Poor SSD Performance

[dajogejr]

After having rather high hopes for SSD Performance...I'm disappointed.
I'm glad I got a test unit, because if I would've shelled out the cabbage for this, I'd be a little PO'd.

I have an 8300 Quad Core 2.5 Intel with 4GB of RAM running W7 Pro 64 Bit.
Instead of trying to clone the old drive, I did what I thought was right and did a fresh install.

I loaded up MSE, Office 2010 and all Windows Updates.
Did a couple of tweaks (made sure defrag was off, DMA mode on instead of PIO, disabled indexing)

I have all the latest chipset, mobo, video, etc., drivers.

Yes, it boots into Windows to the desktop faster. No doubt.
Yes, it opens up windows faster and programs SOMETIMES as well.

But it multitasks terrible. If I'm download, installing, etc., anything...and try to move program to program, it's slow. To the point I think it's freezing up.

I've read a few of the tweaks here...and I'm missing something I think.

It's an Imation 2.5" M series 64GB drive. I know it's not the Vertex 2...but it has pretty decent specs behind it. Not the best, but it should do everything my SATA platter drive does better...period.

It doesn't.

What should I be looking for? (It shipped with the latest firmware, and trim is turned on...not like that matters since I only installed Win7Pro fresh a few hours ago...)

 

[Hopalong X]

http://www.sevenforums.com/tutorials/91339-ssd-hdd-optimize-windows-reinstallation.html

This is the one I was actually looking for.
http://www.sevenforums.com/tutorials/70822-ssd-tweaks-optimizations-windows-7-a.html

Hope they help.

Mike

 

[Wishmaster]

Clean install was the best bet IMHO.
Are you running in AHCI mode?

What does the AS SSD benchmark show?


It may be possible its just be that drive itself. I've not really read anything or done any research on Imitation SSDs though.

Keep in mind, the advertised specs usually show the Sequential Read/Write speeds.

In a sense, this actually not very reliable because how well the OS will perform is actually more about the random read/write.
Random read/Write is what makes the difference as well access time.


A SSD with a really high Seq. speeds, yet low random speeds will perform poorly overall compared to others.

This is why some (Intel for example) show 250Mb/s Read 70Mb/s Write, yet in reality will run circles around similar drives with seemingly higher specs.

 

[dajogejr]

Will get back to you in the morning folks...time to go relax!!
Thanks for the links and advice...I'll look into them in the AM!!!

 

[dajogejr]

Went through a ton of steps...
Gotta say, I'm disappointed with this drive.
I tried to run the AS SSD test but it hung on the 4mb write test...after sitting there for about 10 minutes I stopped the test.

Don't get me wrong, there are times when the drive is brilliant...as said, start up, opening programs...

But it seems like if I'm downloading or installing anything to C:, anything else just locks up or slows down to a crawl.
I'm not into heavy video editing, graphics, etc. I just keep a couple windows open (Outlook, Firefox with a few tabs, ITunes, etc.) and my platter drive does everything overall better.

The good thing is I got this drive as a demo...so I can send it back in 30 days free, I don't even have to pay shipping.

Looks like the OCZ Vertex 2 line is the hot ticket right now, probably pick up a 100GB drive in the next few months. I really don't feel like going through the whole OS install/tweak again.

My old drive really was fine, I just had to quench my thirst. Turns out, I'm not as thirsty as I thought....

Thanks for all the great links and tips... I read mostly not so great reviews, but you know how opinions are in the Internet...everyone has one. Turns out the majority of them were right in this case...

 

[pparks1]

Just get a better SSD drive next time and I am sure you will be pleased. Anything with the new Sandforce controller, or the Intel drive should work great. I have an Intel X25-M g2 80GB and it works great. No slowdowns, stuttering, pauses, etc.

 

[dajogejr]

The Intel GB per $ still are pricey...but from the Reviews I've read the OCZ Vertex 2 or Vertex Limited Edition are the cat's meow now...
Care to comment?
Do you have a list of new sandforce controller SSDs?

 

[Wishmaster]

My Intel is faster than then my Vertex (1).
However, the Vertex is still a very good drive.



