OCZ Vertex 3 Pro Preview: The First SF-2500 SSD
by Anand Lal Shimpi on February 17, 2011 3:01 AM ESTAS-SSD High Queue Depth Incompressible Sequential Performance
While ATTO shows us best case scenario for the SF-2500, AS-SSD shows us the worst case - at least for writes. The AS-SSD sequential benchmark takes place at a very high queue depth of 32 and uses incompressible data for all of its transfers. The result is a pretty big reduction in sequential write speed on SandForce based controllers.
Read speed is minimally impacted by the nature of the data. We see that at high queue depths over a 6Gbps SATA interface the Vertex 3 Pro can break 500MB/s for sequential reads. Over a 3Gbps interface the Vertex 3 Pro is mostly unimpressive, looking a lot like a C300.
The sequential write test is a tough pill to swallow for SandForce. This is truly worst case scenario performance as its high queue depth transfers of incompressible data. Admittedly the Vertex 3 Pro does much better than drives based on its former controller (SF-1200) but it's no faster than Samsung's SSD 470 and barely faster than the SSDNow V100. Over a 3Gbps interface the controller doesn't look all that great either. This is an important chart to look at if you're doing a lot of file archival on your SSD. However most usage models will see a very different performance breakdown than this. For SandForce, this is truly the worst case scenario.
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cgorange - Thursday, February 17, 2011 - link
Anand,Is there some reason that the Samsung 470-series wasn't included on all charts?
Diosjenin - Thursday, February 17, 2011 - link
"Paired with a decent SSD controller, write lifespan is a non-issue. Note that I only fold Intel, Crucial/Micron/Marvell and SandForce into this category."So did you deliberately or accidentally leave out Indilinx?
Chloiber - Thursday, February 17, 2011 - link
Of course he couldn't include all the controllers, only those which he tested thorougly. So I'm pretty sure he left them out deliberately because there are so many broken drives from Indilinx. My 32GB drive also went down the drain. Maybe it was also part of the many, MANY broken firmwares they released. But even if you trust their SMART values, the write amplification on those drives is VERY high.Mr Perfect - Thursday, February 17, 2011 - link
I'm glad to see a component review on AT again, even if it's just a preview. It has been feeling like Engaget or some other phone review site around here.cactusdog - Thursday, February 17, 2011 - link
haha i know, they seem to like phones these days.MrBrownSound - Thursday, February 17, 2011 - link
nice to see that the intel x-25m still is in the ranks of the new generation drives.I bought a intel x25-m 160GB and booted my OS right away without reformating. Will it suffer performance loss?
ajp_anton - Thursday, February 17, 2011 - link
Your "x GB drive appears as y GB in Windows" look very much like GB<->GiB conversion errors.deadrock01 - Thursday, February 17, 2011 - link
Anand,Any possibility of getting the OCZ Revo PCI Express Cards and other SSD-like items in the SSD benchmark list?
marraco - Thursday, February 17, 2011 - link
^^^that.ilkhan - Thursday, February 17, 2011 - link
Numbers look real nice.For someone on a budget looking for a 120GB (or close enough) SSD on a 3Gbps controller, whats the recommendation. Wait for the new drives, grab a corsair force, else?