How to replace the SSD in Vaio VPCZ11 and VPCZ12 with non-Sony SSD

-----------------------------------------------------------------------
CrystalDiskMark 3.0.1 x64 (C) 2007-2010 hiyohiyo
Crystal Dew World : Crystal Dew World
-----------------------------------------------------------------------
* MB/s = 1,000,000 byte/s [SATA/300 = 300,000,000 byte/s]

Sequential Read : 343.008 MB/s
Sequential Write : 383.427 MB/s
Random Read 512KB : 236.691 MB/s
Random Write 512KB : 328.112 MB/s
Random Read 4KB (QD=1) : 16.501 MB/s [ 4028.5 IOPS]
Random Write 4KB (QD=1) : 238.650 MB/s [ 58264.1 IOPS]
Random Read 4KB (QD=32) : 286.988 MB/s [ 70065.4 IOPS]
Random Write 4KB (QD=32) : 324.623 MB/s [ 79253.7 IOPS]

Test : 2000 MB [C: 9.6% (44.6/464.2 GB)] (x5)
Date : 2011/08/02 15:24:31
OS : Windows 7 SP1 [6.1 Build 7601] (x64)

This was test #2.

 

-----------------------------------------------------------------------
CrystalDiskMark 3.0.1 x64 (C) 2007-2010 hiyohiyo
Crystal Dew World : Crystal Dew World
-----------------------------------------------------------------------
* MB/s = 1,000,000 byte/s [SATA/300 = 300,000,000 byte/s]

Sequential Read : 345.267 MB/s
Sequential Write : 372.926 MB/s
Random Read 512KB : 235.263 MB/s
Random Write 512KB : 321.660 MB/s
Random Read 4KB (QD=1) : 16.077 MB/s [ 3925.1 IOPS]
Random Write 4KB (QD=1) : 227.421 MB/s [ 55522.7 IOPS]
Random Read 4KB (QD=32) : 293.943 MB/s [ 71763.4 IOPS]
Random Write 4KB (QD=32) : 324.185 MB/s [ 79146.6 IOPS]

Test : 4000 MB [C: 9.6% (44.6/464.2 GB)] (x5)
Date : 2011/08/02 15:38:49
OS : Windows 7 SP1 [6.1 Build 7601] (x64)


Final test. Why no 400+? I have enabled write-back cache.

 

These are my 128x2 results, your reads do seem kinda low

 

Do you have the bios hack? Try disabling c-state

 

Yep, I have the bios hack. This is after disabling C-States... Firmware 007. My write speeds are fast, but read speeds are 80-100MB/s off in the first two sections.

-----------------------------------------------------------------------
CrystalDiskMark 3.0.1 x64 (C) 2007-2010 hiyohiyo
Crystal Dew World : Crystal Dew World
-----------------------------------------------------------------------
* MB/s = 1,000,000 byte/s [SATA/300 = 300,000,000 byte/s]

Sequential Read : 365.963 MB/s
Sequential Write : 393.019 MB/s
Random Read 512KB : 323.710 MB/s
Random Write 512KB : 380.797 MB/s
Random Read 4KB (QD=1) : 25.922 MB/s [ 6328.7 IOPS]
Random Write 4KB (QD=1) : 249.054 MB/s [ 60804.3 IOPS]
Random Read 4KB (QD=32) : 288.682 MB/s [ 70479.0 IOPS]
Random Write 4KB (QD=32) : 325.450 MB/s [ 79455.6 IOPS]

Test : 2000 MB [C: 9.7% (44.8/464.2 GB)] (x5)
Date : 2011/08/02 21:45:44
OS : Windows 7 SP1 [6.1 Build 7601] (x64)

 

Hi All,
I read through the entire post, lots of info there, thank you.
I have a question or two as it is still not clear to me.
I have a Z13 in 128Gb config (64+64). From the info above I understand that there is room for two drives (not counting one in optical bay).
1- So can one add another Sony 64+64 in there?
I understand that a 256 config has just that - 2 sets of 128 (64+64).
2- If yes would I need two connectors as well?
3- would a Z11 128 Samsung work for that?
Thank you.

 

1 - Go to Intel RST console and check the serial numbers of your drives. If the last 4 numbers are identical, you have one 2x64GB board. And there is physically space for another.
2 - You need a new SSD ribbon cable with ZIF jacks for hooking up Z11 drives. Then, your existing toshiba drives with the mSATA jack can't be connected.
3- See 2., a Z11 Samsung has a ZIF jack and your Z13 has an mSATA jack. Incompatible.

