Msata - Np9170

I was just watching the XoticPC video for the NP9170 and they showed the unit with the cover off. I was under the impression that the msata drive took the place of your primary drive, but from the video it looks like the msata drive is separate and you have space for the 2 more hard drives.

I already have a Crucial SSD I was going to use as my primary drive and a Seagate Hybrid for the secondary.

Could I add the MSATA drive into my build and use it? If so what would be the performance benefits over what I had planned?

 

Yes you could add an mSata. Performance? You could for example use a small mSata drive as a cache drive for your SSD. But you'd have to get a top end one which is as fast as your 2.5" SSD.. so basically, yeah you can do it if you want more SSD space, else you shouldn't bother.

 

There would be no real performance gains from having the mSATA drive installed unless it is used as caching for your secondary drive.
They are nice if set up as a caching drive or if you wanted to have more space, as previously stated.

 

I thought the OS was installed on the MSATA drive.

How would the MSATA acting as a caching drive be configured? What software would control the caching?


Thanks for the help, I'm trying to do some research now but with my order already placed time is of the essence if I wanted to make changes.

update - I use the search function here and nothing. I use google and it takes me right back to here to a similar link.

http://forum.notebookreview.com/sager-clevo/658956-msata-cache-drive.html im reviewing now.

 

You can install your OS on the mSATA drive, but they are not as quick as the SSD in your primary bay.

The caching is controlled by Intel SRT software visa-vie the chipset on the motherboard and configured in the BIOS and during boot.

 

Okay, I am a new member here and I am very interested in this topic.

I have done a lot of internet searching about the Sager np9170 mSATA and all I find is talk about using it for caching or maybe as a boot drive but all using the Intel 310 mSATA drives.

Everyone talks about only using the mSATA if you are NOT using SSD drives in the other bays because it won't speed those up because the mSATA SSD is slower. But from what I've read, this is ONLY true of the Intel 310. Other mSATA SSD drives are larger capacity and much faster with reads and writes.

According to research on mSATA SSD drives in general, they do not HAVE to be slower than a standard SSD drive. Infact, I just read about a Crucial C400 that is VERY fast--as fast as any 'regular' SSD drive and it has 256 GB, quite a bit larger than the Intel 310.

So... why is no one looking at the mSATA on these notebooks as a viable fairly good capacity fast SSD port?

I spoke with Roland today from Xoticpc and asked him if any mSATA drive would work with the NP9170 and not just the Intel 310 and he said it would.

Therefore, why not put a 'good' SSD in the mSATA spot, such as a 256 GB fast mSATA drive and THEN use it for boot drive with dual big 'slower' 7200 rpm HDD in the other two bays for massive storage?

This seems to be a much better plan than using the mSATA port for slower caching with the Intel 310.

Ideas? Comments? Wonder why Sager dealers don't offer any mSATA drives with the NP9170 other than the less desirable Intel 310?

Rob

 

mSATA bay is SATA 2 for starters, while the main bays are SATA 3. Regular SSDs also have better $/storage and $/performance. Only the very new mSATAs can match regular SSDs.

I can't say why Sager doesn't use other drives. mythlogic does. I think that Sager has some tie up with Intel.

 

What is the performance gain on setting up and using an m-SATA SSD drive for caching for the secondary drive ?

 

Well, this isn't very scientific, but from what I have read, if used to cache an HDD, it is pretty good compared to the HDD by itself---not up to par with using an SSD by itself.

If using a mSATA SSD to cache another SSD, I have read that this gives minimal to no performance increase, and it makes sense because the SSD hard drive doesn't need more SSD caching--it already works at that level of performance (actually faster than most mSATA SSD's used for caching).

Rob

 

Hmmm.. Thanks Well that means I won't be getting an SSD till it's more mainstream and reasonable.

 

Odd. I thought I saw/heard in the XOTIC video that the test they showed was on a volume of 160GB and the test machine only included a 80G mSATA drive and a 120G SSD as seen in the bios section of the video. I thought I heard the reviewer mention that the great numbers in the test were the result of adding the mSATA drive to the Intel 520 and enabling SRT. The reviewer made a point that both drives didn't need to be the same size and "it is kind of like what Seagate tried to with its hybrid drives." He also said "the performance boost just over the standard 520 series is ... boy it's pretty sizable!"

I was wondering if anyone's used it in combination with the two 2.5" bays in raid 0 or 1? It might be interesting if someone could run some numbers on all of the different drive configurations you can do with this system!