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

My old super talent 64gb ssd died on me a few nights ago... I had a coupon for 10% off any ocz ssd on newegg so I grabbed this one here Newegg.com - OCZ Vertex 2 OCZSSD2-2VTXE60G 2.5" 60GB SATA II MLC Internal Solid State Drive (SSD)

for 99 bucks plus the $15 rebate.... was this a good choice for a netbook ssd?

 

It's a good choice if you like to gamble

About 20% of the 1200 Vertex 2 reviews on Newegg mention theirs failed.

It's a cheap deal though. Maybe it's worth the gamble.

 

how old was it? just curious.

 

Also, any warning signs?

 

ya it just randomly decided to die one night... it was kind of all of a sudden when I was in ubuntu it started to transfer files extreamly slow (about 2mb/s) I thought it was just a bug or something in the os so I rebooted... the bios would not detect the drive... tried putting it in a different machine I had and same thing..... I wasn't that mad since it was a free hand me down drive... it was just weird because drives do not usualy just die like that

the drive itself was 08/09 something... it was one of the first drives that came out to have trim support... super talents warranty was only 1 year on the drive

 

well, i've had some hdds die like that. but sad to hear it died that way. hope over time ssds and their firmwares are selfaware enough to prevent that and inform you early.

 

i know something about "life" of SSD, but very little about their death..

when a Hard disk fail that's because the platters and the head crush, or the electric spinner breaks down. why a SSD can die so suddenly? too much voltage or current to NAND memory and/or controller?

 

different SSD can have different 'reasons'. According to OCZ, most of their SF die because the controller has entered into 'panic mode(i.e. fail to boot)' and lock itself down. They want people to ship the thing back so they can go through the logs contained in the SSD(kind of aeroplane black box).

The SSD controller is just a computer, very much like a smart phone. When it cannot boot, it cannot boot.

 

I sprang for an Intel 320 160GB. Will be here Friday!

 

congrats, sure a wise choice. nothing over the top, but something that delivers and is nice in price.

 

Thanks. I factored in reliability and the Intel name, and the fact I do not have SATA 3. Been without an SSD for a month since my NOVA bit the dust (controller failure) and am excited to get "Back to the Future"

Just could not bring myself to go Sandforce. Or Marvel for that matter.

In an ideal world, I would have gotten an Intel 510 250GB as well and sent back the one I did not want. BUT, that does not factor in reliability, which takes time.

 

If you don't want Marvell the Intel 510 is not a good choice

 

Yep, at least I would try it but if I did not like it I could return it. I WOULD like to give them a chance. But I could only choose one this time around

 

Intel SSD Roadmap. Hope they make a 7mm version of the 520 series.

 

Any word on the controller used in the 520?

 

I, too, would like to offer my thanks - for confirming that my thoughts on swapfiles on ramdisks were correct.

 

wohoow another supporter.

and my post nr. 7000, which obviously belongs in here, into the ssd thread. can't wait for a bright hdd-less future, where even tiller benefits from an ssd

 

Could that be the rumored drive with Sandforce controllers. If intel can price it right and its fast, it would be great.

I am skeptical they will be able to have an inbuilt 6Gbps controller.

it would be lame if they use another marvell controller(unless that can match Sandforce).

 

oh, now that's the post nr. 7000. i fail at counting.

sandforce from intel? NOOOOHHH!

i still hope they develop own stuff again the future. there's no real competition if all just use the same..

 

I ordered a C400 64GB for my netbook (Vaio YB). Will update when I get it.

There wasn't really a point in getting SATA III but they're pretty cheap.

 

a good sata3 drive should be a nice sata2 drive

 

That's what I thought too. Hopefully it will have low idle consumption.

 

I am waiting (somewhat) patiently for that day.


As I may have hinted/mentioned before: that day will come when the capacity of SSD's matches the then current HDD's (around 1TB is where I'll be happy). Then no matter what it (almost) costs, an SSD will be a real performance upgrade for me and my usage.

Until then, hope everyone else enjoys these 'toys'.

 

Tiller, I thought you would be testing an Intel 510?

 

Phil, yes;
I am still trying to get ahead enough (with work) to get (possibly) behind with testing one. Also, the only one I have had available to me now is the 120GB version - I want to test the 250GB one so hopefully in the next few days/weeks.

