize and analyze Intel SSDs that are installed in the computer system. It supports running regular optimizations that make use of the above concepts to retain the drive’s performance over time. It can furthermore be used to view drive information, check the Solid State Drive’s SMART attributes and run a fast and full diagnostic scan on the selected drive.

The drive information for instance display the drive’s firmware version, model and serial number which can be used prior to upgrading the SSD’s firmware if a newer version is available on the Intel website.

The most important feature is however the SSD optimizer which computer users need to run regularly (Intel recommends once a week) to retain the drive’s performance. The weekly runs can be scheduled in the program which will later be added to the Windows Task Scheduler.

The Intel Solid State Drive Toolbox is a must have program for computer owners with an Intel SSD. It can be downloaded from the Intel website

Both components vary highly depending on the needs of the user building the PC. A gamer naturally wants a fast video card to play games, someone who collects photos or videos needs lots of storage and Office worker a quiet video card.

Build your own PC: Storage

Storage devices are hard drives and optical drives. Hard drives can be divided into the two categories Solid State Drives (SSD) and conventional hard drives.

There are basically two options for selecting hard drives:

• Pick only conventional hard drives
• Combine conventional and solid state drives

Conventional hard drives have the advantage that they provide more storage for a cheaper price than Solid State Drives. Solid State Drives on the other hand are more expensive, offer way less storage but are way faster than convention drives. This is beneficial during system boot, playing games or loading applications.

The PC budget plays a big role in deciding the storage components. A good reliable Solid State Drive sells for about $250 for 64 Gigabytes of storage. Good conventional hard drives provide more than ten times the storage for that price.

PC users with a budget of about $400 for hard drives can consider combining Solid State Drives and conventional hard drives. The SSD would be used for the operating system and important applications (or games) whereas the standard hard drive would be used for storage.

Users with a lower budget should concentrate on buying a good fast hard drive instead that will be used for all files and the operating system.

When buying a Solid State Drive buyers need to make sure that it supports TRIM and garbage collection either out of the box or with a firmware update. TRIM and garbage collection ensure that the performance of the drive does not drop over time. This was a huge problem with first generation SSDs.

Hard drives come with speeds of 5400 and 7200. The former are more quiet while the latter are faster. A user who only works with light applications could consider buying a 5400 rpm drive whereas gamers or users with high end applications should buy a 7200 rpm drive.

The best combination at this point in time is to use a SSD as the boot drive and a 5400 rpm hard drive for storage.

Our Picks

• SSD: Intel X25-M Mainstream SSDSA2M080G2R5 80 GB ($300)
• Hard Drive: Samsung EcoGreen F3 2000GB SATA II 32MB ($200)

The Intel X25-M is one of the fastest SSD when it comes to read speeds. The write speeds are usually lower in benchmarks but better in real life situations. It also offers 80 Gigabytes instead of 64 Gigabytes that most SSDs offer in that price range. It supports both TRIM and garbage collection.

The Samsung EcoGreen F3 is a drive with a speed of 5400. It has slower access and read speeds but offers 2 Terabytes of storage space. It is used to store everything but the most important applications, games and the operating system.

Build your own PC: Video Card

Selecting the right video cards usually depend on the level of gaming activity on the PC. We currently would suggest to buy an Ati Radeon 5000er video card as it is the only video card series currently supporting DirectX 11.

Gamers need to look at the Radeon 5850 or 5870 video cards for optimal performance. The selection here again depends on the budget. The Radeon 5870 retails for about $400, the 5850 for about $300. The 5870 is the faster card of the two and manages to beat the 5750 by 10fps+ in all benchmarks. Both cards can be used to play all modern games just fine.

Casual gamers might want to take a look at the ATI Radeon 5770 video card instead which retails for about $180.

