SSDs have the same features as HDDs, but their internal components are very different. Unlike hard drives, SSDs don't have any moving parts (which is why they're called solid-state drives). Instead of storing data on disks, SSDs use flash memory to store data. Since SSDs don't have moving parts, they don't have to "spin up" in hibernation or move the drive head to different parts of the drive to access data. As a result, SSD hard drives can access data faster than HDD hard drives.
SSDs have several other advantages over HDDs.
For example, when data is sharded or split into multiple locations on the disk, the read performance of the hard disk degrades. The read performance of an SSD disk is not affected by the location of the disk where the data resides. Therefore, defragmenting the SSD is unnecessary. Since SSDs do not store data magnetically, they are not susceptible to data loss because of the strong magnetic field close to the drive. In addition, since the SSD has no moving parts, the possibility of mechanical failure is much less likely. SSDs are also lighter, quieter, and consume less power than hard drives. That's why SSDs have become a popular choice for laptops.
While SSDs have many advantages over HDDs, they also have some drawbacks. Since SSD technology is much newer than traditional hard drive technology, the price of SSDs is higher than that of mechanical hard drives. At the beginning of 2021, the price per gigabyte of SSDs will be about 3 to 5 times that of HDDs. As a result, most SSDs sold today have much smaller capacity than comparable HDDs. They also have a limited number or write cycle, which can cause their performance to degrade over time. Fortunately, the updated SSD has improved reliability and should be useful for several years before performance degrades significantly. As SSD technology improves and prices continue to fall, SSDs are likely to begin to replace hard drives for most uses.