SSD Thread (Benchmarks, Brands, News, and Advice)

Phil did you order the 256GB or the smaller one?

 

64GB C300, and a 120GB Agility 2 is coming in today.

But the Agility 2 I only ordered to sell. I might benchmark it too though.

 

I guess you will run the boot timer on both of them

 

C300 definitely. I might keep the Agility 2 in the seal, as it will be easier to sell.

 

That's true, I would do the same thing...

 

Also I think the Agility 2 will be kind of similar to the Vertex LE I already have.

Something like this: http://www.anandtech.com/bench/Product/151?vs=138
(although not exactly the same products)

 

Good news for me because it fits my usage (heavy multi tasking) repped

Thanks.

 

Ok you're welcome. Just checking, what kind of heavy multi tasking do you do?

Because not all multi tasking is storage bound. Some is CPU bound, some is memory bound.

 

Playing movie, firefox (endless of tabs opened), photoshop, YM, several monitoring apps.

Though my current SSD is already performing fairly good, am still looking to get one that responds super quick (ie, coming from XP to Win 7, it took me awhile to adopt the animate windows when minimizing and maximizing feature. I felt like my computer was very slow) lol!

Main objective is to lower my Windows boot time (same startup apps with my Samsung), faster access time.

EDIT: Was expecting to get greater improvements by upgrading to C300 256GB. Anyway, we'll see when it arrives

 

I'm planning on writing a review between C300, Vertex LE and Agility 2.

Any tips for measuring real world performance typical for notebook users?

This is one of my previous reviews, Ill be doing something similar:
Ultimate Notebook Hard Drive Performance: Western Digital Scorpio Black vs. Hitachi Travelstar 7K500 | StorageReview.com

To be honest, I doubt your SSD is often a bottleneck in that kind of usage.

Nonetheless, your C300 will bring you some improvements.

 

The test was run on the M860ETU in my sig.

 

ill look @ it after work today ... i used the iso firmware from intels web site and it spit out that the firmware is up to date. if its a gen2 and already up to date then intels prolly loading them up with this update from the factory.

 

I've had two Sammys 256GB in RAID0 in my M17X, and two Intels 160GB in RAID0 in the EXACT SAME M17X as well. I had the time to try and play with them pretty extensively.

Never mind what people may say, never mind what synthetic benchmarks may say, Phil is absolutely right, 99% of the people here won't notice a shadow of a difference between them, 99% of the time. Notice I did not write 100% nowhere... Indeed, so far I've found that:


My boot time is the same (15 ~ 25 seconds);

Application loading is the same (instant);

Copying files takes the same time (vary depending on the file);

Installing application is about the same (vary depending on the file).


The ONLY time I noticed a REAL NOTEWORTHY difference is when INSTALLING WINDOWS, where it took ± 20 ~ 30 minutes with my Samsungs, and ± 15 ~ 25 minutes with my Intels. The huge difference comes when windows is DECOMPRESSING ITS FILES on the drive. My guess here is that THIS IS WHERE THE 4K WRITE DO MATTER... So, basically, IF you do indeed decompress a lot of files, you shall most likely notice a difference but else, imho, it's not worth the extra dollas. If I would have known, personnaly, I would never have bought the two Intels because, as per my own experience, the extra dollars I had to put to use the Intels instead of the Samsungs IS SIMPLY NOT WORTH IT !

Now, someone else may have gone through a total different experience; I'm not talking absolute here, I'm talking as per my own experience, which is comparing Intels and Samsungs in RAID0 in REAL WORLD DAY-TO-DAY USE. I can swallow a whole bunch of theory about those 4Ks and blah-blah-blah, and I did actually, almost read 'em all, but at the end of the day, what matters is day-to-day business, and AnandTech and his buddies can synthetic benchmark till the end of the world if they want to, bottom line, the speed's difference between both DO NOT justify the price's difference. IMHO.

