Solid state hard drives (SSHD) and solid state drives (SSD) are two types of high speed storage devices. Both offer faster performance than traditional hard disk drives (HDD), but is one clearly better in terms of speed? Let’s take a closer look at how SSHD and SSD work to see if there is a definitive winner when it comes to speed.
What is an SSHD?
A solid state hybrid drive (SSHD) contains both a traditional hard disk drive (HDD) and a small solid state drive (SSD). The SSD component, which ranges from 8GB to 32GB, serves as a cache or buffer for frequently accessed data. The HDD provides a much larger storage capacity than a pure SSD could offer for the same price. When you access data that is stored on the SSD portion of the SSHD, you can get SSD-like performance. Data requests that can’t be handled directly from the SSD cache fall back to the traditional HDD.
What is an SSD?
A solid state drive contains no moving mechanical parts – it uses flash memory chips rather than spinning platters to store data. Because there are no moving parts, SSDs provide much faster data transfer speeds and lower latency than traditional HDDs. SSDs also offer better reliability and run silently with lower power consumption. While HDDs will always have a place for mass storage needs due to higher capacities and lower costs, SSDs excel in performance, especially for things like boot drives or high performance storage.
SSHD vs SSD Speed Comparison
Let’s dig into some speed test comparisons between SSHDs and SSDs to get a clear picture of how they stack up.
Sequential read and write speeds
One of the standard ways to measure storage performance is by using tools like CrystalDiskMark to test sequential read and write speeds. Sequential transfers involve accessing large chunks of contiguous data, like reading large files. SSDs have an inherent advantage here because they have no seek time – data can be accessed instantly from anywhere in the flash storage. HDDs and SSHDs are limited by the time it takes for the read/write head to move into position over the requested data.
Here are some sample sequential read/write results for popular SSHD and SSD models:
| Drive Type | Model | Sequential Read | Sequential Write |
|---|---|---|---|
| SSHD | Seagate FireCuda 1TB | 153 MB/s | 149 MB/s |
| SSD | Samsung 860 EVO 1TB | 550 MB/s | 520 MB/s |
| SSD | WD Blue 1TB | 545 MB/s | 525 MB/s |
The SSDs show over 3X higher sequential throughput compared to the SSHD. Even budget SSDs easily outpace the best SSHDs when it comes to maximum sequential transfer rates.
Random read and write speeds
More impactful for real world usage is measuring random access performance. This looks at how fast the drive can access small pieces of data located in random places across the disk. Responsiveness for loading apps, opening files, and booting your system depends heavily on random I/O speed.
The SSD portion of an SSHD gives it an advantage over a pure HDD for random access. But again, a full SSD still performs far better as shown in these sample 4K random read/write results:
| Drive Type | Model | 4K Random Read | 4K Random Write |
|---|---|---|---|
| SSHD | Seagate FireCuda 1TB | 37 MB/s | 59 MB/s |
| SSD | Samsung 860 EVO 1TB | 98 MB/s | 88 MB/s |
| SSD | WD Blue 1TB | 95 MB/s | 112 MB/s |
The SSDs provide 2-3X higher random read and write throughput compared to the SSHD. Faster random I/O translates directly into a more responsive computing experience.
Real world performance differences
Looking beyond just synthetic benchmarks, how do these speed differences actually impact real world use? Here are some examples:
Boot times
Using an SSD or SSHD as your boot drive can make a huge difference in how quickly your system can start up and become usable. SSHDs will provide some improvement over an HDD, but SSDs load even faster. For example, testing shows Windows 10 booting in:
- HDD drive – 27 seconds
- SSHD drive – 15 seconds
- SSD drive – 11 seconds
The SSD booted over 2X faster than the HDD and 35% faster than the SSHD.
Game loading
Gamers will appreciate the speed advantage of SSDs and SSHDs for loading games from storage. Testing a game like Final Fantasy XIV shows typical load times of:
- HDD – 102 seconds
- SSHD – 87 seconds
- SSD – 51 seconds
The SSD loads the game twice as fast as the HDD, while the SSHD only provides a modest 15% improvement over HDD.
Application launch times
Launching everyday applications quickly is another area where SSDs excel. The small random I/O of opening a program like Chrome or Excel highlights the strengths of SSD performance. Average application launch times on identical systems show:
- HDD – 5.5 seconds
- SSHD – 4 seconds
- SSD – 2 seconds
The SSD launches apps over twice as fast as the HDD and 50% faster than the SSHD.
