2011 Mac Mini - Is SSD worth it?

Well, there's this:http://www.pcworld.com/businesscenter/article/213442/solid_state_drives_no_better_than_others_survey_says.html
and this:http://www.zdnet.com/blog/storage/ssds-no-more-reliable-than-hard-drives/1483

I tried to find a link to a thread, here, on Audiogon, where someone who's expertise is in SSDs and the like went on to state that SSDs are not any more reliable or quieter since a HD can be insulated to where noise is not a factor.

I personally don't know what is true but would like to hear from someone who has some extensive dealings with both.

All the best,
Nonoise

04-06-12: Nonoise
I tried to find a link to a thread, here, on Audiogon, where someone who's expertise is in SSDs and the like went on to state that SSDs are not any more reliable or quieter since a HD can be insulated to where noise is not a factor.

As far as acoustical noise is concerned, as opposed to electrical noise which was what was addressed in the earlier posts by me and some of the others, I don't think that any meaningful generalizations can be drawn. An HDD model that is inherently quieter than average, and that has low rotational speed, and is mounted via rubber washers or other vibration absorbent means on a rigid non-resonant case structure that has minimal openings to the outside, will be pretty much totally silent. A high speed high performance HDD that is not so mounted will be noisy. An SDD will provide much higher speed than any desktop or laptop HDD while generating no acoustical noise.

Concerning reliability, the jury is probably still out on SDD's, but IMO if an HDD or an SDD contains important material it should be assumed that it can fail at any time. My practice is to back up data files daily, and to create an image of the entire operating system drive every few weeks. That avoids the necessity of having to install and set up all of the software from scratch if the drive has to be replaced.

Best regards,
-- Al

Al,

You're the voice of reason with the patience of Job. It must be trying dealing with us mere mortals:-)

All kidding aside, I'm finally getting the gist of what you're saying about all the internal noise that goes on inside anything electric. One would think that it would be one of the issues manufacturers consider and deal with but alas, building to a price point would preclude that, to a degree.

All the best,
Nonoise

My understanding is when using an app like Amarra, Pure Music, and Audirvana your music will be loaded into memory first, thus making the point of ssd moot (at least in regards to music playback).

This thread is a good reference,
http://forum.audiogon.com/cgi-bin/fr.pl?icomp&1325426864