The KEY POINT here is that the Intels are most likely faster than the Samsungs; however, THE SPEED GAIN IS NOT WORTH THE EXTRA DOLLARS: it's kind of you gotta pay say $1.9/GB for the sammys ($500 for 256GB) while you gotta pay $2.8/GB for the intels ($450 for 160GB), this is almost $1 per GB more for the Intels... For that price increase, I would have expected my boot time to be down by at least 5 seconds for my brain to justify the higher price of the Intels... But again, my boot time is the same...

So, all in all, any SSD will beat the siht out of an HDD, and all SSDs seem to deliver a snappiest access time. And as most people say, it all depends on what you do, your needs, and so on. Again, I like my Intels, but for the price difference, I was expecting a much more greater difference between them and the Samsungs.

This being said, I'm getting a replacement for my current M17X, replacement which should arrive (hopefully) before the end of July. Now, guess what ? You got it, my replacement unit will come with two brand new Sammys 256GB, which I need to sell. Will post a FS in the appropriate topic when I receive them. Meanwhile, any question, let me know.

Good day to all !

 

Nice post eye-I-aie .. well said.

that being said, anything i should look out for when buying a used ssd? (just incase there's something i don't know about, that i should know about)

Thanks

 

I'm not eye-I-aie but I do have a tip.

OCZ is saying on their website that they don't give warranty on SSDs without receipt, but I've heard from a couple of customers that they actually do.

I believe Intel also gives warranty without receipt but I'm not sure.

Personally I wouldn't buy SSDs without warranty, unless the price is extremely low of course.

 

I can confirm Intel services SSDs w/o a receipt.
All you need is the serial number..

 

eYe am eye-and-I and I'd say this...:


How old is the used drive ?

How long has it been functionning ?

Was this always with the same/first owner ?

Was it in RAID or not ?

Has TRIM always been enabled on it ?

Does it actually support TRIM ?

How much cost an haircut (a trim) ? (ok: discard this one...)

What for this drive has been used (general or heavy-duty) ?

Version of the FW ?

Size ?

What else ?

oh yeah: still under warranty

How much, how many and why ?

That's about all I can think of right now !

 

One of the best SSD reviews I've seen. Very extensive. Unfortunately it was run on a desktop.

SSD 2010 report: 13 models compared (page 1: Introduction) - BeHardware

 

Also ich10 sata. Not the mobile version let alone addressing the most common market of upgrades in the ICH9, ICH8 or even ICH7 let alone the mobile concerns. Also leaving out NVidia or AMD chipsets etc

It seems these tend to preform somewhat differently on different platforms. HDDs tend not to really push a platform to its limits the newer SSDs do. Older HDD testing methodology was streched with the first SSD's, it is almost irrelevant with these newer ones. It is quickly becoming almost like comparing a program trying to run out of the PAGE file compared to running in RAM. Before you all get in a tizzy I know that is more than a bit over exagerated, just making a point.

Also it seems the returns are diminishing as well. Where an HDDs selection could cost you seconds or even minutes on a procedure we are now starting to get to the point if you can get one or two blinks of the eye in. With these fast SSDs it looks like it is becomeing more of a storage to cost ratio thing. And that is exactly what we need.

This will start bringing the prices down quickly as the different players are now on a more even perceptual performance front. You no longer are just forcing competition between the OEM's but even within the controler types as well. More competition will always bring lower prices and better insurance against price fixing as well.

 

I ran some benchmarks, MS vs. Intel driver for the ICH9 controller.

MS


Intel

Yes that's what I think too. Every review comes to different conclusions.
It's about time someone reviews these drives on a normal laptop

 

And as you even show there can perform vastly different with just a different driver. Just too many variables that seem to have a huge disparity between them.............

 

For daily use like browsing the net, starting up and shutting down the computer, hibernating and resuming, word processing, watching videos, playing games - is the Intel G2 a huge improvement over an entry level SSD like the Kingston V series? Does anyone know

 

If you're talking about the Kingston V 64GB SNV425, it's a decent performer yes. Very suitable for that kind of usage.