 

In this situation where the last 4 numbers are identical, would I need a different or another cable if I wanted to add another 128GB SSD? (I've got a Z11 - It's got 2x MMCRE28GQDXP-MVB - 2x64GB)

 

To simplify what we are talking about here see this picture that shows a dual SSD on the left side and a 4x SSD setup on the right side. In your case, the left side shows what you currently have inside your Z.



If you have the same Serial ending, that means you have the 2x64GB - double sided SSD board (part 501 in the picture). So you have the left configuration with one board and the ribbon cable highlighted in yellow (no. 517 in the pic, Sony Part No. 1-881-491-12, Sony description PWB, FPC-202 FLEXIBLE PRINT).

If you want to add another identical drive (a second 501, see in the right part of the picture), you need another ZIF cable with a second connector ( green, no. 518, Sony Part No. 1-881-492-12, Sony description PWB, FPC-209 FLEXIBLE PRINT)

Hope this helps.

 

Super thanks for the information. Just wondering, is the "yellow" ribbon cable which has a single ZIF connector also called FPC-202 1-881-491-12?

 

Sorry my bad! Thanks for correcting me.

Yellow is 1-881-491-12, FPC-202, Single SSD connector (2xSSD Samsung)
Green is 1-881-492-12, FPC-209, Two SSD connectors (4xSSD Samsung)

If you want to do a 4x SSD setup, you need the latter. I updated the post above.

 

I got identical last 4 numbers in my 128Gb Z13, toshiba drive.
So a better way would be to add another Z12/Z13 2x64 toshiba board and I'd need another mSATA ribbon there?
Or could I "squeeze in" another 1.8 mSATA drive in there as explained at the beginning of this thread by Enny02 ?
Would that make a quad RAID?

Thank you pyr0

 

Did you do the SSD upgrade in your z13?
If so, can you give instructions?

 

Hmm, I tried to use search and looked through the entire thread... but couldnt find any info whether its possible to add a SSD (or 2) into the cheaper hdd version of the z13, which has a 2,5 hdd drive and adapter in the ODD bay. anybody tried?

putting in a nice quite 2,5 hdd with enough storage and a fast SSD seems like the perfect combination...

 

it's possible, but you're gonna need more than just a 1.8" ssd as the HDD model uses the SSD's sata port instead of the optical drive's port. You will need an ultrabay caddy even though you already have something similar, as the after market one will use the correct sata port.

Check out this thread. He uses my old OEM SSD but it's the same idea

http://forum.notebookreview.com/son...laptop-newmodeus-hdd-caddy-review-photos.html

 

In the end I decided not to as I instead replaced the optical drive with a 1TB rotating drive.

Two things turned me off:
1) http://forum.notebookreview.com/sony/478621-fix-new-z-quadssd-extra-ssd-cpu-bug.html
2) Having to rebuild and reinstall everything

That said, I would not recommend the Samsung Spinpoint M8 1TB drive that I have.

 

@Pyro or anyone who would know,

I also have a Z11 with the 2x64.
I'm trying to ingest all of the great information in this thread.

If I'm understanding this right, if I want to go aftermarket, I would get the A1781464A part? This part would provide up to 2 msata ports so I could either 1 or 2 1.8" ssd's (either in raid 0 or ahci).

Thank you for your time and your great info!

 

Has anyone managed to source the part in the last few weeks? I am based in London and have approached some local repair centres to see if they can source the part for me. I will let you know if I have any luck.

 

yup, that's the part!

 

Sorry for this question here, but I do not know where else to ask:

I r eplaced my DVD drive with a Samsung SSD 470 128GB (in a caddy from newmode us).

Can you please tell me what system settings I have to adapt in order to get the best performance?
I have read the one must make sure that AHCI is enabled in the BIOS. But I cannot find that anywhere in the VPCZ12 BIOS.

Also, what do I have to do to prevent degradation for the installed RAID0 (since I have read that TRIM is not supported for RAID0)?

Thanks in advance for your help!

 

Your controller is set for RAID aleady, that will give you the same performance as AHCI on your single 470 along with passing along TRIM commands to the 470 (even if you're setup in RAID, TRIM will work on single non-raid ssd's). Don't worry about TRIM, you drives have garbage collection that works independently of the OS. The Samsung SSD's in the Z11 have been shown to keep performance up to new condition for a long period of time. The Toshibas in the Z12+'s should also be rather good at cleaning up after themselves, I would not worry about it esp since there's not much you can do unless you do the bios mod to switch from raid to ahci and break your raid and have two smaller slower drives instead of 1 super fast one, not worth the potential bricking.

 

Qwaarjet, many thanks for your fast and competent answer!

