SRT and the Z68 motherboard? Is it worth it? [closed]

Question

I'm looking at building a new PC - mostly for programming and power use but for the occasional high end game as well. I've set my budget to be right around 1K$, and I've decided to go with an i5 sandybridge...

My question is:

Are the Z68 motherboards the best choice for an i5? I'm really interested in the SRT technology but am a little skeptical. Does anyone know if this tech works really well, or is it a gimmick? I'm looking specifically at the Gigabyte line of Z68 MOBO's. If you would recommend SRT- What would be the best SSD ~<100$ to use?

Also- Is it possible to use an SSD as the boot drive, and have a secondary mechanical drive enhanced by a 2nd SSD in SRT mode?

Thanks for all your help!

Answer 1

As for the SRT technology, I havent seen to many reviews of performance. From what I have read, there will be some performance gained, as well as lost.

Read times will decrease. As blocks get cached to the SSD, their read times will decrease significantly. However, write times will increase. Now this isnt a bad thing, since you spend a large amount of time reading rather than writing to disk - especially when it comes to gaming. Load times for everything will decrease and everything will feel faster. However, the gameplay itself might not feel any different once the loading is finished.

The question is whether or not the performance gained is worth the cost. That question comes down to personal opinion. My opinion is that if the motherboard is in your budget, and your need for faster loading times is high, then there is no reason not to bo with SRT.