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

Have you thought about a momentus XT?
Your useage pattens indicate that this may be a better and definately cheaper option

 

Agreed, if you don't mind a slight increase in power consumption and noise.

Vertex 2 will be fine. Also cheaper SSDs will do the trick just as well.

 

Yep, I was thinking about the Momentus XT too but I would like to get rid of standard HDD technology, no heat, no noise, lower power consumption.
I guess Vertex 2 would be fine.
Also thinking of waiting 2more months untill Sandy Bridge comes out (will change laptop), do you think new SSD's are arround the corner?
thanks

 

Intel G3 is expected Q1 2011, possibly sooner.

Crucial C400 and OCZ Vertex 3 are also expected around that time frame.

Personally I expect prices on current SSDs like Sandforce 1200 and Intel G2 will continue to drop slowly.

 

Moving movies from one partition to another?

I would suggest that the SandForce based Vertex 2's are not a good fit for you with their performance limiting DuraClass/DuraWrite firmwares.

I would be first looking for the soon to be released (crosses fingers) Intel G3's or even this:

See:
OCZ Vertex Plus Preview: Introducing the Indilinx Martini - AnandTech :: Your Source for Hardware Analysis and News


Over any SandForce drive with your potential high write usage scenario.

Also concur with waiting for a few short months to get into SB tech - not only will the new SSD's be introduced by then, hopefully SB will not have the performance robbing bugs that current i3/i5/i7 based chipsets exhibit.

See:
http://forum.notebookreview.com/har...-intel-series-4-5-965-chipsets-jjb-tweak.html


I think an XT will be a good fit for your system/usage while you're waiting.

Good luck.

 

I expect prices on gen 2s to drop suddenly upon release of the gen 3s and then continue to slowly drop in price until inventories become low/non existent and production ceases completely.

 

Your point is valid if he transfers many movies per day.

I'd guess he transfers less than a few GB per day on average. Sandforce drives handle that fine, although slightly slower than Intel G2 or Corsair Nova.

Other tasks will be slightly faster with the Sandforce, so still a good choice imo.

 

I posted 3 X25 G2 deals in the Notebook and Tech Bargain section (one has recently expired). They're the lowest I've seen on the Intels so I think the movement of old inventory has begun:

http://forum.notebookreview.com/not...-194-95-after-rebate-amazon-ends-11-30-a.html

http://forum.notebookreview.com/not...-v-2-5-40gb-ssd-69-99-after-rebate-mwave.html

 

Phil, I agree with your assessment,

but just the fact that we do not know what initiates DuraWrite throttling or at what amount per time unit it triggers itself at would still make me wary of them for the intended use we're describing here. I would certainly look at other drives/controllers first before 'settling' for a SandForce with this known usage pattern.

 

Basically EVERY used Sandforce drive I've seen throttles down to 80 MB/sec for incompressible data.

It's only a problem for someone who writes a lot of incompressible data like you

 

Not alot at all, I only use my drive for internet and of course updates to the OS. I have to every 2-3 weeks SE my drive to get the performance back. I do not anywhere near fill the drive before LTWT shows its ugly head. Just those small internet cache files will get you in the end.

At least with my brand drive, but I think it more a FW issue as they just release the FW given to them. If the drive would hold its performance without LTWT and trim alnog with GC worked on the drive and OP NAND I'd be a happy camper. Even just a tool kit to alow me when running to force it based on OS accessable tables for the drive etc. Again SF has to admit there is an issue before anything will ever get done about it, that is again assuming something can be done about it as (speculation allert) maybe it is a fatal issue of the hardware. Hmmmm.......... fatal issue of the hardware would so make me want to purchase another of these.............

 

Why exactly do you care about sequential write speeds for incompressible data if that's all you do?

As far as I know every brand Sandforce with every firmware throttles back to 80MB/sec.

As far as I know doing a Secure Erases so often does far more harm than good.

 

As it slows down so does the IOPS. Also I purchased this drive to be faster then my HDD for writes so I could use it as the work folder.

I can tell you loosing the IOPS I can feel it cruising the net. not that it still isn't faster than any HDD. I purchsed it for 141 MBs and I want my 141 MBs sequential.

Yes it does more harm, but I want my 141 MBs I paid for! Warrenty doesn't exclude SE's so the fact that LTWT enables and they do not fix ait and it dies and they have to replace it is their fault not mine. Not like I am blindly doing this and keeping quiet about the problem, it is a well known issue that as far as I know I uncovered.

For the future I would only go with a XT for a work and OS drive until SSD's mature enough not to have these issues. In hindsight if I would ahve known about LTWT I would have either researched another drive or just got another XT.