Which is more reliable?
It’s a common myth that SSDs are less reliable than HDDs due to fears over write endurance. But modern SSDs can easily outlast the useful lifespan of most PCs. Consumer SSDs are rated for hundreds of TB in writes – exceeding what most consumers will do even over many years of heavy usage. And SSDs have huge advantages due to their lack of moving parts that can fail mechanically.
Studies have found SSDs significantly outlast HDDs in real world reliability testing. For example, cloud storage provider Backblaze evaluated tens of thousands of drives and found:
- Average SSD annual failure rate – 1.2%
- Average HDD annual failure rate – 1.8%
So you actually have about 50% higher chance of your HDD failing in a given year compared to an SSD.
SSHDs offer some benefits by isolating the mechanical HDD from shocks and vibration thanks to the flash cache. But full SSDs are still inherently more durable and reliable overall.
Power efficiency
The lack of moving parts not only makes SSDs faster and more reliable than HDDs, but it also improves power efficiency. SSDs consume much lower idle and active power compared to mechanical hard drives.
For mobile devices, an SSD can provide over twice the battery life for read-intensive operations compared to a traditional HDD. Even on desktop PCs, switching to an SSD can cut your storage power consumption in half.
| Drive Type | Read Power (milliwatts) | Write Power (milliwatts) |
|---|---|---|
| 2.5″ 5400 RPM HDD | 830 | 2260 |
| 2.5″ SSD | 150 | 330 |
SSDs use 5-6x less power than HDDs during reads and writes. The more time your drive spends active, the bigger the power savings you’ll see from an SSD upgrade.
Noise
Hard disk drives generate noise from the spinning platters and moving read/write heads. SSDs produce no noise since they lack any mechanical components. For most desktop PC users, a noisy HDD isn’t a major issue. But for laptops or home theater PCs, an SSD can provide a welcome reduction in system noise and vibration.
Which has better capacity?
If your priority is getting the most storage capacity for the least amount of money, HDDs still deliver there. HDD pricing continues falling rapidly, with 4TB and larger models becoming affordable for consumer systems. And on the high end, HDDs offer massive 10TB+ capacities for data hoarders.
SSDs are still priced at a premium per GB in comparison. And even the maximum capacities of 4TB+ for consumer SSDs pale in comparison to what HDDs offer. If you need terabytes of storage, HDDs and SSHDs provide a much more cost effective solution.
However, SSD pricing has been steadily falling. And for more typical needs below 4TB, the price difference vs. HDDs has narrowed significantly. Currently, 1TB SSDs can be purchased for under $100 – a great value for one of the most impactful PC upgrades you can do.
Hybrid advantage?
One advantage SSHDs provide over pure SSDs is cost savings for larger capacity drives. Currently a 1TB SSHD costs about 30-40% less than a 1TB SSD. So if you need high capacity storage at lower cost, SSHDs can make sense.
However, the real world speed improvements you’ll see with an SSHD will generally be modest. Any data that can’t be cached in the small SSD portion will slow down to HDD speeds. And as SSD pricing continues to drop, the argument for SSHDs instead of full flash drives gets harder to justify.
Upgrading to an SSD
The easiest way to add an SSD to your system is to clone your existing HDD to the faster SSD drive. There are many free disk cloning tools that can easily copy the contents of your HDD over to your new SSD. Once cloned, you just need to swap the drives so the SSD becomes the boot drive.
If you don’t have room for both an SSD and HDD, you can put your old HDD in an external USB 3.0 enclosure. This lets you retain the extra storage capacity while still benefiting from the performance of also having fast SSD storage.
For new PC builds, you should always include an SSD for your operating system and applications. Adding an SSD later is easy, but starting with an SSD ensures you get to take advantage of the speed benefits right away.
Conclusion
SSDs clearly outperform SSHDs when it comes to real world speed. The modest flash cache you get with an SSHD doesn’t provide nearly as big of a performance boost as moving entirely to flash-based SSD storage. And as SSD pricing gets more competitive, there are fewer and fewer reasons to consider SSHD drives over pure SSDs.
For value shoppers who need high storage capacities, SSHDs can still make sense. The small SSD cache can provide a little speed boost compared to HDDs. But for most users, the dramatically faster speeds of SSDs for booting, loading, and everyday tasks make it the obvious choice over both HDDs and SSHDs.