SSD & HDD 2 drive format query Mac Pro 3.1

Question

Hi
Can't seem to get a straight answer to this question anywhere else so am turning to anyone here that can help.
I currently have my original 320 gig drive in my Mac Pro 3.1.
I want to add an SSD and format it so that its the boot drive and contains the programs and nothing else.  The 320 gig drive will house all the 'other stuff' (photos, vids etc)
I don't want to migrate anything over - I basically want to start with two empty drives - SSD for boot and programs and 320 Gig drive for stuff.
I just want to know the best practice for this.  Do I have to wipe 320 gig first as its currently the boot, then add SSD in to the computer.  Do one at a time?  Both together?  I've been used to having one hard drive all these years and am having problems working out best way to do.
I've asked elsewhere and people keep telling me to migrate stuff over from the 320 Gig drive. I don't want to do this - I want to start with two fresh drives and put everything back on manually (tedious, I know, but thats the way I want to do it)
Any help in this matter greatly appreciated
Craig

Answer 1

you want simple? just buy a 500GB $225 Samsung EVO
http://www.amazon.com/Samsung-2-5-Inch-Internal-MZ-75E500B-AM/dp/B00OBRE5UE/
There use to be, and still can be, reasons to split the OS and apps from the data drives.
You want speed, then even SATA III with 500MB/sec read/writes, or XP941 with 900MB/sec writes, and 1000MB/sec reads cannot be beat. And you could not fit data onto or justify the cost when an SSD was too small and when 500GB cost $1500.
SSD Blade Drive for "Classic" Mac Pro
Most PCIe cards costs $79-299 and add a level of complexity that the XP941 adapter does not though.
But you do this all the time, but just never had a dedicated system boot drive before. When 15K SCSI drives were small and fast and ideal, and higher cost, the whole idea of using cheaper drives for data came to desktop. It was used already before then on other systems for years.
Using the drive bays, SATA II and 250MB/sec is still an improvement. But even new 4TB drives are 150MB/sec and above. Back when 320GB drives were used they were not even able to achieve 100MB/sec, more like 80MB/sec. And SSD has a lot of other benefits. So yes today's SSD will make a difference.
I would just clone to 500GB SSD and try it! your last clean install was less than a year ago and yet still using older drives that are slow. Small SSDs have not without firmware and controller changes in the last two years able to perform as fast as the 250GB and larger. Larger SSD, more channels. An SSD has 4 channels on 128GB but 8 channels on 250GB which can all act simultaneous and concurrently to shovel I/O. Plus near-zero seeks and access times, and 90,000+ I/Os per second.
128GB $80 will work and make a difference though if price is the main concern and not speed. Also, with an SSD free unused space is more important. A deleted file is not "deleted" and the SSD "page" (NAND) is not freed up until it is trimmed.