Re: Solid State Disk to boost Mathematica performance
- To: mathgroup at smc.vnet.net
- Subject: [mg129537] Re: Solid State Disk to boost Mathematica performance
- From: Szabolcs Horvát <szhorvat at gmail.com>
- Date: Mon, 21 Jan 2013 00:09:22 -0500 (EST)
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Hi, The short answer is no, it won't boost Mathematica's performance for most computation. The longer answer is that the Mathematica kernel doesn't need to access the disk a lot (unless you explicitly ask it to write/read things to/from disk), and its speed it mainly limited by your CPU. Where the SSD will make a noticeable difference in Mathematica is browsing the documentation centre. Help pages will load faster in my experience. It will also significantly speed up the startup of many programs and will reduce the boot time of your OS, so it may be a worthwhile upgrade On 2013-01-20 06:25:24 +0000, E. Martín-Serrano said: > Hi all, > > I am thinking of installing a 256 GB Solid State Disk (SSD) on my machine to > increase its performance. > > The current configuration of my machine is: 4 cores (8 threads), 3,4 GHz; > with 12 GB DD3-RAM, NVIDIA GeForce GT 400 (3 GB integrated RAM) and 4 TB > Internal HD. It is not a small machine, I think. > > The Solid State Disk (SSD) would hold the operating system (Windows 8) and > Mathematica (currently v8); plus some half a dozen of other "mission > critical" programs. > > Anyway, the true actual candidates to reside in the SSD are Windows 8 and > Mathematica, but I wonder whether it is going to really boost the > performance of Mathematica considering that the machine already has 12 GB of > RAM. > > But I do not know how Mathematica deals with the kernel and the fronted > (their interaction), in other words, whether the kernel uses de internal HD > to interact with the kernel and vice versa. > > I use intensively and extensively dynamics constructs, and in many occasions > the dynamic refreshing uses Solve, NSolve and, in occasions NDSolve and > DSolve, within the second parameter to Dynamic. In any case, with or without > solving (always small) systems of equations, moving graphical objects tied > to dynamic locators remains an unsolvable issue to me. > > In summary, my question is whether the SSD holding windows and Mathematica > would bust in any form Mathematica's performance. > > Kind regards > > E. Martin-Serrano > > > ___________________________________________________________________ > This e-mail and the documents attached are confidential and intended solely > for the addressee; it may also be privileged. If you receive this e-mail in > error, please notify the sender immediately and destroy it. As its integrity > cannot be secured on the Internet, E. MartEDn-Serrano liability cannot be > triggered for the message content. Although the sender endeavors to maintain > a computer virus-free network, the sender does not warrant that this > transmission is virus-free and will not be liable for any damages resulting > from any virus transmitted. > > Este mensaje y los ficheros adjuntos pueden contener informaci=F3n > confidencial destinada solamente a la(s) persona(s) mencionadas > anteriormente y pueden estar protegidos por secreto profesional, y en > cualquier caso el mensaje en su totalidad est=E1 amparado y protegido por la > legislaci=F3n vigente que preserva el secreto de las comunicaciones, y > por la > legislaci=F3n espa=F1ola de protecci=F3n de datos de car=E1cter > personal. Si usted > recibe este correo electr=F3nico por error, gracias por informar > inmediatamente al remitente y destruir el mensaje. Al no estar asegurada la > integridad de este mensaje sobre la red, E. Mart=EDn-Serrano no se hace > responsable por su contenido. Su contenido no constituye ning=FAn compromiso > para el remitente, salvo ratificaci=F3n escrita por ambas partes. Aunque se > esfuerza al m=E1ximo por mantener su red libre de virus, el emisor no puede > garantizar nada al respecto y no ser=E1 responsable de cualesquiera da=F1os que > puedan resultar de una transmisi=F3n de virus.