Intel will be slightly faster but not worth the premium, for that kind of usage.

The Kingston V+ is faster than Intel G2 80GB.

 

AMAZING deal here: Newegg.com - OCZ Vertex 2 OCZSSD2-2VTXE120G 2.5" 120GB SATA II MLC Internal Solid State Drive (SSD)

WOW! HOT!

Crap. I took my own advice. Bought two.

 

Just put a 128 GB, Crucial C300 in a Dell Studio 1737, fresh install of Windows 7 Ultimate 64-bit, all updates and still takes 1-1/2 minutes to boot up - what is wrong with that?

Firmware 001 - going to update to 002 now, wish me luck.....

-----------------------------------------------------------------------
CrystalDiskMark 3.0 x64 (C) 2007-2010 hiyohiyo
Crystal Dew World : Crystal Dew World
-----------------------------------------------------------------------
* MB/s = 1,000,000 byte/s [SATA/300 = 300,000,000 byte/s]

Sequential Read : 246.985 MB/s
Sequential Write : 136.979 MB/s
Random Read 512KB : 225.031 MB/s
Random Write 512KB : 138.084 MB/s
Random Read 4KB (QD=1) : 21.587 MB/s [ 5270.3 IOPS]
Random Write 4KB (QD=1) : 36.929 MB/s [ 9016.0 IOPS]
Random Read 4KB (QD=32) : 162.846 MB/s [ 39757.4 IOPS]
Random Write 4KB (QD=32) : 132.532 MB/s [ 32356.4 IOPS]

Test : 1000 MB [C: 19.3% (23.0/119.1 GB)] (x5)
Date : 2010/07/27 17:33:35
OS : Windows 7 Ultimate Edition [6.1 Build 7600] (x64)

 

The_Snowman, have you tried installing Intel's ICH9 driver?

 

Phil, thanks for reply, not heard of that driver and not aware of the function, even after finding it on Intel website; can you please elaborate?
regards, John

 

Eye and I, you ever run the Intels alone/not in RAID-0? I have two Intel 32gb SLC's sitting around (put them in RAID-0 once; don't use them because I never get around to moving all my files over from HDD) and I wonder if RAID-0 is really worth it at all. Did it damper the speed in any noticeable way? I figure they're fast enough alone, but since they were so small, I needed at least 64 GB alltogether, hence the RAID-0.

 

The_Snowman, It's the Intel RST driver for your storage controller. On my laptop it performs better than the default MS driver.

You can find it here: http://downloadcenter.intel.com/SearchResult.aspx?lang=eng&keyword="ICH9"

 

Hello Hankaaron,

I ran my two sammies and my two intels in RAID0. Never ran any of them as a single drive; was coming from 2X7200RPM in RAID0 as well, so didn't want to step back...

Basically, a RAID0 setup will split the data that is to be written on two disks instead of one, thus, speeding up the process. In theory, such an array will be able to write two times the amount of data one disk would write by the same time. But that's theorical because other stuff matters (one example is the stripe size) but I'm not gonna go there here.

Say your house is burning. Say the Firemen can only use one hose. Now, say they can use two hoses... Any RAID0 setup, would them be SSD, HDD, you name it, any RAID0 array will certainly speed-up any machine, and the main reason is this...

1. Disk's access time (either SSD or HDD) is measured in miliseconds...
2. RAM's access time is measured in microseconds...
3. Processor's cache memory access time is measured in nanoseconds...

Therefore, the disk's access will always be the bottleneck of the entire machine. Why wouldn't one then want to speed this area up ? In other words, no matter how fast one system is, almost doubling the rate of the disk access will always make you feel like you just got a new machine !!!

To me, a RAID0 setup will always worth it, as switching from an HDD to an SSD will always worth it too, for the sole reason that disk's access are the bottleneck of any computer because it's the mass memory (storage) that takes the longer to respond, among all the stuff inside a computer.

