Intel X25-M G2 160GB in G73JH - Why the sluggish performance?

I did (and for win 7 its not F6)

 

So you've cleverly deduced the problem, but does this mean the only way we can get the maximum benefit of our SSDs is to have the CPU under load the entire time?

 

To have the full speed, I need more than 1 thread load too.
Hope gary can check on this problem too

 

No, the problem is the CPU goes in to C6 power state when it does not do anything. The solution would be to disable the C6 power state but this is usually a BIOS option which I think we don't have.

Going in to C6 power state is fine if you are on battery but when I am on external power I don't want it to go into C6 power state.

As I read it these power levels like C6 should be tied to the minimum processor state setting in the Windows 7 Power options but eventhough I have it at 100% for external power it seems this setting is ignored and the CPU does go in C6 state.

Also I read that power saving and turbo should be excluding eachother. I haven't tried using the tubo button yet.

 

I can confirm the SSDs read and write speeds increase significantly - to what youd actually expect when the CPU is in full load.

Gary it seams we will need another bios update with the option to disable C6 (but only when plugged in AC please and it would be nice if the fan profiles would be taken from the 209 bios since many of us still want a silent machine as it was advertised). Or is there also another option now besides making the cpu run at full load which isnt really a solution?

 

I won't be surprised if a solution to this could take a long time. Since we are all talking about Intel components I would like to know what Intel proposes the solution should be. And I think Gary will come to that conclusion too.

So it might take a while before a solution to this finds it way. Also because this doesn't seem to be a G73JH specific problem but one of all Core i CPU's so Asus might want to know a solution for all their laptops.

 

Maybe a silly question but, do all of you have unparked cores? Unless I'm misreading things, C6 essentially controls core parking and turbo boost:

 

I disabled ‘core parking’ by deleting some registry keys according to this thread: ** Critical ** Windows 7 DAW Tweak .... Disable CPU Core Parking

After deleting them keys I can’t see any difference in performance

iemie

 

I also have unparked cores but the performance is still bad if the cpu is not runing full load.

 

Intel SSD slow with C1E? - [H]ard|Forum

It looks like C1E is the culprit. EIST / Speedstep is of no importance. C3/C6 is also probably not the cause.

Intel PM55 chipset and X25-E SSD Very...

Somebody already started a thread on Intels site about it. It would be great if Asus in the form of Gary could put some more pressure on Intel to come up with a workable solution. Because next to Asus enabling the C1E option in the BIOS this seems something Intel needs to fix.


EDIT: Just Googling for C1E and SSD performance brings up tons of posts about it improving SSD performance. So it looks like we need the C1E option in the BIOS.

 

Thanks PulsatingQuasar, its a nice read and Gary_Key should make some progress with this if he really gets to work.

 

Yeap, that was me who started the thread at the Intel forum, as well as the one at Dell official support forum:
Alienware M17x - R2 Killing the SSD performance - Laptop General Hardware Forum - Laptop - Dell Community

As you can see after 23 days no response from them (Either Dell or Intel) and I don't expect an answer any time soon...

I don't think we will have the option to disable C1E. My only hope is if they manage to work around it (either with an updated BIOS or modified chipset drivers).

 

We will see, but this issue isnt the one that worrys me the most atm, since the SSD still works at full speed when i need it to - loading windows the cpu is under load so the SSD should work at its full speed and loading programs and games its the same story.

 

Even if the CPU load is very high with multiple threads, the SSD doesn't perform as it should. The major advantage of SSDs over HDDs are the 4K random reads/writes and that's what is seriously affected in our case...

 

I tried using "Throttlestop" (you can download it here: http://www.fileden.com/files/2008/3/3/1794507/ThrottleStop.zip)
I used to be able to 'lock' the multipliers on my previous laptop (Acer 8930) with this little gadget which worked very well, but I can't get it to work on the G73. Shame coz there is also an option to disable the C1E state but that also doesn't seem to do anything.
Oh well......Maybe a future BIOS update will sort this thing out

iemie

 

I am not sure if C1E or C2E or any other power state is the sole culprit of this low performance. There could be other power management features that may affect the performance as well, but it would be nice at least for a start, those companies to acknowledge the fact that there is a problem here.

 

It would be nice to get it fixed considering we payed a large premium to get the top performance, but i dont expect it to happen anytime soon since most users dont even know the problem exist (how many users actually have these SSD in such laptops and how many think to test them and know what the results mean...).

IF Gary is serius he will need to work with Intel and that means we wont see a solution tomorrow... Well be extremely lucky if we hear an update in the next week or so. Wouldnt expect a solution sooner than a month or two from now.

