[travist]

So I know there are plenty of questions on here about SSD drives in your HTPC, but after searching I can't decide what the better option is for my case.

I have an ION-based mobo running openelec right now. XBMC runs off a CF card which is in a CF-SATA converter, and plugged into the integrated SATA controller. The CF card is a Transcend (cheap). Media is stored on a NAS on a gigabit network.

Problem is, menus lag in XBMC, and I would like to improve the performance. I know that my local storage on the XBMC is causing the problems. I can't decide whether upgrading the CF card to a higher performance one is the best option, or if I should drop some $$ on the smallest SSD I can find and install the even smaller OS on there and call it good. I also don't want to do this twice. I was pretty much set on just getting the SSD, but I keep reading that some CF cards can perform much better than the one I have.

SSD or CF? Any recommended model #'s of either?

[GortWillSaveUs]

I'd recommend going with a SSD and preferably this one. Patriot Memory Torqx 2 Series 32 GB SATA II 3.0 Gb-s 2.5-Inch Solid State Drive PT232GS25SSDR

That is to say, if you're looking for a small sized one,..but for another $40 you can quadruple the size of the drive to 120G

[wsume99]

Are you sure that this is a storage problem? If you are running a heavy skin then it could be your ATOM CPU (I'm assuming that is the case if you're using an ION-based MB).

[teaguecl]

I run an Atom with SSD. I don't notice any lag in Confluence, though I am not very particular about such things. If as you state your problem is storage speed, you can eliminate that all together by PXE booting your machine. No local storage, everything comes from the network and executes (very quickly) from RAM. If the problem is not storage speed, then maybe try playing with the "dirty rectangles" setting.
http://wiki.xbmc.org/index.php?title=Dirty_regions

I didn't really notice any difference, but again I'm not very picky about this area.
I would try the cheap/free options and see what you think before spending on something that might not help. Of course, a small SSD is getting pretty affordable these days...

[travist]

I really think that the problem is storage related, but the p e boot option may be a way to verify that. Otherwise, that 32gb SSD is a good pricepoint, so I may go with that one.

I'm running the confluence skin right now. Is there a better one to try?

For the pxe boot, is there a software recommendation for that? Don't think my NAS does that out of the box.

Thanks

[aptalca]

Same Torqx is $39.99 after rebate here

Comes in and out of stock though. I snatched one a few weeks back, no problems so far.

Here is the 64GB version at $64.99 after rebate and in stock (this was $44.99 after rebate recently but I missed it)

[Kirky99]

I was running an Atom with an SSD and was very happy running some of the heavier skins (Aeon MQ2 at the time). I was also running that machine under Win7. An SSD should make a noticeable difference.

You may also want to play with moving your database to a central server and maybe even your image cache.