SSD advice please

[digitalrurouni]

So since I have been on a PC upgrading binge lately, I was thinking of getting a couple of SSD drives and for the hell of it getting them set up in RAID 0. I know TRIM commands cannot be passed down to the SSD if it is in a RAID array but I have also been reading that if you get one of the nicer ones you could actually get away without TRIM and degradation of performance a la this link: Best SSD & HDD April 2011 | Hardware Revolution

I have an Asus P6t Deluxe V2 motherboard so I doubt I have SATA 3 so far I can see the best SSD I can get is the OCZ Vertex 2 120 GB. Is that a correct statement? I would like to get a pair of these slap them together in RAID 0 and see what's what. My current Velociraptor RAID 0 set up I am not sure but I am probably going to either set them aside or keep them in the machine either as another RAID 0 setup or just 2 separate drives. I am not worried about hard drive failures because I usually back everything up. Recommendations? Suggestions?

Oh yeah so far I am liking this one: Amazon.com: OCZ Technology 120 GB Vertex 2 Series SATA II 2.5-Inch Solid State Drive (SSD) OCZSSD2-2VTXE120G: Electronics

 

[essenbe]

There is really no advantage in Raid0 for SSDs unless you are going to be transfering 10GB files all day. Not only do you lose Trim, but for an OS drive the only things that really matter are 4kb reads and access times. Raid will not increase these at all. A good SSD will have a .1ms or less access time. That is instantly. You will not do better than that.

 

[DeaconFrost]

Instead of buying two, you'd be better of spending that money on a larger single SSD, then having a large HDD for data storage.

 

[whs]

I can only agree with the two prior statements. SSDs in Raid0 make no sense at all. There may be a little sense in Raid1 if you want to do mirroring. But even there, I would rather go for a decent imaging strategy.

But if you have the money and ambition for 2 SSDs, get a 60GB for the OS and an e.g. 240GB for the data - without Raid.

And you are right, your board has only six 3Gb Sata ports. So a Gen3 SSD makes little sense. The Vertex2 is a goos choice. But read the customer reviews (e.g. on Newegg). There were a couple Vertex2 that were a bit iffy regarding reliability. Same with the Intel 320. Crucial is another good option.

 

[pooch]

I am running two Vertex2 SSD's in RAID0 now since March, a lack of trim has not made any noticeable difference, and if it did I need about 20 mins to break my RAID, boot up into Vista that I have installed on another drive and do a secure erase on the SSD's. Once RAID is set up again I reload windows from a daily image.
All my SSD's are running the newest firmware 1.33 this is important!!
See my system specs for details.

Single Vertex2 Running in my laptop.



Single Vertex2 4Kb and 8 Mb read



Vertex2 RAID0



Vertex2 RAID0 4Kb and 8Mb read



I use two Samsung 1Tb drives in RAID0 for storage.



and amongst other disks 2 Samsung 1 Tb drives for backups over USB3

 

[whs]

Interesting data. Thanks for posting. I still maintain that you probably see little difference for the OS - Raid or not.

 

[pooch]

Interesting data. Thanks for posting. I still maintain that you probably see little difference for the OS - Raid or not.

You are welcome

Some more interesting facts. My desktop has a reboot time of around 50 seconds :shock: and it is beaten by my laptop which reboots in a blazing 32 seconds. I put it down to the time taken to show the BIOS screens. so no win here!!
Where my desktop does excel though is the time taken to start programs even MS office is instantaneously open.
Scanning of my system (antivirus, spyware) is also blazingly fast.
Transferring data and the making and reloading of backups is another area where it is very noticeably faster.
Lastly it all runs so very smoothly, the difference may not be huge but it is still very noticeable

 

[whs]

Yeah, I know. These buggers are fast. My Vaio laptop with a single Vertex2 boots in 16 seconds.

 

[pooch]

Yeah, I know. These buggers are fast. My Vaio laptop with a single Vertex2 boots in 16 seconds.

Very nice