A WINNING COMBO FOR ULTIMATE SPEED
WELL, THAT DIDN’T TAKE LONG. SSDs may feel as though they’ve just arrived, but they’ve actually been with us for a few years now—although far fewer than the venerable hard drive. But now it seems they are approaching the end of their useful lives. Why?
The problem is the Serial ATA interface. Manufacturers have figured out that people want faster storage. Intel, in particular, relies on higher processing demands to continue justifying its CPUs. If usage and applications don’t demand more power, then there won’t be anything new to sell. And so, SATA is looking like it’s on its way out.
Hitting a theoretical maximum of 6Gb/s, SATA hasn’t improved at all. Sure, there was a brief appearance of SATA Express, but let’s be realistic: it’s a dud. What’s in is PCI Express, and that’s where SSDs are headed—new NVMe SSDs, to be exact. They’re significantly faster than SATA SSDs, physically smaller, and are approaching the same capacities as SATA SSDs. Personally, I’m all in for NVMe, but I’ll wait until 1TB hits mainstream. For now, it’s still safe to add a SATA SSD drive to your system, but if you’re in the market for a new PC, it’s in your best interests to go NVMe, especially for your boot drive. Windows boot times will be much faster, as will your apps.
If that’s not enough, and you’re a stickler about speed, there’s more youou can do with Windows to speed thingsgs up, especially if you’re willing to use the he command line. Windows 10’s commandnd line interface (CLI) is far more powerfulul than in previous versions of Windows. Microsoft is taking a Linux-like approach to the CLI. You can get a lot of things done quickly by just typing instead of mouse-poking around, including running your own customized scripts. It’s a powerful tool that all serious PC users should know about. We show you how to familiarize yourself and compute like a pro in the CLI this issue.
If you feel like the Windows CLI is for beginners, well, the only way to go is Ubuntu. Long-time readers will know that us folks here use both Windows and Ubuntu. Some of us even swear by it. Me, I’ve used Ubuntu before, but primarily for running servers. Any flavor of Linux was born as a server operating system first, even though there are mainstream desktop flavors.
Ubuntu has been a crowd favorite. It gets the most updates, has the widest range of application support, and supports the widest range of hardware. If you want rock-solid stability and support, though, you’ll want Ubuntu LTS—longterm support. Ubuntu LTS won’t have the most recent gizmos, but it does have thoroughly tested drivers, software, and modules. Ubuntu LTS stays on a specific Linux kernel version for longer than usual. If you’re brave enough to try, you can even install it without a graphical user interface. Command line that!
While you’re at it, install Ubuntu on to that new NVMe SSD. Talk about speed! Tu an Nguyen is Maximum PC’s editor-inchief, also known as“the pointy end of the stick .” He’ s been writing, marketing, and raising hell in the te chi nd us try for 19 years.