Just my thoughts....
Come, share your tips!
Published on April 25, 2012 By RedneckDude In Personal Computing

Guys, I know a few of us have SSDs. I'm pretty sure more do than we know.

 

What say we all share any tips or tweaks we might have so we can all benefit from each other's knowledge.

 

Or maybe we can ask a question, someone else may have the answer.

 

I'll start by saying I have an OCZ Vertex Plus 120 GB.  Sata II on a Sata II Mobo.

 

Currently, I get the following stats when testing. I wonder how this compares with yours and if it can be tweaked.

 


Comments (Page 1)
9 Pages1 2 3  Last
on Apr 25, 2012

I would also ask if there's anything to the stuff you read online about disabling indexing, things like that.

on Apr 25, 2012

Same type of disk. Slightly different stats:

Haven't done any tweaking of any kind.

on Apr 25, 2012

Crucial M4 64 GB

on Apr 25, 2012

Corsair Force GT 120GB Standard no tweaking. Indexing enabled.

on Apr 25, 2012

128GB Crucial m4 2.5-inch SATA 6GB/s

on Apr 25, 2012

 

3 x Intel X25-M 80 GB in Raid 0 (SATA 3Gb/s)

on Apr 25, 2012

OK....Jorge wins...

on Apr 25, 2012

I don't see anyone sharing "tips or tweaks"; I only see folks posting performance numbers.

If this thread is only going to be a "My SSD is faster than your SSD!" thread, then what's the value?

on Apr 25, 2012

Mark Phelps
If this thread is only going to be a "My SSD is faster than your SSD!" thread, then what's the value?

Showing off.

There really aren't that many tips to share regarding SSDs. What do you want to know? Which ones are the most reliable (but not necessarily the fastest)? Intel and Samsung.

on Apr 25, 2012

Ok, ok...

Make sure 'Write Caching' is enabled for your SSD in Device Manager.

If you are cloning your system from a hard drive to an SSD using disk cloning software such as Acronis TrueImage, make sure to read about SSD partition alignment first.

Do NOT use a disk defragger on your SSD, this provides no speed gains and seriously reduces the life span of your SSD (Windows 7 is SSD savvy, so you don't need to worry about the Windows defragger).

Make sure AHCI mode is enabled instead of IDE mode, it's faster. If you're still using IDE mode, read THIS before switching or you risk not being able to boot into Windows afterwards.

Read about TRIM and why it's so important. Read about Garbage Collection too.

Someone else takeover now...

on Apr 25, 2012

Some of you may want todays giveawayoftheday it's from Paragon, a trusted name in software. Even if you have already migrated over, you may want this software,  Paragon Migrate OS to SSD 2.0 Special Edition

I'd like to know some camparison data, such as MLC vs. non MLC drives. SataII mobo's with SATAIII SSD's. SATAIII mobo's with SATAII SSD's. Mix it up a bit for all us half-steppers.

Is it worthwhile using a SATAIII SSD on a SATAII mobo as far as any additional performance and the obvious ability to use the same SSD on a new upgraded system with a SATAIII mobo?  I'd like to go SSD someday, but doubt if it will be in conjunction with a complete new sysytem. I would want to be able to get my moneys worth from the SSD when the time came for a new build, though.

Right now, SATAII MLC drives are the most affordable, but..........

Is a SATAII MLC type SSD the lowest rung on the ladder or does that belong to Hybrid drives? Is it better to just go ahead and spend the money on SATAIII instead?

on Apr 25, 2012

JcRabbit
Someone else takeover now

If you ain't got one....get one...

on Apr 25, 2012

OK, now Jorge is being more useful, he does that a lot. Thanks Jorge.

 

I am guessing, since it wasn't listed, that the above stats that are much higher numbers must be using Sata 3?

 

If no, why the major speed over mine?

 

Mark Phelps
I don't see anyone sharing "tips or tweaks"; I only see folks posting performance numbers.

If this thread is only going to be a "My SSD is faster than your SSD!" thread, then what's the value?

 

I was hoping it wouldn't be. I was hoping to gain/share info. I read all kinds of tweaks online, I also read that a good portion of them are for the first generation disks and may not apply to today's technology. So I started this thread to see if any of you guys had real info.

 

I never was able to find anything in my BIOS to set to AHCI mode. Trim is on and supported.

 

I didn't clone to the SSD, I did a fresh install. I do use Acronis to keep backups.

 

So, is indexing off, or on?

on Apr 25, 2012

RedneckDude
I am guessing, since it wasn't listed, that the above stats that are much higher numbers must be using Sata 3?  If no, why the major speed over mine?

No, it's Sata II. What you missed in the description is the 'RAID 0' part: that means these are three individual drives which the OS sees as a single drive, with each drive connected to an individual SATA port.

The maximum bandwidth *per device* for SATA II is 300 MB/s, but here we have 3 drives/devices. Again, note that the SATA II 300 MB/s limit is *per device*.

None of the X25-M G2 drives is *individually* able to transfer data faster than the 300 MB/s limit (the X25-M G2 maximum read speed is about 257 MB/s). However, the RAID 0 splits (distributes) data across all the 3 drives simultaneously, i.e.; it reads and writes data to all 3 drives at the same time.

For instance, imagine you have a 9 MB block of data you are writing to the SSD, the first 3 MB of that data gets written to the first drive, the middle 3 MB to the second drive and the remaining 3 MB to the third drive. All three write operations are performed simultaneously.

The theoretical limit then becomes 3 x 300 MB/S, or 900 MB/S. Theoretical because there is another limit, the SATA II interface, which saturates at around 700 MB/s (in other words, I would not gain anything by adding a fourth SSD to the RAID 0 array, except in *write* speeds, since the read speeds of all 3 X25-M drives already fully saturate the SATA II bus).

RAID 0 has a major potential problem: if one of the drives goes south, the whole array goes south and you lose all your data. Same thing would happen if you were using a single drive, of course, but the difference is that every time you add a drive to a RAID 0 array you are doubling your chances of a malfunction (for the simple reason that you are adding one more component that can go wrong). On the other hand, SSDs, having no moving mechanical parts, are much more reliable than hard disks - plus I backup my data everyday to external hard disks.

on Apr 25, 2012

Thanks Jorge.

9 Pages1 2 3  Last