Any other things that I can do (e.g. special Win 7 settings) to boost and keep the good performance on my SSDs (installed Toshiba RAID0 and additional Samsung SSD470 128GB)?

 

Hey, just wanted to say, great thread ! I have a Z11 which came with HDD. I've now temporarily replaced the HDD in the optical bay with a 1.8 inch vertex 2. I've also ordered the msata cable shown on the first page (at the moment I have a standard sata going to the optical drive bay, where I have a sata to msata converter installed temporarily to attach the 1.8 inch vertex 2. There is also a slim stata cable coming to the optical bay, which is not used). By the way, I live in london and ordered it from vaiorefurbs (you can contact them through ebay), paid 85 dollars /55 pounds for it (better than the price I got when having it sent from the states)

As soon as I receive the msata cable, I will be taking the ssd out of its case and moving it to the space under the touchpad. I also ordered an optical bay adapter to make use of the slim sata port in the optical bay to connect the original 500 gb HDD that came with the laptop. If anyone can tell me how to take the case off the vertex 2, I would be very grateful

Thanks for all the info on this thread !

EDIT : I have now received all the parts and assembled everything. So I have a vertex 2 on the msata ribbon I had to purchase (if I find another cheap one, I will go raid). I also used the slim sata to sata adapter from the bay drive adapter I bought on ebay to keep the HDD in the original bay caddy my laptop came with (as it was the HDD version). I just had to cut off some of the plastic from the bottom of the original caddy, and it fit perfectly. !

 

Hi Great thread as well but after some SDD advice.

I also have the HDD only version of the Z11 I was wondering is there any problem with the SDD that comes with the others or is everyone swapping out for more space.

I see everyone after the C300 but the C320 is now the latest model.

But my question is, there are a few 128gb drives from original z12/13s on ebay ($85) are they a good choice for a drive or should I just get a new intel drive and cut it open. Obviously still need to buy the cable from the first post, its £55 in the UK so about $88. So all in all will cost $160 odd to get a 128gb drive in my HDD only laptop (plus caddy for old drive or cable)

I'm perfectly happy with 128gb size SDD and a 500gb HDD so this is what I hope to do in the future. If you recommend going down getting a new drive and not the ebay route then may have to wait a bit for prices to come down due to the Bangkok flooding and prices sky-rocketing over the last few weeks.

 

Just a quick question:
What kind of SATA interface does the Z12 have: 3Gb/s or 6Gb/s?
Is there any advantage of using a SATA 6G SSD vs a 3G SSD? Lets say a Samsung SSD 830 vs 470?

 

All Z1s and some early Z2s have the Sata 3gb/s bus. You get no benefit form a 6gb/s SSD on a 3gb/s bus. One reason to buy it anyway is that you will probably switch it out of this machine into your next, which will likely support 6gb/s.

 

Do you know if you'd experience any performance increase by using a high-performance 6 Gbps SSD, instead of a 3 Gbps SSD, in a machine with a 3 Gbps port. Obviously it won't be in the sequential access, but perhaps in random or 4k-byte access?

 

My sense is no, there would be no advantage, but we'll let someone more knowledgeable than I chime in.

 

The 6Gbps SSD can be faster than the 3 Gbps on the 3Gbps bus but not because they are 6 Gbps but they are newer and faster in general. Check on Toms Hardware for the latest benchmark results.

The successor of the C300 is the M4 from Crucial. I swapped out the Toshiba SSd that came with the laptop because the Toshiba SSD are slower. The C300 I have is faster than the 2 Toshiba SSD in RAID 0. That also allowed me to add another SSD for more capacity (without removing the optical drive).

 

I am so happy to find this thread.
Purchased a minimum Z11 thinking I could upgrade drives later when they would also be cheaper. Sony says they will not upgrade drives.
Now my drives (or RAID) have failed completely. I have tried for one month to get the Z11 to Sony repair with no success. Now I find this protocol for replacing the drives!

Questions:
1. Could I leave the dead drives as is but put a larger SSD into the optical drive bay, which sounds like the least intrusive change?
If so, I do not see a description for what is required to do that. I assume a 2.5" fits. Naked? Interface? Caddy or tape?
2. If 1 is not an option, then RAID replacement. What current 1.8" drives do you recommend - easy of being naked, for example? Is it 2x1.8" or 4x1.8"? I have ordered the mSATA cable just in case.

Thank you SO much.

 

1. http://forum.notebookreview.com/sony/469244-z11-replace-dvd-hdd-working-solution.html
2. 2x1.8" SSD from Intel or Crucial (before you take them appart, update the firmware and test that they work properly)

 

Awesome thread - just found it.