Will definitely keep everyone here updated on my experience with one.

 

you know that one can perfectly well balance out to have high performance for the in-use data, and high storage for the not-in-use data. in my case, that's between 40-160gb highperformance per system, and 5.5tb high storage for the rest.

i'm not sure how much data you have at one time really in use, tiller. but in most cases, the solution i use is perfect for endusers both at home as at work.

so it's not just toys at all. you might have special needs, and you lack the skill to put an ssd to good use when you have one (smile), but that does not mean they're toys.

 

Did any of you guys notice that the prices for the Crucial C300 256GB went up again?!?! One would assume that they should drop wirth the C400 being available now.
Just checked Amazon, and even my marketplace vendor I bought mine from about 10 days ago raised their prices form 370 back to 420. Amazon itself is at 473!!! Makes me think if I should sell my unopened C300 and get a C400 instead. What's going on here. SSD pricing is fluctuating more than RAM prices were 10 years ago.

 

Just because they work for you doesn't mean they work for me.

I have all the skills needed to 'put an SSD to good use' - but I haven't found one yet that gives me back what I (want) to use it for.

Still a toy for me - still useful for you. See both are valid points of view without trying to make me look too stupid.

 

you said you got not much more than hdd performance out of it (sometimes even less). that is something i never where able to reproduce, no matter what i do. so what's your special workload again, where a hdd which in ANY performance aspect is slower than an ssd can possibly be suddenly faster?

not worth the money is another topic. but not being faster, there you really failed if that was true for you. i will never be able to agree with you on that part.

 

If he needs to write in the TB range(as part of the workflow) then no that is not manageable manually(in-use, not-in-use).

 

yes, but that is a minority of the users (thus not making an ssd a toy), and would still not change the fact that the systems performance (outside of that specific task) would increase (which he stated it didn't). so even that kind of task would not make his points valid (at least not the way he makes those points).

and having to write in a TB range is quite difficult on a laptop. how many TBs can you have in there? (and how long does it take on a hdd to write a tb? quite long.. i've just moved my home server (around 3.5 unduplicated tb of data) to a new one. took quite long.)

 

I mean 'TB range', not necessary that each read/write is in TB. What seems to be happening is that he needs very large SSD with very good write performance as his write is unusually large. And that his work pattern would unveil short comings of SSD's GC(and increased WA) which results in performance degrade.

On the other hand, his HDD drive setup while may be slower initially but would not degrade due to repeated write. IOW, SSD was faster initially but drop through the baseline HDD performance over time due to his specific usage pattern.

 

my ssds don't degrade due to repeated write. hello, trim

 

But your pattern is different from his. Beside, I believe he was using a SF drive, not sure about other model.

 

i have tons of patterns, and none can reproduce his case without first slowing down hdds to a crawl (fully random writes). and even those don't drive down the performance of my ssds (trim never slows down over time. it slows down when there's no space left. but so does a hdd (for different reasons, but running out of space is always slowing down).

so if his workload is sequencial, a good ssd beats the hdd with ease (and does not slow down over time). if it's random, then the ssd beats the hdd always, no matter what.

if that is not true, he has a problem with his ssd. (using an SF drive is one such case. there, you have a problem with the ssd..)

 

^^^^get out the popcorn ^^^^
Seriously guys, no need to argue. Everybody his own needs and likes. I am sure that the people who have a SSD appreciate it, and the once that don't for some reason, don't. There is always some specialty use to anything that might render the latest technology not worth the money.
Hey, I can't use CD drive because I am running a DOS based applciatio that needs to be loaded form floppy, and that is the only program running on that computer, so a CD drive is useless technology???

 

he claims to have gotten WORSE performance with an ssd. that should never happen. if it happens, it only means one thing: the ssd had a problem in that specific setup (not the task, the hw setup. maybe it's a crappy ssd (sandforce), or the hw did not support it and throttled it or similar).

and that's the point where tiller annoys me. he argues a bit like that, and thus suggests in a lot of places where we all say "an ssd would be best" that this is not true, a hdd would perform better. which can't be true.
so no, ssds are no toy. and they're not useless.


and yeah, i love popcorn times as long as people learn out of it, it'll all be fine.

 

Guys, I have explained it to davepermen a few times; he just doesn't want to get it.

Even when he admits that he's never played with the level of HDD's that I have an am accustomed to.

