What if I checked the box "Compress this drive to save disk space" on an SSD?

Solution 1:

By enabling drive compression you would save space on your hard drive, however the benefit is not without cost. Compression uses processing power (CPU). Every time you access a file, it has to be read and uncompressed to be worked with. Every file you save or edit will also have to be compressed.

Whole disk compression is not a good method for growing storage, adding another hard drive or upgrading to a larger drive is a better choice.

Not that whole disk compression is bad, there are definite advantages in the right situations. However, "what if" is not one of them.

Solution 2:

Compression can have a positive effect on a computer with an older, slower disk. The CPU may have enough horsepower so that doing decompression and compression on read/write is faster than letting the drive read the raw data. It has definitely speeded up my 5 yearold laptop.