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

+1 Good to know -- thanks.

Other than the obvious benefit (more capacity), is there any performance benefit to having a larger drive w/ more cells (like fewer reads, writes, and erases per cell)?

If there is, this could be a real decision for me. If not, that gen2 Intel is still looking mighty good. Whenever it resurfaces, that is...

 

If there are more cells, then the lifespan of the SSD goes up because the algorithms used to R/W have more cells to use, leading to less wear per cell on average. This typically means a longer lasting and more reliable SSD.

 

Hmm, could you please expand on that idea? The reason I ask is because SSD's are currently quite small compared to their HDD counterparts, and as such would fill up very fast.

 

You shouldn't use a typical defrag on a SSD b/c it would cause more wear and damage the cells. While most affordable ones are smaller than their HDD counterparts, they operate on different principles.

 

As is often the case, Dell UK manage to combine old rubbish with stupid prices. Here's their offering. Sata 150, 128GB for a bargain price of $1360

 

Interesting benchmarks. OCZ Vertex looks good too.

 

Yeah first review that put the Vertex right up with the intel, most of the new reviews show the new intel being faster than all else including the old intel.

here is hoping we see a sub $200 120GB Vertex sale (or Falcon)

 

I like Laptopmag reviews because they rely on real world benchmarking.

I'm keeping my eye on the OCZ Vertex 60GB. But at the moment it's hardly cheaper Intel Gen 2 80GB.

 

I see, but do they actually slow down as they fill up (as many hard drives do)?

 

It will take some time before OCZ's price cut reaches stores and unfortunately the drop won't be much. According to their price cut, it will still be $190 USD, compared w/ Intel's $225 USD (OCZ being more expensive per GB).

 

Yeah they didnt cut prices on the 60gb much at all, the big cut was on the 120gb and the price cut that is being advertised for OCZ has not hit the actual stores yet, seems like when it does hit it will be done via rebate anyways.

 

Yeah I'm expecting a price drop on the 60GB soon. Here's the price development sofar:

 

I appreciate the "real world" benches, too. The funny thing about that review, though, was that they completely ignored the Summit when drawing up their top 5 -- despite the fact that it consistently scored near the top of their tests, winning one of them outright. The take-home message from that review, for me, was that there was little to no difference between Indilinx and Samsung controllers on real-world tests -- but still obviously a major difference between those two and jmicron.

 

Phil, how are you getting those price charts? Is there a website that can track prices for you, or are you making them yourself?

 

I get them from the dutch site http://tweakers.net/pricewatch

So dutch prices.

 

The 256 GB drive that dell sells is the Samsung with the 2nd generation controller. I have it in my T400 and I think it's fast.

 

Speaking of prices I though I would check on the Falcon to see how it is doing, and I was in newegg looking for my server parts.

128GB for $320 shipped http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16820231256

Thats actually cheaper than the Vertex even though I have only seen a price reduction announcement for OCZ and not G.Skill.

Math wise that puts the Falcon in at $2.50 per GB

While the G2 160gb Intel is comming it at $2.80 per GB

Probably not a big enough gap in the per GB section to make you choose one over the other.

But when it comes to outright cost the $320 is easier to take down than the $449 of the Intel and its in stock.

So if you feel you can survive on less space than 160gb but need more than 80gb the Falcon maybe still a good pick.

All of it is still preemptive though. I feel in a few months we will see larger price cuts.

 

I have tried twice in the past couple weeks to order the 256GB drive from Dell. The first time they delayed it 3 times (1 week longer each time) and then finally cancelled it. The 2nd time (now) they have delayed it once already (was supposed to be delivered yesterday, now pushed back a week) and I suspect they will wind up delaying/cancelling it again.

In other words, if you didn't already buy one from Dell, it may be too late. Despite the fact that the web site says it usually ships in 24 hours, I think they're out of stock and have no idea when it will be in stock, and are too dishonest to actually tell anyone that.

 

Was price hunting/checking and I maybe fould the new G2 80GB intel in stock at ecost.

http://www.ecost.com/detail.aspx?ed...google-_-ewbbase-_-Storage&CAWELAID=372595882

It has the old G1 photo but it clearly has the G2 model number and its listed as in stock.

I kinda want to order it but really should hold out for price cuts and a larger capacity.

 

One more time, in case anyone missed my question: do ssd's slow down as they fill? Thanks.

 

Most SSDs do, though I believe Tony @ OCZ did demo a full Vertex EX w/o performance loss...

 

So, most SSDs do, but OCZs don't? What gives?

 

There won't be any price cuts anytime soon, as the G2 drives' price is already "cut", so it can be months before they lower it again. Now is the good time to get one.

Intel temporarily stopped shipments of G2 drives, because of a small firmware issue. They are going to resume shipments sometime next week, after it's been fixed.

 

For one, the Vertex EX is an SLC drive, and costs an arm and a leg more than most consumer drives which are MLC. OCZ's MLC drives show degradation like anyone else.

 

Hi guys! First time posting in this thread.

