Will an SSD make much of a difference to LR on my aging laptop?

EspressoJunkie

EspressoJunkie

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Greg
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My laptop is a good few years old (a Packard Bell i5-2450m,8gb ram) but it's always been alright for processing individual photos with Adobe Camera Raw.

However I've recently started using D750s and Lightroom for larger quantities of pictures and I'm finding that it's taking its tole speed wise. Not to the point where I can't work but it's just slow.

I do plan to get a new computer at some point in the next while but I can't afford it now (spent all my money on camera stuff......).

I know SSDs are meant to be great and the prices now make them pretty affordable,but would one make any difference to how LR runs or is it purely dependant and RAM (which is at the maximum) and processor?
 
A new SSD has transformed my Dell i5 16gb ram laptop - everything loads fantastically quickly and processing with Photoshop is a breeze, (D7200 & D810).
 
It should do, but best to check the height and the sata bus that is supported by your laptop. That could be a limiting factor.
 
An SSD will speed up loading programs and startup and make the whole PC seem much zippier but it will not make a great difference to the speed of programs - that is dependent on the processor, RAM and the actual program - also of course using a 64bit OS.

A better move would be to increase the RAM to 16GB - but since that is not possible the only other way is another machine.

I'm assuming of course that you do not have loads of other programs running in the background.
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TBH installing a SSD has made far more difference to mine than did doubling the ram from 8-16gb.
 
Lightroom doesn't need much RAM but does need a good CPU.

An SSD for a scratch disc will also help and an SSD for your progs. will definitely make your laptop feel faster.
 
Do you have the model number of your laptop?
I've been trying to confirm it supports SATA3 in order to give you higher read/write speeds.

What size is your current disk and how much of it is used?
 
The model (I think) is a TS11HR or something like that. Current HDD is 750GB but only about 200GB is used. The computer is plugged into an external display and is literally only used for PS/LR and a bit of browsing so there's not a lot else on it.

I do realise that a new machine is really what I need but I'm thinking that if I do buy an SSD now that at least it could be used in a new PC down the line.
 
I believe it is SATA 3. So you should get plenty of performance from an SSD. Memory is already maxed out though @ 8 Gig
 
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