How do I know if I have an SSD or HDD?

User question

Hello.

I already use a computer quite a bit, but I have never thought about disks at all ... Almost all experts now recommend switching from HDD to SSD to speed up the system.

Here, after switching to Windows 10, my computer began to slow down terribly (immediately after turning on - in general, horror - the load on the disk is 100%!). Now I think, maybe I also need to buy an SSD (what if I already have it installed?).

In general, tell me how to find out which disk I have: SSD or HDD (or something else)?

Hello.

The question is typical (in general), below I will give several options for its solution ...

👉 Add. to help!

Why does the computer (laptop) take so long to boot / reboot, what to do for faster Windows boot

Ways to find out the type of disk

👉 Option 1

The easiest and fastest way to view the type of all installed disks is to use the 👉 command line (to invoke it: press Win + R, and use the CMD command).

In its window, you need to copy the command below and press Enter.

PowerShell "Get-PhysicalDisk | Format-Table -AutoSize"

After that, the system will think for 1-2 seconds and show you a list of disks - see the column "Media Type" (on the screen 👇 I have it highlighted in red).

Command line - see the type of disk

👉 Option 2

Windows 8/10 has a built-in Disk Optimizer that "knows and shows" the type of drives. To call it - press Win + R, and use the dfrgui command (an alternative is to use the search, see the screen below 👇) .

Optimizing disks

Further see column "Media type" ... A hard drive is an HDD, a solid state drive is an SSD ...

Disk Optimization - Media Type

👉 Option 3

Nowadays, service utilities are quite popular for viewing the characteristics of a PC, testing it, etc. One of these is AIDA 64.

It is enough to open the tab in it "data storage / ATA" and you will be able to view the properties of any of the installed drives. See example below. 👇

👉 Help!

Specialist. utilities for viewing the characteristics of a computer - my selection

AIDA 64 - Data Storage / ATA Tab

👉 Option 4

In the device manager, you need to open the tab "Disk devices" : It will show all drives connected to the system.

If you open the properties of the required drive and copy its ID, then in Google (Yandex), in most cases, you can find all the characteristics of this drive. See screenshots below 👇.

Device manager - disk properties - copy its ID

A full disc description was found on "Niksa" ...

👉 Option 5

If Windows is not installed on the PC / laptop (or it does not boot), then you can see the type of disk in the BIOS / UEFI (well, or at least its model - which you can then check in Google and find out the characteristics .. .).

👉 To help!

How to enter BIOS (UEFI) on a computer or laptop [instruction]

As a rule, information about the drive is located immediately on the first screen. Just look at the "Storage" / "Disk" subsection. A couple of examples below. 👇