PC GAMESS/Firefly-related discussion club

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Thomas Patko
tpatko@gmail.com

Does anyone have any first hand experience using any of the newer solid state disks (SSD) as temporary directories for I/O intensive jobs such as MP2?  While it is generally recommended to only use one traditional HDD for each temporary directory (per core) I wonder if the SSD can support multiple temporary directories for disk intensive I/O jobs as they should perform better for simultaneous read/write operations.  If so, how many temporary directories (cores) can one SSD handle simultaneously without significant slowdown (like traditional HDD)?

Any manufacturer recommendations and timing reports would be appreciated.  While the SSD prices have come out of the stratosphere it seems that the SSD are still rather expensive so I am weighing the cost options, although space becomes a consideration for machines with very many cores.

I am also interested in any first hand / anecdotal accounts about MTBF (other than what the manufacturer report for general use versus this significantly more severe service Firefly use).

Cheers,

Thomas