I am not saying 80-85 MBs isn't enough for most, it very well is, especially considering access times. it is however not what you will see as the benches everywhere which leads you to the original purchase. Also knowing it is most likely a fixable issue just sticks it too me that much more.

And Yes every SF drive has the LTWT issue and slows to the 80-85 MBs speed. It does this because the firmware slows the drive down, This is LTWT and is suppsed to be disabled when TRIM and GC cleans the drive and usage goes down. It never disables as it is supposed too. Another point of contention at the minimum. I ahve the aboe bare minimum of writes as they are just internet files going to the drive and LTWT enables, if this is the alogorithym they intended ans lowes possible casual use enabling the drive crippling setting without it coming back off then to me this is false advertising. I ahve no issue with slower noncompresible data speeds just the further crippling of these speeds under casual usage.

it is like having a 5870m in the laptop but the GPU fan is purposely disabled to save battery. The video card is more than capable of great speeds but slows itself down to keep cool when any heavy 3D is being done. If this were the case you would have a bunch of people up in arms, but with this issue it seems no one cares but to me this is just as important as the 3D issue would be to a gamer..............

 

Have you measures that? If so, how?

I'd like to understand the issue deeper.

Most of the 4K write performance I've seen on used Sandforce drives still look stellar in CDM. Well except for the one of Tilleroftheearth.

 

TANWare, what do you use to image and restore your drive? I have only SE'd my Intel a few times now and two times did a reinstall, and one time used the Intel transfer tool from my Kingston to the Intel. I haven't found any drive image utility (especially free) that guarantees alignment and don't feel like messing with a dozen different programs to find one that works.

Thanks.

 

The 1Q is not affected, what becomes affected I have easy measure too is the Q32. While the Que depth is never really 32 most times running in real life que depth is well above 1. So this is where you see the difference in IOPS. Sequential writes over all of course I can not use the drive as intended as I wanted to use it for the photo's I was working on at the time. To do so I have to SE almost dailly to keep performance up.

The idea was off load the camera to SSD. Work the raw files as required then archive to the secondary HDD. As it is now I can not do this.

Edit I also wanted to be able to access raw files work photo or video files archved from there and then the worked output to the SSD as jpg's etc using the IO of both drives, this isn't possible either without the LTWT being enabled in no time at all............

Presently, First I create a backup to the secondary drive, I place in a Partition Magic CD, reboot to bios and set as "IDE" and boot to Linux. Perform the SE, replace the CD with a Windows restore CD and reboot to that, do a system image restore from image without auto reboot. Once done reboot accessing bios and remove the CD, set ACHI back then save and reboot and all done. In all this very quick, I haven't timed it though..........

 

What linux distro do you recommend? I tried using a flash drive but to no avail, wouldn't boot. Are you saying that the Partition Magic CD has a linux distro on it? I have an old Partition Magic CD but just boots to DOS and have to manually start PM or DI. Wonder if I can just use GParted CD?

So far, I just used the Intel toolbox since so far I've only SE'd an Intel.

 

Acronis True Image works well with SSDs and keeps alignment.

 

Which version? I have True Image Home 11 and it didn't keep alignment. Neither did DriveImage XML or Paragon's free drive image program. Hate to have to buy another image program...

 

The PM ISO I have has a Linux distro essentailly. It boots right up I used the Pmagic 5.1 ISO............... Te backup I do using the Win7 backup from control pannel.............

 

Needs to be v13 and up. I'm not sure the trial version can do it.

 

So Windows Backup and not System Image?

Ah, great. I guess it's $30 to upgrade. Maybe I'll do that. It's a decent program.

 

It might be worth checking the trial version first. I remember a while ago it was capable of cloning.

 

Right, this way I always have the system right back where it was before performing the SE. For me the PM ISO on a CD with the default system backup image and repair disk works just fine.............

 

Phil,

TANWare answered most of your questions, but just want to add that the sequential speed in CDM may be ~80 for most users. I would be okay with that.

The problem is that it drops to the single digit levels (and below) when I ran AS SSD and it showed the individual iterations dropping lower and lower. Even in AS SSD though, the higher scores are reported (I'm guessing it just 'throws' out the lower scores to make a drive look good).

When right clicking on the desktop is 2+ seconds to 'recover' - SandForce has a problem.

And, seeing TANWare's usage now (with the associated drop in performance still), I can rest assured that my usage is not as extreme as I once thought.

I will have to change my recommendations back to Intel for SSD's - with the additional info TANWare provided here.