With the Vertex 2, they have changed controllers and performance is supposed to be much better. Benchmarks seem to look very good as well.

I only have have the Vertex 1, so the only info I have on the 2's is by what others have said about them, and benchmarks I have seen.

The Vertex 1 certainly performs well, so any improvement on what was already good should make them that much more attractive

Intel and OCZ are the 2 brands I would look into personally.

Hopefully someone with a Vertex2 can chime in with some more specific info on that drive.

 

[dajogejr]

I know the Intel is a great drive...however, dollar per GB is still too high vs. the performance of the V2.
20% higher for the Intel and not as many options....
I'm gonna order the V2 later this week...thanks for all the help!!

 

[Mexman]

I think there is something wrong with your SSD especially with the hangups and freezing during benching. Have you tried Crystal disk mark? I have the Vertex 2 and low end Value Kingston SSDnow Gen2 64GB. I CANNOT notice ANY DIFFERENCE between them. Both are much faster than a HDD but I would not waste money on the so-called performance SSD's. The Kingston is the best value IMO at $89 on sale. Sandforce sounds great in theory and on benchmarks but real world, you will NOT see a difference, and remember it compresses your data on the fly so for uncompressible data it may actually be slower than a conventional controller.

 

[Dave76]

The AnandTech site has good reviews and a nice benchmark SSD comparison tool.

AnandTech SSD Bench

In my opinion if AnandTech doesn't benchmark it, it's not a good SSD.

Search their SSD/HDD site for articles on SSD controllers and performance.

I agree, return the one you have now, if it can't run the 4mb write test, that's the random write test, then it's defective.
Random read/write is much more important than the sequential numbers, access time is what makes them faster. Input/output rates which are ran by the controller will make or break the SSD.

OCZ Vertex 2's are good, but you can't go wrong with Intel SSDs, their real world performance is excellent.

Unless you're in a rush you might want to consider waiting a little while the new 25nm next Gen SSDs are due to come out in the next couple of weeks to months.
Some rumors say they will come out after New Years.
These are suppose to be twice the size for the same price, and faster.

 

[dajogejr]

Thank you very much...I'll look at those reviews on Anandtech.
I know the Intels are great drives...just too pricey per GB right now, even for an SSD.

I'm in no hurry...just got a bug to do something different.
I remember paying 230 per 36GB Raptor years ago to run them in Raid0. Boy...was that fast in it's day.
Funny, I ran a hard drive test on a new 300GB Hitachi and it scored better than my 5 year old Raptor...
Just goes to show you, time and technology, it keeps getting better.

Who will be making the new 25nm next generation SSDs? Who should I be looking for?

 

[dajogejr]

Kinda got my eye on this. 5 bucks cheaper than NewEgg and I can drive to this store in about 15 minutes compared to waiting...whatcha think?
Micro Center - Intel 80GB 34nm X25-M 2.5" SATA Solid-State Drive 524454

 

[stew2]

I know someone with the Intel x-25m and its performance is really disappointing. Its low write spreads really let it down and its quite an old drive now.

 

[Dave76]

The Intel X-25m are very good SSDs.
There are a lot of people that have these and I've heard no bad reports.
Write speeds aren't as important as the read speed, your OS and apps do mostly reads.
The input/output rates and the controllers make the performance.

I have the X-25V 40GB slower read/write than the X-25m, and it's really fast, truly amazing performance.
Absolutely zero regrets, I will never go back to HDDs for my OS.

The next Gen 25nm SSDs will be sold by everybody.
I'm slightly bias so I'll be looking at the Intels.

Sandforce is coming out with a new controller very soon, this coupled with the 25nm should make for something very interesting.

OCZ with SandForce controllers are doing very well right now and they have aggressive pricing, the best I/O rates are the Vertex 2.

Crucials Real SSD C300 are impressive if you have a 6Gb/s motherboard, or you can get a 6Gb/s PCIE card.
They initially had some issues with their firmware, but they have it fixed now.

MicroCenter has some great deals, I bought several of my last build components there.

AS SSD is a benchmark for SSDs, this thread has a list of RAID and single scores.
You can see comparison of many SSDs.