Our Picks:

• High End Gaming: Sapphire Radeon HD 5870 Vapor-X ($440)
• Mid Level Gaming: ASUS EAH5850/2DIS/1GD5 Radeon HD 5850 ($300)
• Casual / No Gaming: POWERCOLOR PCS+ AX5770 ($170)

Our PC System:

Case: Lian Li PC-8NB ($100)
PSU: Enermax Modu 87+ 700W ($200)
CPU: Intel Core i7-860 ($300)
CPU Cooler: Prolimatech Megahalems Rev.B CPU Cooler ($60), 120mm fan, for example be quiet Silent Wings USC (BL013) ($20)
Motherboard: GIGABYTE GA-P55-USB3 ($120)
RAM: CORSAIR XMS3 8GB (4 x 2GB) 240-Pin DDR3 ($270)
Hard Drive 1: SSD: Intel X25-M Mainstream SSDSA2M080G2R5 80 GB ($300)
Hard Drive 2: Samsung EcoGreen F3 2000GB SATA II 32MB ($200)
Video Card: High End Gaming: Sapphire Radeon HD 5870 Vapor-X ($440)

Some components have not been discussed yet. This includes optical drives, keyboard, computer mouse, monitor, printer, sound adapter, network cards and other peripherals.

FlashFire is a software program for Windows XP, Windows Vista and Windows 7 that can speed up computer systems with SSDs noticeably. The description on the developer’s website is a bit vague. FlashFire seems to make use of computer memory to speed up random writes of a connected SSD. Probably something comparable to a RAM disk.

The good news is that the software works. It works that well that the performance gain is very noticeable after installation of the software and a reboot of the system. There is another aspect that is kinda confusing. Some users state that they have a icon in the system tray upon startup. Some users on the other hand say they do not. This apparently depends on the version of the software program. There are two things that users need to know: Flashfire needs to be started with parameters and settings can only be changed in the Windows Registry.

To start Flashfire a user would use the command flashfire.exe on to turn it on or flashfire x where x is the drive number that the program should speed up. Users who use flashfire.exe on have to make sure that a SSD is the configured drive in the Registry. They need to navigate to

HK_Local_Machine\SYSTEM\CurrentControlSet\Services\ffire\Enum

and check the drive number of the Solid State Drive there. They then need to navigate to

HK_Local_Machine\SYSTEM\CurrentControlSet\Services\ffire\Parameters

and make sure that drive number is the value of the Disknum key. Flashfire can be turned off easily by issuing the command flashfire.exe off. Several users reported great success with Flashfire on Asus EEEPCs with Solid State Drives. Flashfire can be downloaded from the developer’s website.

Their biggest downfall besides the price is the write speed which can be low. So low that it will slow down the computer system when data is written on that drive. Many programs, including web browsers, email programs, editors but also the operating system itself cache data on the hard drive or use the hard drive to store temporary data. That’s a problem if the cache folder of that application is located on the Solid State.

What can be done to speed up the overall computer system?

• Move the temp folders of the operating system to another hard drive.
• Move the pagefile and System Restore locations to another hard drive
• Move the cache of applications to another hard drive, e.g. web browsers, email clients.
• Disable programs that access the hard drive and that are not needed, like Windows Indexing Service
• Upgrade the computer memory of the computer system (only makes sense if sub 4 Gigabybtes on a 32-bit system)

Most of these tips center around moving the cache to a new hard drive and disabling features that slow down the computer system. If you cannot install a second hard drive to the computer system you might consider adding a fast external device that can be used for caching. The downside of this method is that you need to have it near the computer system all the time which can be annoying if the system is mostly used on the road.

Newer Solid State Drives (check the OCZ Vertex review for instance) are slowly introduced that beat conventional hard drives fair and square both in write and read performance. They come at a price though but this is going to change in the future. Prices will drop, capacities increase and the slower SSD will slowly cease to exist.

This in effect means that all methods of overwriting free space are not sufficient for erasing the data securely on those drives. This also means as well that it is not possible to erase specific files securely on the SSD. Users who want to delete data securely on SSDs have therefor the following options at hand:

• Encryption
• Format
• Filling the Drive

Encryption is surely the best method of ensuring that the data on a SSD is secure as it cannot be accessed without decryption. Formatting the drive on the other hand is only reasonable if no data on that drive is needed anymore. It would otherwise require extensive backup and restoration procedures. Filling the drive with data might work as well as it would overwrite anything on the drive as well.