Now, I foresee some people saying here: yeah but a RAID0 setup is a risk, as if any of the two disk fails, you loose everything ! Which is true. To what I do however respond: If I have only ONE disk, and if ANY of my ONE disk happens to fail, I loose everything too... Besides, that's not likely to happen with SSDs...

So, all in all, I'm not quite sure I answered your question, but I would like to thank you for asking. And if my answer is somewhat unclear, let me know.

Cheers !

 

You can also find them here ...

And if you want to use to latest one (9.6.4.1002), while not official, but that's the latest one and the one I use myself, grab it here first link:

Pour Chipsets ​	Version	Sous	Pdf	Boot	Whql	Info	Officiel	DL
ICH7R/ICH8R/ICH9/ICH10/i5	9.6.4.1002	Windows 200x/Xp/Vista/7 32/64bits		oui	oui		non

​

 

Some more about getting my Vertex LE back in original shape...

Is there anyway I can do this with the SSD connected through USB to my laptop?

Has anyone experience with doing it with HDparm as described here?

I'd rather not working with Linux images and hot plugging.

 

When I got my Intels, before installing windows on them, I pluggued one to my usb port via a sata2usb adapter, and the Intel toolbox did not even saw that I had an Intel drive connected to a usb port; not sure therefore if doing this with your vertex will work, but OCZ is not Intel, so, cannot tell, sorry...

 

I have a small problem that I've been trying to figure out since the weekend but no one has been able to give me a definite answer. Was wondering if you could give me some input/advice? My problem is I want to install my Intel SSD that just arrived. But I want to make recovery DVD with DELL DataSafe. So I can use that DVD to reinstall on my SSD.

My main question is mostly about this post, in this thread.
http://forum.notebookreview.com/alie...17x-r-2-a.html

I'm a lost on what exactly are the steps I need to do to ensure an easy reinstall process. I really do not want to lose my Alienware wallpapers and what not. I would greatly appreciate any help. Haven't opened my copy of SC2 yet since I want to install the SSD first. Thanks for your time.

 

After all that, firmware, re-install WIN 7, drivers as suggested, still same benchmarks, boots slightly quicker around 1 minute as seems not to stick on the Windows logo as long.

Is there a way to format these Crucial SSD and start over or not good idea?

-----------------------------------------------------------------------
CrystalDiskMark 3.0 x64 (C) 2007-2010 hiyohiyo
Crystal Dew World : Crystal Dew World
-----------------------------------------------------------------------
* MB/s = 1,000,000 byte/s [SATA/300 = 300,000,000 byte/s]

Sequential Read : 247.890 MB/s
Sequential Write : 135.967 MB/s
Random Read 512KB : 225.724 MB/s
Random Write 512KB : 139.741 MB/s
Random Read 4KB (QD=1) : 19.166 MB/s [ 4679.3 IOPS]
Random Write 4KB (QD=1) : 34.539 MB/s [ 8432.3 IOPS]
Random Read 4KB (QD=32) : 195.500 MB/s [ 47729.4 IOPS]
Random Write 4KB (QD=32) : 133.333 MB/s [ 32552.0 IOPS]

Test : 1000 MB [C: 28.7% (34.2/119.1 GB)] (x5)
Date : 2010/07/28 7:13:28
OS : Windows 7 Ultimate Edition [6.1 Build 7600] (x64)

 

Snowman, your numbers seem totally fine. Something is delaying your boot but I don't think it's the ssd. Do you have another computer you can test the ssd on?
If you do you could try to reinstall windows on the other comp and check if it's taking that long there.
I suspect you will find that it's not.

 

Today, I'm getting my THIRD M17X replacement unit, which will come with two brand new sammys that I need to sell, will post a FS in the appropriate topic later on.