I want to buy an Intel 80GB 2nd generation SSD drive (160GB is too expensive), and would like to ask you for any advice, tips and tricks on using that type of drive (this will be my first SSD). I simply plan to swap my 250GB 5400rpm drive for this one and install Windows 7 on it. Is there anything special I should do? Any advice is welcome. Thank you!

 

You don't need to do anything special, just treat it like a normal HDD (that's super fast). Oh and don't need to defrag.

 

Thanks! It's simpler than I thought, which is good!

 

Yes they do/can, this is what the TRIM feature is supposed to help prevent. This feature though is only in certain SSD's (vertex with new firmware and the 2nd gen Intel are the only two I think) and it has to be supported by the OS.

Windows 7 is the only one that supports it native, but I think there is a way to do it with XP/Vista.

 

If your notebook has a shock sensor to protect the hdd, you may want to disable that, too.

 

I thought that's a hard disk's feature, not the notebook's
because the 7200rpm disks specifically said "with free fall sensor", while the 5400rpm disks didn't have that. Not sure if we are talking about the same thing. Also, why should that be disabled?

 

It can be on both the hard drive itself and on the computer. I'm not sure how the one built into the computer works, but the hard drive feature just parks the head to minimize damage on impact.

 

I'm just curious why it should be disabled on the computer (if it's there).

 

The fujitsu's is software controlled; you can set how sensitive you want the shock sensor to be. If you want to completely disable it, you have to use the applet. Why bother? I don't know that there's any harm that can result, but there's no need to disrupt data transfer to/from a SSD. I mean -- if a shock is severe enough to bother a SSD, chances are the rest of the notebook is already in pieces.

At any rate, I remember reading it my owners' manual. I don't know how common it is, but I figured I'm probably not alone...

 

I have a 1.8" Samsung 64GB MMCRE64G8MXP-0VB in my laptop pc.

My OCZ Vertex in my desktop PC has TRIM and FULL ERASE ability to either erase unused Flash Chips with a File System enabled for basically to reset the drive to its brand new state.

Do the Samsungs have anything like this? or after a format do all the flash chips stay active so effictively in a few months of heavy use its slower than a $3 flash drive?

 

I agree. What will this do for the SSD's?

 

Some slow down (degrade) and some don't... My samsung SLC DOESNT slow down, and i thought back when intel fixed their firmware on the G1's the slow down basically fixed itself as the drive was written too. and i would think the G2's are even better at it. i don't know if the samsung MLC's degrade or any indilinx drives. any Jmicron seems to slow dramaticly.

 

On further investigation, it seems like the reason has less to do with the newly installed SSD and more to do with compatibility problems between the software and SSDs (or maybe any non-Fujitsu HDD?) which apparently might create problems for drive operation.

So it doesn't seem applicable to all cases after all. The important thing, I guess, is to check for any possible issues, whatever the brand., just to be on the safe side.

 

if you shake your notebook and it has shock - resistance enabled, it will shut down the hdd/ssd for the shake duration.

that means, during that time, no disk access can happen. so it may block your system during the shake. if you want to prove, that your laptop can be shaken and still plays back a movie, it would be a good laught, as it stops playing while shaking.

disable it. it can only annoy, never help. and possibly, in some configurations, maybe actively harm.

 

I've read that OS X (even in Leopard?) has some underlying code for Trim already in it, but it has yet to be implemented. With Snow Leopard only a month away, who knows if it even will.

 

A Video of Windows 7 RC 64-bit on 80GB Intel G2.

 

alright im getting one of those

 

The video made you decide?!! As soon as I saw it was 9 minutes long I was like "ahhh, I'm not watching this." Maybe I'm just impatient.

 

It showed some programs getting installed pretty fast, quick boot up too.

 

Any predictions on how the scene will look in about ~5 months?

EDIT: Did a quick number crunch and 80 gb hard drives are ~38% (give or take) higher $/gb than this prediction (using the "Flash" indicator in the middle).

That means that, if prediction holds, then the price will be ~$152 for an 80gb SSD, but if the current ~38% deviation holds, then the prices for 80gb drives will be ~$210.

Just rough, rough numbers to think about.

EDIT EDIT: BTW, that graph is over 2 years old

 

Intel will be bringing out new ssd's, the "refresh" of the current 2nd gen 34nm ssd's, which includes a 320gb model, as seen on the roadmap. Since the new drives coming in the first half of next get a performance increase over current G2's, despite still being 34nm, will they be the third generation, or gen 2.5?

 

Probably just gen 2.5, I don't see them making any big changes hardware wise. Might even be just a firmware upgrade.

 

Isn't that one of the things the Intel is not that good at? OCZ Vertex would beat it afaik through the better writing speeds.

 

no, it didn't. Just reaffirmed what I was thinking.

 

Seen this ? 2.23GB/s with 16 X25-E. Too bad that you cannot boot from them

From Tom's Hardware : Breaking Records With SolidStateDs: 16 Intel X25-Es Do 2.2 GB/s

 

New low price for Samsung 64GB

http://www.mwave.com/mwave/skusearch_v3.asp?scriteria=BA31644

$120 after rebate. Shipping is extra, though. This is a great price, but I am still waiting for the sub-$200 Intel 80B G2.