Buy another SandForce based SSD with DuraClass/DuraWrite? Only if I become (more) stupid by my next available spending budget.


TANWare, how many times would you say you've SE'd the Mushkin Callisto DX you have?

 

Thanks, I'll have to give that a try. Although, do you mean " Parted Magic" and not "Partition Magic"?

 

I don't really care about the AS-SSD performance as it's just a synthetic benchmark. Who knows what the problem is.

The 2 second thing is annoying. I don't think it's typical for all Sandforce drives as you quickly assume I haven't experienced it on any of the 5 Sandforce drives I tried. I saw the performance drop to 80MB/sec on each one though.

By the way, AS-SSD writes about 15GB on each run. I wouldn't do that on an SSD.

 

Well, the CDM is synthetic also, right?

I have seen this '2 second' thing with each SSD I have tried filled to 50% or more and used 'normally' anywhere from 2 to 10 days.

As to the problem? I think TANWare has summed it up pretty good.

Either all SSD manufacturers based on SF drives give us the tools to really complete/perform TRIM/GC at our discretion, or; release a firmware that does it much more aggresively than the non-working solution the drives now have.

I vote for TANWare to make a new thread specifically about this issue to (hopefully) get SandForce's attention and a quick fix by them too.


If I had a firmware option without the DuraClass/DuraWrite junk as it currently is implemented - I would be flashing the Inferno as we speak. Even if it meant only a year of High Performance Use (the reason I bought it).

 

It would be nice to see a thread with solid proof, like in the PM55 threads.

So far the proof hasn't been very strong.

 

, tilleroftheearth feeling slighted... for not providing strong enough proof.


Seriously, I can see how mine and TANWare's results seem suspect, when nobody else is chiming in to say 'me too'.

The only explanation I can think of is that I'm not coming from just any viewpoint: I know what good/fast mechanical HD's respond like (and what proper optimizations/setups mean too) - as I suspect TANWare knows too.

Others may just see a speed-up compared to 5400 RPM, 2 gen's old mech. drives that the manufacturer got a deal on and in comparison, sure, an SSD may seem 'wow'.

What I'm concerned with is increasing the actual performance in each and every area that the HD/SSD storage subsystem affects - I'm not looking for sideways improvements (trading off improvements in one area (no matter how much better) for detrimental performance (compared to the HD they're supposed to be replacing) in others.

 

I had to look up what slighted means. I don't think I was insulting you, but I wasn't sugar coating my words either.

My point of view is this: If there is a real issue, I'm sure it will be quantifiable and repeatable. If it's not the evidence isn't strong enough to speak of an issue for all SF drives.

So there's an issue at QD32? Shows us the numbers please.

And then I'd love to see that an Intel G2 really does better.

 

oooops yes Parted magic, sorry.........

 

Ask and yee shal recieve...................

"Interesting speculation with the heat, but I don't think that is what is going on here.
The CMD and AS-SSD benches are absolutely worst case scenarios for this controller, this type of data would never normally happen in the real world.
When you do a weeks worth of writes in a few hours by hammering the drive with CMD(or AS-SSD) you are making the "DuraClass Technology" work extremely hard, one of the things that happens is the controller slows the drive to preserve the NAND for the life of the drive.
Remember that Sandforce comes from the Server world, longevity is everything and you are exposing the drive to a highly unusual set of circumstances, the controller will do what it can to preserve the life of the drive(Nand)

To get the drive back to normal speed you have 2 choices, either leave the drive along by just using it normally, the DuraClass technology will see that the number of write are returning to a more normal level and will recalculate, allowing the drive to return to normal levels. This takes time.
Or you can use Secure Erase to restore the drive and start over."

Another thread........... to show it is an attribute

"Modified SMART attribute 230 to indicate “lifetime throttling was active for last write” instead of “lifetime throttling is currently active”"

First picture is symbolic of fresh, second before an SE..........

 

So the issue is that the 4KQD32 write performance dropped to 84 MB/sec?

Here's what a Corsair Nova does (couldn't find the Intel G2)

Corsair Nova Series V128 SSD Performance Review - HD Tach v3.0.4.0 & CrystalDiskMark v3.0 - Legit Reviews

That's 9 times lower than a degraded Sandforce.

I found the Intel too, similar 80MB/sec 4KQD32 random write.

 

no the sequential too dropps to 85-80 MBs too............. I added pics...........

Edit; I should note others sometimes experience even worse...........

2nd Edit; and it NEVER gets back to normal either..............

 

I've said it several times that the sequential writes drops to 80MB/sec. It's a known fact for incompressible writes. OCZ confirms it too.