I have a Z11 with 2x128GB and one of them is dying a slow death (repeated disk errors). Can I just replace them both with one 256GB Crucial C300 and life will be good? It looks like that would be faster than what Ihave now. It looks like the Crucial M4 is only available in 2.5" format (or can I get one of those and crack it open to make it fit?).

 

As far as I know, you will need the Z12 mSATA SSD cable and it will only work with 1.8" SSDs that have an mSATA connector as well.

 

namaiki - OK, great. The Crucial C300 has a "16 pin Micro Serial ATA" so I will buy this and the Z12 mSATA SSD cable. Thanks.

 

Wait one long minute... Which C300 are you looking at purchasing? Also, ComputerCowboy purchased C300s and has some issue with them about not always booting properly - link.

 

my C300's have never failed me in my Z. Come out of sleep without issue every time.

 

Here is what I ordered from ALLHDD.COM for $524:

Crucial CTFDDAA256MAG-1G1 C300 256GB SATA 6GB/Sec 1.8inch Solid State Drive.

I just ordered the one 256GB drive to replace my two 128GB Toshiba drives that came with the system when I ordered from Sony. Looked at the Cowboy thread and now I am worried. I actually had some trouble locating a 1.8", 256GB drive. Newegg has the 128GB drives below for $240 and two of those would actually be cheaper than the drive I ordered - wondering if I should cancel and reconsider just duplicating the RAID0 setup that I have now.

> Kingston SSDNow V+ 180 SVP180S2/128G 1.8" 128GB SATA II MLC Internal Solid State Drive (SSD)

> Crucial RealSSD C300 CTFDDAA128MAG-1G1 1.8" 128GB SATA III MLC Internal Solid State Drive (SSD)

 

If you've got Toshiba drives, you might already have the mSATA cable in there.

 

My mistake - I just checked the Intel RST application and it says that I have two SAMSUNG MMDPE56GQDXP-MVB 128GB drives.

As a replacement, can't decide whether it would be better to have one 256GB drive or two 128GB drives.

 

A single drive supposedly would have less chance of failing than if you have two drives in RAID. Is there any significant price difference between the options?

 

$524 for one 256GB
$490 for two 126GB drives

So price is not really the issue... more interested in absolute reliability (use this thing everyday for my business) so I think I will stick with the single drive.

 

I was not able to find the Crucial C300 anywhere but I found a Kingston SSDNow V+180 256GB Micro SATA II 3GB/S 1.8 Inch Solid State Drive SVP180S2/256G.

Anybody have any experience with the Kingston?

 

Newegg.com - Crucial RealSSD C300 CTFDDAA128MAG-1G1 1.8" 128GB SATA III MLC Internal Solid State Drive (SSD)
C300 ^^^

I haven't had a problem either of mine in my C300 but if you want the best reliability, you have to go Intel

Newegg.com - Intel 320 Series SSDSA1NW160G301 1.8" 160GB SATA II MLC Internal Solid State Drive (SSD) - Internal SSD

 

Curious: did you have Samsungs originally in your Z11? Did you get the infernal blinking cursor delay? Has it gone away - for good - with the new ssds?

Thanks.

 

hi, great forum and post here.

I have bought a VPCZ11X9E but it has no SSD cable or the SSD's, so bascially no hard disk or caddy.

1: I was wondering if anyone has the original 2 x 64GB Samsung SSD and cable that comes with this laptop and was willing to sell it as i see a lot of you have upgraded their systems.

Or

2: can you recommend an SSD and cable that i need to buy to get this laptop work?

Thanks

 

I have a DOA Z11 with internal (not in DVD bay) 384GB SSD and ZIF cables. The SSDs are fine, and I would provide them to you secure-erased, so you would be starting with an as-new SSD combo.

email me at [email protected] if interested.

 

Crucial drives are crap. I had some, they were crap in the Z1. I sold them off and they were crap in other peoples computer also.

I bought the not crap Intel drives and I've been happy ever since. Don't get crap, get Intel.

 

The part you are looking for is A-1781-464-A
with that part you can run any 1.8" microSATA drive or drives that you can cram in there. I'd recommend the Intel drives. You have to strip the cases though which means no warranty

 

us Z1 owners can finally have 600gb of SSD love without sacrificing our ODD!!!! Or 1.2TB's if you do give up your ODD! Time to start saving every penny!

Newegg.com - Intel 320 Series SSDSA1NW300G301 1.8" 300GB SATA II MLC Internal Solid State Drive (SSD) - Internal SSD

 

^ The Z14 was available with stock 1TB options in Japan