Meanwhile, I had the idea of testing my current (used) sammys speed both in normal and safe mode, just out of curiosity; never benched them in safe mode. What I found is pretty interesting: seems that safe mode does indeed boost the READS, while it seems to not affect the writes, except for the 4K... Picture on the left is in normal mode; the one on the right is in safe mode...

When I'll receive my new unit, I will remove the two brand new sammys, put one my old sammys in the new unit, as well as one of my Intels, will run the Intel toolbox on it, then on the other one; then, I'll re-install windows on the Intels (in RAID0 again), and I'll run the same bench in both normal and safe mode to compare... It promises to be interesting I guess... I'll post it when done.

 

My OCZ Vertex 2 may come tomorrow. Then I will know for sure if it is faster than my Corsair NOVA

 

Today I found out that the Alienware M17x-R2 is killing the performance of SSDs

This is how the drive performed on the R1 with the NVIDIA chipset


This is how the same SSD with the exact same customizations performs on the Intel based chipset of the R2

(the best performance I could get was with the default MS drivers, anything else gives even worse results... )

Very disappointed with that...

 

How are you going to establish that?

Crystal Disk Mark is a very limited way of evaluating the performance of an SSD. Duplicating a folder would be a better way.

I'd like to know how much the difference is then.

 

Unfortunately I can't copy folders on both of them and compare the results since I don't have the R1 any more, the R2 was the replacement, but other benchmark programs confirm the difference. I will run a couple of them and post the results. The problem is mainly on the 4K random reads/writes.

 

I'd be interested if the same difference shows up in real life.

In Crystal Disk the MS driver was faster for me, but in Vantage the Intel was a lot faster.

Not that Vantage is a real life benchmark but it's close enough.

 

What Storage controller are you running ?

May I suggest you try the Intel Rapid Storage Technology v9.6.4.1002; just click the disk under the DL link below....

Pour Chipsets ​	Version	Sous	Pdf	Boot	Whql	Info	Officiel	DL
ICH7R/ICH8R/ICH9/ICH10/i5	9.6.4.1002	Windows 200x/Xp/Vista/7 32/64bits		oui	oui		non

​

And once installed (and after reboot), double-click on it and choose manage, then advance, then enable for the write-cache option; see if that helps...

 

And here are the Intels along with the Samsungs, both in RAID0...

It's interesting to note that the READS are largely favoured in safe mode, for both of them, while the WRITES seems to take a serious hit in safe mode with the Intels, except for the 4Ks, while this is the only area where the Sammys are not effected, except for the same 4Ks...

 

This is after your suggested drivers ( I couldn't find any option to enable the write-cache option inside the Intel Rapid Storage Technology, see the screenshot)



Still the performance is so slow, not even half of what it should be

 

4k reads in raid for x25 intel look worse than with a single drive and they do still look limited like we suspect.
@stamatisx can you test in safe mode and take a screenshot ?

 

Safe Mode gives me better results but still nothing compared to those I had in normal mode with my R1 on the right
---(R2 safe mode--->R1 normal mode)--->

 

This is weird...

Is it really version 9.6.4.1002 ?

To check: goto→Help→about→down right side...

If so, could it be because I run a RAID config

See this pic, where antémémoire à écriture différée (write caching) is active in the pic; Désactiver = To Disable in blue...

When I enabled it, my 4K writes jumped from ±20KB/s to ±40 ~ 75KB/s

Not a bad jump...

 

I have no idea, the thing is that my 4k random writes from 70MB/s dropped all the way down to 24MB/s.
With this chipset and drivers I lost 2/3 of my performance. It's not 10 or 20 MB/s less, it's 50MB/s loss.

 

That's why I tell you that my 4K writes jumped from 20 to 40+ KB/s when I enabled this write caching; huge improvement...

Did you check the version ? (should read 9.6.4.1002)

Do you have write caching enabled in windows as well ?

Right click your C drive→ Property→Hardware→double-click-your-drive→click modify parameters (lower left; admin rights required)→strategy→THE TWO BOXES should be checked...