AS SSD Benchmark Scores

 

[stew2]

The Intel X-25m are very good SSDs.
There are a lot of people that have these and I've heard no bad reports.

Well here's one lol. Its not a very impressive ssd. It sped up reboot time from about 40 seconds to 30 seconds on his pc and made his pc quieter at boot but thats about it, its not great.

Due to the small size of the ssd its only got the OS and apps installed while games etc are installed to a hard drive. You notice no real performance gain as the folders you open are normally really small in size eg: computer, documents etc and a hdd can handle that no problem.

Id advise getting one with a higher write speed as that way you can install apps faster and everything will feel quicker as when windows is writing at boot up it will be able to do that faster and when you open an app its writing as well so it should speed them up as well.

Its up to you though but just remember that Intel one came out sometime in 2008ish

 

[Dave76]

Well here's one lol. Its not a very impressive ssd. It sped up reboot time from about 40 seconds to 30 seconds on his pc and made his pc quieter at boot but thats about it, its not great.
...
Its up to you though but just remember that Intel one came out sometime in 2008ish

There has been a lot of improvements since 2008.

There are a lot of people that will disagree with you.

You must be talking about Gen 1, that would explain the issues your talking about.

Gen 2 came out around July '09, with much better performance.

There are a lot of sites with tips on which settings are needed to optimize performance, pre Gen2 there were a lot but, since Gen2 there are not very many setting changes needed.
The main one being to run them in AHCI or RAID, which give better performance. Some motherboard's chipsets don't run SSDs very well, the drivers are very important as well.
Early Gen2 was the MS AHCI driver (was the only one that enabled TRIM), then Intel came out with Rapid Storage 9.6.2.1001, which ran the SSDs much better and finally enabled TRIM.

There still are a few settings recommended to optimize performance.

If your friend had issues, they were likely fixable.

For some background info: Show us your SSD performance

There are many sites that have dicussed the settings issues, OCZ's site has a lot of information.

 

[Wishmaster]

The Intel X-25m are very good SSDs.
There are a lot of people that have these and I've heard no bad reports.

Well here's one lol. Its not a very impressive ssd. It sped up reboot time from about 40 seconds to 30 seconds on his pc and made his pc quieter at boot but thats about it, its not great.

Due to the small size of the ssd its only got the OS and apps installed while games etc are installed to a hard drive. You notice no real performance gain as the folders you open are normally really small in size eg: computer, documents etc and a hdd can handle that no problem.

Id advise getting one with a higher write speed as that way you can install apps faster and everything will feel quicker as when windows is writing at boot up it will be able to do that faster and when you open an app its writing as well so it should speed them up as well.

Its up to you though but just remember that Intel one came out sometime in 2008ish

Seq. write speed for the SSD as a OS/application drive means very little. Even the Intel V series, which has a 35-40Mb/s write (approx) are very fast. The 80Gb M series has twice that for writes.

As mentioned, its all about the random read/write, which is where the excell and why they end up benching faster than some with seemingly higher specs.

If his is not making much of a noticable difference there is certainly something wrong.
Possibly set up wrong be it alignments, drivers, AHCI controller issues on the board ..

Something isn't right.

For example, My Intel V series says it can do 250MB/s read 35Mb/s write.

My OCZ Vertex says 250 MB/s Read 100MB/s writes.

Of course these are Seq. speeds which mean little.

Its a bit deceiving because when you benchmark them, you will find the Intel actually scores nearly 3 times higher, on a AS SSD benchmark.

Vertex 2 should be closer in score/speeds though ... this is a regualr Vertex im refering to.

 

[stew2]

It gets scores like it should on the benchmarking tools:

View attachment 107565

Im not at his pc, he just sent me that pic but like dajogejr iv been underwhelmed by the ssd's iv used. Perhaps they are more useful and noticeable on pc's that have not been tweaked?

But anyway il not hijack this thread, dajogejr let us know if you need more help.

 

[Dave76]

You are the first person in all the forums I've been to, that has that opinion.

They are used on many tweaked and OC'ed systems, mine is tweaked and OC'ed.
Some tweaks may have detrimental affects.

There must be something that wasn't set up correctly or as with all hardware sometimes they are defective from the factory.

Wish you better luck next time.