workflow with photos in SSD -> RAID

Heya all

I recently upgraded my pc finally to an i7 2600K. LOVE LOVE LOVE. The best part about it is that my windows OS (and lightroom) is on the SSD drive and things are just SO snappy fast (especially bootup time).

My catalog and photos are on a eSata RAID (mirroring) at the moment ... but
I'm wondering if anyone is using SSD for lightroom catalog + photos as well? I'm thinking doing this will also speed up lightroom environment (especially Develop module?)

only problem is, SSD is small so it wont last too long.... anyone have a working flow using SSD as "temp" area and then move it to main RAID setup later on? seeems super tedious but the editing speed is worth it?

datadump wrote in post #12367518
anyone have a working flow using SSD as "temp" area and then move it to main RAID setup later on? seeems super tedious but the editing speed is worth it?

I have an SSD and a single data drive. I use the SSD for Windows, Program Files and the LR catalog. If I'm working on a large batch of files then I'll also transfer them to the SSD for processing, then move them (from within LR) to the HDD once I'm done.

I did a test to time profile generation on the SSD and the HDD and the SSD was quite a bit faster (surprisingly so as I'd assumed it would be processor-limited). It doesn't add much to the workflow time. Importing to SSD can only be faster than HDD. And the transfer from SSD to HDD when processing is over can be started and left to run on its own.

The more steps, the more opportunity to screw something up. KISS.

A fast HDD is quite good at sequential read and write speeds, or "good enough" for photo/video stuff. Which is what you'll be doing throwing a bunch of RAW files on it. Where they suck is random reads/writes, SSD is so much faster there that it's not even funny.

SSD would be a lot (noticeably) faster, but imho i'd use a good HDD for data storage and use the SSD for apps/OS/page file/cache/etc. Now, if you have the $$$, then sure, by all means grab some 256gb ssds and roll with it for photo/video storage, just make backups. But for most I think the sweet spot is a 64 or 128gb SSD + hdd or two or three for media storage.

Everything i've read, including some experiments by a very technical photographer, says put your RAW files on a fast spinning drive, and the cache on the SSD. Hard drives deliver data just as quickly as most SSDs, it's just the latency that SSDs win at right now. Latency for getting the raw images isn't so important. Latency for getting the little previews from the cache is important.

btw cache is not the same as catalog in LR, afaik.

Lightroom stores previews in two different ways and places -- the "normal" previews are stored in the Catalog folder, but the full-size used in the Develop module are stored in the Camera Raw Cache (which it shares with Camera Raw if you have it).

tim wrote in post #12371418
Everything i've read, including some experiments by a very technical photographer, says put your RAW files on a fast spinning drive, and the cache on the SSD. Hard drives deliver data just as quickly as most SSDs, it's just the latency that SSDs win at right now. Latency for getting the raw images isn't so important. Latency for getting the little previews from the cache is important.

btw cache is not the same as catalog in LR, afaik.

interesting.

so the setting here: http://www.pixiq.com/a​rticle/camera-raw-cache
point that to an SSD?

datadump wrote in post #12374926
interesting.

so the setting here: http://www.pixiq.com/a​rticle/camera-raw-cache
point that to an SSD?

Yep, I have that ACR cache and also the bridge cache on an SSD. Some time i'll do some testing with both SSDs, caches on one and images on another. Someone could test with the LR catalog on an SSD, but they get pretty big, so you'd probably want to offload them after processing.

I doubt that the SSD is much faster for just reading and writing plain picture files than a HD with nothing else going on on the HD.

As mentioned above, shuffling is risky. I would try to avoid it.

uOpt wrote in post #12379126
I doubt that the SSD is much faster for just reading and writing plain picture files than a HD with nothing else going on on the HD.

As mentioned above, shuffling is risky. I would try to avoid it.

SSDs only help when you're loading lots of small files rapidly, such as loading the OS or reading thumbnails from a cache. Hard drives have a lot more latency, but their transfer speeds are as good or better than SSDs.

tim wrote in post #12379280
SSDs only help when you're loading lots of small files rapidly, such as loading the OS or reading thumbnails from a cache. Hard drives have a lot more latency, but their transfer speeds are as good or better than SSDs.

Not really anymore, the best one now beat HDs and raid1 only helps random seeks, not contiguous transfers.

Still, I question whether writing or reading a photoshop file (jpg or ps) will be much different in practice and worth the risk of shuffling.

uOpt wrote in post #12379572
Not really anymore, the best one now beat HDs and raid1 only helps random seeks, not contiguous transfers.

Still, I question whether writing or reading a photoshop file (jpg or ps) will be much different in practice and worth the risk of shuffling.

True, my point was hard disks are still pretty good for transferring large files

In practical terms I find SSDs great for fast booting and for cache, I haven't tried it for much else.

I have 2600k OC @ 4.6ghz, sabertooth, 8gb ram. 128GB SSD and 4x2TB in raid 10 for storage. I have PS5 and it open up in 3 seconds. Working with photos is no problem. each raw file is 21mb. To open 21mb file take less than a second from memory card or any spindal HDD. My raided Sata III 6gb/s HDD rated 180mb/s read/write and Sata III SSD rated 410mb read and 210 write. Any single Sata II 3gb/s HDD will give you atleast 30-60mb/s write. So I wouldnt worry too much about editing any photos with your setup.

Note: First generation SSD are slower than spindal HDD but now newer SSD suppass spindal HDD. SSD are faster than any spindal HDDs. Spindal HDD have spin up and Seek time, SSD almost have none. Transfer rate with newer SSD are alot faster than ANY Spindal HDD.
Sata II 3gb/s spindal HDD @ 5400rpm does NOT mean you get to transfer at 3gb/s. Sata II at best constant transfer will give you 30-50mb/s
Example. My Sata III 7200rpm 6gb/s raid 1+0 rated only 180mb/s (raided!). SSD Sata III 6gb/s is 410mb/s read and 230m/s write.

Startup time for the OS or PS is really irrelevant most of the time. Most people start the PC once a day, and start PS once or at most a few times a day. Once it's been started once it's cached in ram anyway, so would start quickly unless huge memory usage kicks it out of the cache.

remember that SSDs are much less reliable than HDDs so have a good and regular backup.