I doubt that would be noticeable during surfing. And it's not causing Tiller's 2 second problem.

 

interesting reading...

 

The sequential and random drop at the same time. If he is getting the sequential and 4K Q32 at a different rate than that may be a seperate issue. I have seen though others get below 80 MBs.

Now if his sequential is 80 MBs but 4KQ32 is like 10 MBs then it isn't the exact same issue.

Edit because they confirm it does not make it right. It should go back up, the lifetime write throttling is not mean to be turned on and kept that way forever or why ever have it off to begin with?

 

I agree it's weird. I am in no way saying that it's right. Just that it's a known issue and it's easily repeatable.

It's something that Anandtech and Techreport are well aware of.

 

TANWare,

just as additional info, my 4K32QD write performance drops as much as anything else (sequential, etc.) even with both the JJB's and stamatisx tweaks applied.

Here is a CDM after 10 hours idle at the BIOS screen (with highly compressible data).


Ha ha... typing this post the 'tiller 2 second problem' happened again - only it lasted closer to 6 seconds to display the contents of a (small) folder where I have the included jpg file.

This was simply clicking a desktop toolbar I create on all my installs.

(Right Click on the taskbar, select Toolbars and selecting Desktop).

 

If that is 0 fill you have some other issue, without a doubt. I am not saying LTWT is not enabled but it should cap the entire drive not just 4K.........

They along with OCZ may be aware of it but it is because of LTWT not working as it should along with Trim and GC. Even when the drive should be clean the LTWT does not disable as it should. Will SF admit this is an issue and fix it is the question. I have yet to see that.

This means LTWT is a broken function the the SF2 FW. These drives are capping themselves under real world usage, not just CMD or artificial benchmarks. When CMD goes to 80 MBs I can take say 10 gigs of pictures in a folder and transfer them from my HDD to the SSD and see exactly that, a 80 or so MBs transfer rate. While LTWT is not functioning yet I get 95+ MBs as I am limited by the HDD.

Edit;
So in the end it is not a "Degraded SandForce" it is a "Lifetime Write Throttled Sandforce"...............

 

It's any used Sandforce drives. So yeah if compressed writes are important people should get another SSD.

Tiller, you have some other issue. Your 4K QD1 and QD32 is way below normal. I'm not sure why you still haven't done a Secure Erase.

 

New 0006 firmware for the Crucial C300 64/128/256 GB drives is available today, download it from here : Crucial.com Product Downloads - Firmware Updates

Release Date: 11/16/2010

Change Log:

* Improved power management
* Improved power-up behavior after uncontrolled power-down
* Improved full drive and corner-case performance
* Improved TRIM behavior

Note: This is firmware from Revision 0002 to Revision 0006. It will not work for updating between any other versions. If your drive has Revision 0001 firmware, then you MUST first perform the intermediate step of updating to Revision 0002.

 

Finally! Was waiting ages for this... however i'm really scared doing this as i can brick my drive.. is there any tips on flashing firmware? I really need better TRIM so this is good.

Thanks
Leopard 2

 

hiya guys,

i need help.

my OCZ Vertex 2 (Fw1.14) has just randomly decided not to play nice.

its a 240GB drive, but its not being recognised in the bios.

I've taken it out of the computer, but anyone got any advice/tips for me? i'm worried because i have important work on that which i need for friday, otherwise i've lost a fortnights work ffs.

Thanks in advance.

 

@Siorah, I'd try the OCZ forums.

 

Try different settings on your laptop's BIOS, ie change from AHCI to IDE and vice versa. It might recognize it.

*EDIT*
A couple of other things that you might try is to restore BIOS to defaults or as a last resort to use the power drain method.

 

it was with a laptop, and AHCI mode.

the laptop still posts, but doesn't recognise the ssd anymore.

 

Try to power drain the whole thing. If that still doesn't help, sorry to tell that the chances of getting you data back is slim. This is one of the recurring issue with OCZ Sandforce based product.

 

Hey folks, have been out for several months now. I used to read the thread on a daily basis, but I've missed far too much now to keep up with it. Read the last 12 pages or so...

How have things changed since I've been gone as far as the TOP SSD performers? Can anything compare to my two 32gb Intel SLC drives in RAID-0 yet??? When I bought them they were $400 a piece haha.

Also, how do you optimize them nowadays? Are they (the most popular/top performers this community recommends) self-sufficient nowadays or do you still need to download third party software or do tweaks and stuff with the OS?

Just trying to wrap my head around what's going on with SSD's these days. Based on the last few pages or so it doesn't seem I missed TOO much info, but if can anyone can catch me quickly and concisely it'd be appreciated.