 

FWIW, I get accurate sequential read and write speeds with my Crucial M225 using ATTO. It's indilinx based, so that may or may not have some influence here. P4G set on High Performance with Intel RST 9.6 installed

 

Sequential is not what we were talking about. The 4k reads and writes are important here and theyre more than half lower than what they should be. And indilinx drives are horrible - i know cause ive had two and id rather have a 7200rpm HD than one of those.

 

ACtually my sequential read/write are also lower than what they should be. The drive is Indilinx based.

 

Say whatever you like, but my drive is performing as it should, as is my laptop (and I'm not just talking about sequential reads/writes either). Funny how you are quick to condemn anyone else's results aside from your own.

 

I'm sorry but if you test it properly then your results should be the same as us and any other notebook users. This isn't a G73JH specific problem. It's chipset and power saving related problem for which no one has provided a solution yet other than to go into safe mode.

 

That's correct, but, even in safe mode the performance is capped at 19MB/s and 48MB/s

Take a look at those screenshots

safe mode (capped speed) --------------->normal mode (full speed)
-------------------->

 

So stamatisx do you want to try switching off C1E with throttlestop?

-Ash

 

Throttle stop won't help in this case unfortunately

 

Do a CrystalDiskMark and post a screenshot and we can talk further. Sequential read/write tells us nothing - we all have that working fine.

I know it still isnt performing as the tests done there, but its significantly better in safe mode and i think just perhaps it cant perform completely at its fullest on the mobile chipsets and take into account we arent benchmarking empty drives like you see there. But the speed in normal boot mode is still abysmal. If we get a solution to make it run at same speeds as in safe mode id be happy.

 

HellCry, if Nvidia was able to make a chipset that allows an Intel SSD (or any SSD) to perform at 100% like the screenshot above, isn't it unacceptable for an Intel chipset not to?

I personally wouldn't accept it since the difference from 48MB/s -> 75 MB/s costed me more than $300 dollars. (I could buy the X25-M instead of the X25-E if I knew that the speed would be capped there)

 

I understand what you mean... but im just saying that i dont expect much to be done becouse most people dont even know this problem exists.
IF we get the speeds from safe mode i will consider it lucky already...
But i perfectly agree it shouldnt be like this, since we pay a LARGE premium to get top performance SSDs and the chipset is limiting them making it kinda a waste of money. Its horrible to see an Intel chipset cant handle Intels - their own SSD speeds.

 

Yeah, that's true. The irony is that when I switched from the Nvidia chipset to the Intel one, I expected my SSD to perform better than before. LOL
You can imagine my disappointment when I found out that it was happening the exact opposite...

 

Ya, i really dont know what Intel is thinking...

 

I can't put the blame on Intel only, there are so many manufacturers that use the HM55/PM55 chipset, noone (?) ever (?) tested a fast SSD to see how it performs on their laptop? Was it that difficult or all of them knew about it from the very beginning but they just pretend that everything is normal?

 

Have you seen any compatability papers recently for our laptops which state that this and that harddrive perform as advertised while others don't?
I haven't, and neither have I from different manufactorers.
Besides with a laptop, they sell you the complete unit and don't execpt you to tamper around with it. Sure, you can, but then they will not guarantee anything.
I can accept this argumenting with computers that you build yourself, there I also would be pissed! But here with a complete unit in one piece, I accept what I get.
This is just my opinion, but I hope you won't forget that you bought a complete unit that is advertised to perform like it does now.

pato

 

• First of all, the low performance we complain about is very specific and it has to do with a specific chipset the PM55 and the 4K random reads and writes of SSDs (of any brand) that can achieve speeds above 18MB/s and 48MB/s respectively. We are not talking about hard disks in general.
• Second, those SSDs have specifications stated on their official website. They state sequential speeds, IOPS, etc... so when you buy a product, you expect it to perform as advertised.
• Third, the chipset specifications are known and stated on the Intel website and since we are talking about the SATA II protocol we expect to see the analogous performance. If not, Intel should specifically mention those limitiations. If you see any, please let us know.
• Fourth, there is no need for a laptop manufacturer or an SSD manufacturer to issue any kind of compatibility list since the industry follows standards.

• I am not tampering around with it. That's the performance out of the box. Well, I don't know about the Asus owners, but as far as it concerns me and I believe all the Alienware/Dell owners, when I pay $4K premium, I expect the performance to be at least equal to that price.

• If I was able to building the laptop myself I wouldn't be pissed, I would simply change the motherboard with a different chipset that would perform as it should. No need to wait for BIOS update or drivers,etc...

• Yes this is your opinion and I respect that but the advertised performance is SATA II is not 18MB/s 4K reads and 48MB/s 4K writes.

