Re^2: sorting very large text files

Use faster drives. If you're doing this often, it might well be worth spending Ł200/Ł300 on a Solid State Disk. These are orders of magnitude faster than harddisks and could yeild substantial speedup if used correctly.

I have vaguely impression that SSD technique is not mature yet. It will be broken after reading 200,000 times. If I remember right, SSD is not a good choice for him.

Comment on Re^2: sorting very large text files

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Re^3: sorting very large text files by BrowserUk (Patriarch) on Dec 20, 2009 at 08:23 UTC
I have vaguely impression that SSD technique is not mature yet. It will be broken after reading 200,000 times. Things have moved on. A lot! Otherwise, it would be very bad news for the owners of the dozens(hundreds?) of models of netbook (like this) that come with the OS installed on the only drive possible which is an SSD. If you look at the spec sheet for the SSD I linked, the significant number is `Write Endurance (500GB/Day): >10` (That's > 10 years!). And If I remember correctly, the GoogleOS will only run from SSDs. Though that's possibly not a recommendation. Examine what is said, not who speaks -- Silence betokens consent -- Love the truth but pardon error. "Science is about questioning the status quo. Questioning authority". In the absence of evidence, opinion is indistinguishable from prejudice. "I'd rather go naked than blow up my ass"	[reply] [d/l]
Re^3: sorting very large text files by Anonymous Monk on Dec 23, 2009 at 10:59 UTC
No. SSDs have a write limit, you can read all you want. And there's a per-block limit, so how many times you can write to a disk depends on the disk's size and the file's size. For instance, if your disk can handle 10000 writes per block, then you could rewrite the entire disk that many times. If you're using 1/4th of the disk, you could rewrite your data 40000 times, and so on.	[reply]