Can someone explain SSD's to me? noob here

Okay so I'm shopping around looking to buy a gaming laptop, and sites like xoticpc allow you to customize your own laptops. I'm basically overwhelmed by all those options and I have no idea what's good for what.

Mostly I'm confused about SSD's and mSATA and RAID etc... all those weird words.

From what I know SSD's are drives that are supposed to perform better than traditional hard disks? I heard they were faster and such, and I've been hearing how great they are and how I absolutely have to...

Can someone explain SSD's to me? noob here

Can someone explain SSD's to me? noob here