SSD boot via expresscard slot

FileMate 24GB ExpressCard/34 Ultra SSD MLC w/ USB 2.0: 3FMS4D24M-WR

Has anyone tried something like this out? Are the speeds very limited? What kind of increase would you see in comparison to a 5,400RPM or 7,200RPM drive when the OS is installed on it?

 

Oh and does anyone know what version of Express slot the Vaio VPCEC290X has? It just Says "Express card"

 

I'm not sure if Expresscards are bootable devices. The "type" of Expresscard doesn't really matter; Expresscard comes in 54 mm and 34 mm varieties (you can take a look at Wikipedia, here for pictures), but the 54 mm card can take both 54 mm and 34 mm cards (the 34 mm version can only take 34 mm cards). In the case of the VPCEC290X, however, it's an Expresscard/34. I also seem to recall complaints that Expresscard SSDs ran rather hot, but it's been a while.

 

See Booting Windows 7 from ExpressCard which afaik hasn't been successfully done yet. The most promising idea is the Kansas city shuffle, using one media to initiate the boot then switch to your expresscard once it's started up.

 

I've heard of MacOSx being booted onto it already.

Will the SSD be throttled by it? I'm mostly curious in:
What speeds a 5.4k RPM drive gets
What speeds express cards limit to
What speeds that thing can actually do

 

Anyone? =p

 

Newegg lists it with rather average speeds, up to 115 MB/s read, and 65 MB/s writes. Prices are also really, really, expensive ($3.5+/GB). It might be worth taking a look through the feedback on that product page ( here) for some other opinions. Basically, for sequential writes, it's maybe about even to worse than a 5400 RPM drive, although it seems to do a bit better in the randoms.

 

Aren't randoms the only ones that matter? If it's not going to be a big difference I won't bother.

 

Here are the benches for the one you listed:
Xbench score for Solidgo
Disk Test 77.90
Sequential 100.44
Uncached Write 120.43 73.94 MB/sec [4K blocks]
Uncached Write 102.98 58.27 MB/sec [256K blocks]
Uncached Read 57.57 16.85 MB/sec [4K blocks]
Uncached Read 225.20 113.18 MB/sec [256K blocks]
Random 63.62
Uncached Write 18.78 1.99 MB/sec [4K blocks]
Uncached Write 147.62 47.26 MB/sec [256K blocks]
Uncached Read 953.92 6.76 MB/sec [4K blocks]
Uncached Read 555.79 103.13 MB/sec [256K blocks]


And here's the Seagate momentus 7200:
Disk Test 52.42
Sequential 113.24
Uncached Write 168.27 103.32 MB/sec [4K blocks]
Uncached Write 153.04 86.59 MB/sec [256K blocks]
Uncached Read 56.00 16.39 MB/sec [4K blocks]
Uncached Read 200.40 100.72 MB/sec [256K blocks]
Random 34.10
Uncached Write 10.76 1.14 MB/sec [4K blocks]
Uncached Write 166.54 53.32 MB/sec [256K blocks]
Uncached Read 84.92 0.60 MB/sec [4K blocks]
Uncached Read 151.34 28.08 MB/sec [256K blocks]"

It seems to have a big advantage on reads/ random.

 

Well, it is still an SSD. Personally, the things I've heard about Expresscard SSDs that bother me is the heat and the price. I'd rather just get a regular SSD at that point, and get more capacity for my dollar. In fact, I did.