 

Well said Stamatisx, I fully back you up on that.

 

Thanks iemie, people have to realize that when something is wrong, is wrong, period. They paid a premium price for both the laptop and their SSD, it wasn't given to them for free to accept it as is.

 

Couldnt have said it better. But i have no idea who to start nagging to... Intel would probably be better than trying Asus again right (considering i never got any answer from them)?

 

There's going to be a lot of fingerpointing in this situation- Intel is going to say it works in other configurations (ie most desktops) and ASUS/Dell will blame the manufacturer.

Hope to see a resolution to this- I've been keeping an eye on this thread, and the ASUS update one as Gary did make specific mention of the issue. My guess is that it's a laptop power/heat saving issue as others have stated.

 

It would be nice if Gary can indeed openup the power state options in the BIOS. But I think this is still something that Intel has to fix. Disabling the C1E power state in the BIOS disables it for both battery and external power mode.

Intel can easily issue a driver that can switch behaviour depending on the situation. Since when booting into save mode the power saving options are ignored/not loaded and there is a significant increase in throughput.

 

People have to accept a notebook is a notebook. Just because something performs this way on a desktop doesn't mean it will perform the same on a notebook.

I have no sympathy for this issue. Buyer beware. Before buying an SSD one should do the research to make sure it will be compatible.

NOTEBOOKS HAVE NEVER BEEN MADE TO BE FULLY COMPLIANT WITH ALL STANDARDS.

Notebooks have always been made to specific requirements of that one manufacturer. That's how it's always been and that's why Sony, Toshiba, Panasonic still won't support ATi mobility drivers and insist on using only their specifically released versions.

As another user stated, this is not a DIY built desktop. This is a notebook. This is why the G73 is sold as one complete unit and not a DIY Barebone notebook.

 

I dont agree there, since resellers offer SSD upgrades without any warnings. When i see some posted somewhere i just wont buy it and wont have anything to complain about. And its something that can be fixed, since the hardware can do much more, but some driver/software is holding it back as we can see from safe mode.
If you dont have an SSD and dont care about a solution just stay out of this, i dont care much for people like you who try to contradict someone trying to acomplish something.

 

I don't really agree either. That was the way it used to be but with the standardization of connectors( ie the one for a graphic card connector in a laptop) and the unwillingness of laptop manufacturers to provide drivers for graphic cards on the same schedule as Ati and NVidia do themselves the process has begun that this changes.

With Ati and NVidia providing drivers for all modern graphic cards( especially performance) in laptops they are forcing the manufacturers to deal with it and it's about time too. Ati and NVidia have no other choice than to releases drivers at this rate because every month there is a game that does something complex which reveals a bug or a performance issue that needs fixing. Neither manufacturer can accept that their flagship GPU can't be used properly in laptop X because the manufacturer doesn't want to release at the same schedule.

It's a matter of time when manufacturers like Sony see their sales dropping because they can't provide the driver support. And let's face facts here. With these standardizations there is nothing special about a laptop anymore besides it's size.

 

I think opening the Power Management options in BIOS is the way to go. If you prefer power savings, then keep it at default. If you want the highest SSD performance by sacrificing battery life, then you should have the option.

 

+1 to both of you guys

There should be more options and more control on the user side. It's kinda pointless to apply power saving features when operating on AC and not on battery. But even in battery I would like to have the option for maximum performance that won't cap the SSD performance.

 

Just want to say a big thank you to almost everyone on this thread for pursuing this topic.

I have an Asus U30Jc with an Inferno 100GB SSD and have been experiencing the same issues. After reading all ten pages, at least I know it is not 'only' my system or SSD - this has been proven here without a doubt.

I can only hope that any fix is not simply for the G73's, but for all HM55 chipset based notebooks.

I am eagerly waiting for Gary Key to provide a solution soon.

Thanks again.

 

Thank you all for the information - I have the same problem with my Acer TimelineX AS4820TG (it has the HM55 chipset) and the Corsair Force 120gb drive. My benchmarks: http://forum.notebookreview.com/har...marks-brands-news-advice-638.html#post6639525

 

I emailed Intel, but im not expecting an answer to be honest.
Just tried it to be sure ive done what i can. If youre also for the cause just send them an email yourselves too. Perhaps if enogh people write to them they might do something like release a new chipset driver that prevent such agressive power saving.

 

HellCry could you PM me the email address you send to Intel?
They didn't respond to the thread I created, I hope they do on my email
Thanks

 

I just used THIS.

 

Oh, ok I will try and see what happens, I hope more people follow us on this

 

Done it too.