Dear clients
While you know that I am not in the computer business, I am an IT specialist with vast experience in the IT world, and I keep up to date with the latest developments in the world of technology.
One such development is in the development of Solid State Drives (SSD from here on)
I have been following the development of the SSD for some time, and have observed their cost and capabilities, and am using the technology myself.
In brief, an SSD is a solid-state hard drive, which can replace your existing hard drive which is slowing down with age.
SSD is nothing new to you, everyone uses USB flash drives, and it is the same technology, except that it is much larger in capacity, and has intricate controlling technology to manage your data.
Your hard drive (HHD) consists of spinning magnetic disks, with arms and heads which whizz around to access the data on the drive.
An SSD consists of micro chips, with no moving mechanisms.
Now Windows is an operating system that runs entirely from the hard disk, while processing applications in it’s memory. HDD technology is slow, power-consuming, and susceptible to crashes through age or shock.
SSD is lightning fast, uses very little power (think improved battery life) and is not susceptible to crashes or shock.
The benefits of replacing your HDD with an SSD are immediately obvious: Lightning fast startup time, program loading time, rejuvenation of your sluggish PC, longer battery life, less risk through shock and disk crashes.
A very fractional percent of SSD’s can fail, as with any hardware component, but this failure rate is infinitely smaller than HDD failures. An SSD will also start degrading in about 5 years time, when it should be replaced.
So an upgrade to SSD if you haven’t done so for your elderly computer is a no-brainer. Most new laptops have SSD’s in them already, it allows the manufacturers to get away with lower computer specs in other areas.
The figures we’re looking at here are 10x better speed, and 3x less power consumption.
I am offering an SSD upgrade to my clients as a once-off exercise, if you are in the situation of having an elderly computer – laptop or desktop, that runs on an HDD, is getting slower all the time due to fragmentation and simply age – the HDD degrades with age.
I am doing this already for quite a few clients, with fantastic results, people are loving their PC’s again. My process is the following:
1) Purchase the SSD according to the size of your existing HDD. The cost is around R540 for a 500Gb drive, double that for 1Tb.
2) I install a special hard drive cloning program on your computer and create an exact clone of your hard drive.
3) I then replace the old HDD with your new SSD, and start up the computer.
4) I then perform a detailed test of the entire computer, all your programs and features.
5) The old HDD is returned to you as a backup.
6) I then perform a complete test and cleanup of your computer, hardware, software, and the physical appearance.
7) I return the computer to you for your testing and sign-off.
This process takes me around 5-10 hours. I will charge you for three man-hours (2 x R380). All your software licenses remain active, this is an exact clone. Do not use your old hard drive in another computer or the licenses will clash.
Of course a PC shop can do this for you, but I offer you the personal care, and thorough cleanup.
The total cost of the upgrade is thus R760 + the cost of the SSD
Thus, if you have an elderly computer and have been considering a purchase of a new computer, an SSD upgrade of around R2000 will give the same results as purchasing a new laptop for say R10K to R15K (or higher for higher spec)
I have a small queue of customers’ upgrades already, please let me know if you would like to have this upgrade done, and I’ll add you to my list, and arrange a time to collect your computer.
Kind regards
Ian