All he needs to do is prove how inadequate my logical facilities are.

Okay dave - I'm stupid, you win.

Now, please stop this inane rant you're on, okay?

 

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Lol........

 

So what HD is faster than what SSD, under what circumstances? Should be a simple question to straightforwardly answer, right?

As far as I can tell, modern SSDs are faster in all respects than modern HDDs. Not as big, not as cheap, but across-the-board faster. Is there really a situation where that's not true?

 

Yes there is one situation. In large file copies sequential speeds are important. Many SSDs have a sustained sequential write below 100MB/sec. Especially Sandforce 1x00 SSDs write with ~80MB/sec when it comes to incompressible data.

So if you have a source that's fast enough to supply data at higher than 100MB/sec the SSD can be slower than a fast 7200rpm HDD. A fast 7200rpm HDD has a sustained sequential write of more than 100MB/sec in the outside area of the platters.

Tillerofthearth used a Sandforce SSD. If he used a Samsung 470, that writes with 260MB/sec, I don't think he would have had a problem.

This shows the write speeds of incompressible data. The Mushkin Callisto is a Sandforce based SSD. Notice how the sequential write of the WD Black is higher.

http://www.hardwarecanucks.com/foru...rpio-black-750gb-2-5-hard-drive-review-7.html

 

Fair enough...though that seems like it's sort of cherry-picking the worst SSD to go against a very fast HD. Seems like with any reasonably apples-to-apples comparison of modern drives would put SSDs ahead in all cases. Is that really what tilleroftheearth is basing his whole case on?

In any case, I appreciate the straightforward response.

 

I think that is what he bases his case on combined with some performance degradation issues specific to Sandforce. When Sandforce 1x SSDs have to write large amounts of incompressible data they will even throttle to 60MB/sec.

At the time he choose his SSD these Sandforce issues weren't known. Looking back on it he picked the worst SSD possible for his usage.

And I agree, this is a very rare case. Normally SSDs will always be faster than HDDs.

 

as i said before: with a good ssd (and i don't see anything ocz as good for a variety of reasons) there should never be a case of lower-than-hdd performance. that does not mean that there can't be such cases (an intel g2 ssd on a notebook throttled sata1 chipset sucks, for example).

it does just mean that all those cases are a bad combination of hardware, and can be fixed by having a different choice of hardware (in case of the throttled sata1, a samsung ssd fixed it).

so his case could have easily been fixed by using another ssd (it wasn't his if i remember right anyways).


oh, and for the important things: i LOOOVE HAL and how e can't let me do this, can't let me do that.. he's awesome. big daddy of GLAdos. and while we're at it, "i'm in space" (for those who understand)

it's not a rant, it's a fight against lies. bring me the hdd that has higher performance than a good ssd. show me the one that has 250MB/s seq reads, or writes. that has the random performance > 1MB/s (yeah, that would be awesome. even while ssds are at 50x that by now).

show me the hdd that beats my ssds. then, i can accept your statement. till then, it's nothing but a lie based on a faulty situation that you experienced.

 

Even Intel G2 can have lower than HDD sequential writes. For most people not very impotant but for some rare exceptions it can be important.

 

Impressive, although i expected some new ssd from intel 5 seems really nice, but the only one that im looking forward is the 520s, but a little worried with 480gb size.... seems on Sanforce style, then again there is 64gb so might not be.... guess time will tell.

 

i know, which is why i chose it, and wouldn't if it would be important for me. i specifically don't care much about write speeds above 100MB/s as i'm on Gblan with my home server, so there's not much situation where >100MB/s file transfers happen.

if i would care, i would have gotten another ssd.

point is partially mood as, by now, even the intel ssds have about equal write speed than the fastest hdds.

 

from what i remember
A intel x25 m beats a SAS 15k in every way less sequential writes, but surely around the world there are some SSD who s**k compared to HD, for example i read from Anand tech that some model have the maximum latency higher than HD..

 

SSD Reading List

http://bytepawn.com/2009/10/18/ssd-reading-list/

Also interesting is a toaster for raw SATA hard drives, either 2.5” or 3.5”. You drop any hard drive in the top and plug the USB 2.0 plug into your computer and the hard drive is connected.

http://www.thermaltakeusa.com/Product.aspx?C=1346&ID=1642