immich: Does a SSD/HDD make a noticable difference?
from GravitySpoiled@lemmy.ml to selfhosted@lemmy.world on 18 Jun 19:51
https://lemmy.ml/post/17027875

I wonder if there is a nptocable difference between a HDD and SSD. Did someone already test it? I run it off a good SSD but wonder if a HDD would be enough.

#selfhosted

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vext01@lemmy.sdf.org on 18 Jun 19:54 next collapse

Unless somethkng changed in the last few years, SSDs are much much faster.

RegalPotoo@lemmy.world on 18 Jun 20:13 collapse

They are, but I think the question was more “does the increased speed of an SSD make a practical difference in user experience for immich specifically”

I suspect that the biggest difference would be running the Postgres DB on an SSD where the fast random access is going to make queries significantly faster (unless you have enough ram that Postgres can keep the entire DB in memory where it makes less of a difference).

Putting the actual image storage on SSD might improve latency slightly, but your hard drive is probably already faster than your internet connection so unless you’ve got lots of concurrent users or other things accessing the hard drive a bunch it’ll probably be fast enough.

These are all Reckons without data to back it up, so maybe do some testing

poVoq@slrpnk.net on 18 Jun 19:55 next collapse

Usually* there is a database for the file meta-data that will benefit from faster access times of a SSD, the files themselves can be on a HDD.

*not sure how Immich specifically does it.

ShellMonkey@lemmy.socdojo.com on 18 Jun 20:07 next collapse

It depends on the load on the disk. My main docker host pretty well has to be on the SSD to not complain about access times, but there are a dozen other services on the same VM. There’s some advisory out there that things with constant IO should avoid SSDs to not wear out the read/write too fast, but I haven’t seen anything specific on just how much is too much.

Personally I split the difference and run the system on SSD and host the bulk data on a separate NAS with a pile of spinning disks.

walden@sub.wetshaving.social on 18 Jun 20:09 next collapse

Noticeable difference loading the page? Loading photos? Uploading photos?

Photo files are relatively small, so an HDD is absolutely fine.

MHanak@lemmy.world on 19 Jun 10:49 collapse

relatively small

Until you dump 2000 RAW photos on there

dogsnest@lemmy.world on 19 Jun 11:02 next collapse

We don’t need to know your pron prefs, pal!

walden@sub.wetshaving.social on 19 Jun 15:36 collapse

Meh, even then. If they’re 60MB each that’s only 120GB.

Knossos@lemmy.world on 18 Jun 20:39 next collapse

I use a HDD for my immich instance. I have a feeling it might have made the initial import process quicker (complete google photos dump). However, general usage, I have found zero bottlenecks.

Drathro@dormi.zone on 18 Jun 21:19 next collapse

I run mine with the actual photos on HDD but the database on SSD. So far everything has been near instantaneous for loading, downloading, uploading, you name it.

69420@lemmy.world on 18 Jun 22:14 collapse

Same.

markstos@lemmy.world on 19 Jun 15:58 collapse

Considering the database itself is relatively small, PostgreSQL could end up largely caching it in memory, so even hosting the DB on an HDD might not feel much slower.