SSD Performance

[Paes]

Hi all,

I am a bit of a noob and I am looking for some help with understanding whether or not I have my system configured for optimal performance of my SSD drive. The performance I am currently getting seems quite low.

Below are what I understand to be the relevant components involved:

OS: Windows x64 Ultimate SP1
Drive: Corsair Force 3
MoBo: ASUS P6TD DELUXE
Sata Controller: SATA 6 Gbps PCI Express SATA Controller Card (PEXSAT32)

I have attached a screenshot of the performance I am getting. I am not convinced that the the SataIII controller is providing the throughput that is to be expected, but I am not sure how to evaluate its performance.

Any thoughts/suggestions would be highly appreciated

 

[seth500]

It's doing twice as good as mine I do have lots of stuff running but my score was 200 and your doing double than that.

 

[Paes]

It's doing twice as good as mine I do have lots of stuff running but my score was 200 and your doing double than that.

Thanks for the reply. What kind of hardware are you working with? Are you using the same type of drive? What about your controller? Is it an onboard SATA3, or an expansion card?

The comparison to your performance becomes more relevant if we are comparing apples to apples.

 

[seth500]

Is it an onboard SATA3? Yes it is and not ahci mode only ide..

 

[DeaconFrost]

I believe that if you have AHCI enabled, Windows 7 will detect the drive as an SSD and configure itself accordingly. I know it did on my Intel chipsets, but after loading the Intel Rapid Storage Driver in Windows, I saw a performance boost.

Given your newish chipset for your mobo, have you tried running the SSD off the mobo's controllers? I see that the msachi drive is being used, which was fine and stable, but I was able to increase me perfomance by installing the driver I mentioned above. If you do give your onboard SATA controller a shot, try that.

EDIT: Found a screen grab of my current RealSSD, which is one gen earlier than your drive, I believe. Notice the driver listed as iaStor.

 

[Paes]

Thanks for the reply DeaconFrost. I plugged my drive into my onboard SATA2 controller and tested without the iaStor driver. My score was 337, so about 50 lower than what I got using the Marvell SATA3 card. I then installed the iaStor driver and tested, and my score was 317. I am not sure why.

I am amazed that your score is double mine, but I assume you are using a onboard SATA3 controller? I have the feeling that the root cause of my performance issue is the expectation that my SATA3 card should perform as well as an onboard SATA3 port.

 

[DeaconFrost]

That's certainly possible. I know my SSD is connected to one of my two SATA 6.0 Gbps ports, so I should be getting the best possible speed with it.

 

[Paes]

Update: I plugged the drive back into the SATA3 card and tested, and this time performance was significantly worse than the onboard SATA2 controller. I tested twice to make sure it wasn't a fluke. Then I plugged the drive back into my onboard SATA2, and the performance jumped by almost 40 points.

It looks like buying a SATA3 controller with hopes of legitimate SATA3 speeds is a waste of time and money. I am returning the card and purchasing a new motherboard. Thanks to everyone for the help.

 

[cluberti]

It could just be a poor SATA3 controller, issues with the motherboard bus and a SATA PCI card, etc - your best bet is probably to get a motherboard with (good) onboard SATA3 ports, which it sounds like you're going to do anyway .

 

[GeneO]

Thanks for the reply DeaconFrost. I plugged my drive into my onboard SATA2 controller and tested without the iaStor driver. My score was 337, so about 50 lower than what I got using the Marvell SATA3 card. I then installed the iaStor driver and tested, and my score was 317. I am not sure why.

I am amazed that your score is double mine, but I assume you are using a onboard SATA3 controller? I have the feeling that the root cause of my performance issue is the expectation that my SATA3 card should perform as well as an onboard SATA3 port.

The RealSSD uses synchronous NAND, the Force 3 uses asynchronous and is slower. I would expect a little better read speed on your Marvel controller though.

If you are going by the published performance of the Force 3 and comparing it to AS-SSD results - you are comparing apples to oranges. The sandforce controller compresses data on the fly and will show much higher results with data that is compressible. The published performance numbers for sandforce controllers are usually based on the ATTO benchmark, whose data is 100% compressible (all zeros) hence show inflated numbers that are not real-world. AS-SSD uses nearly completely incompressible data (random bits) which is closer to the real world.

I get better performance from my Intel SATA2 controller and iastor than with my MB's MArvel SATA3 chipset. Though the AS-SSD measurements are higher for the Marvel, the PC boots faster with the Intel controller and has some better write speeds with the Intel.

The sequential speeds aren't as important as the random and access times, which look good on your SSD.