OCZ Vertex 3 Pro Preview: The First SF-2500 SSD
by Anand Lal Shimpi on February 17, 2011 3:01 AM ESTFinal Words
I didn't really believe that SandForce could pull it off when I first heard how fast the SF-2000 line would be. Even after CES, I didn't really believe the drives would be this good in real world use cases. Consider me pleasantly surprised.
When connected to a good 6Gbps controller, the Vertex 3 Pro is significantly faster than anything else on the market today. Obviously the V3P itself is an unreleased drive so things could change as its competitors show up as well, but the bar has been set very high. The Vertex 3 Pro is the first SSD to really put 6Gbps SATA to good use. In fact I'd say its the first drive that really needs a 6Gbps interface. Whenever you Sandy Bridge owners get replacement motherboards, this may be the SSD you'll want to pair with them.
Even writing incompressible data the Vertex 3 Pro is faster than current SandForce drives running full tilt. The performance gains we see here are generational, not a simple evolutionary improvement. SandForce has also successfully addressed the limited shortcomings of the original SF-1200 controller with regards to writing incompressible data.
Clearly performance isn't going to be a problem with this generation. The real unknowns are how well will the Vertex 3 (non-Pro) perform and how reliable will these drives be? Intel is still king of the hill when it comes to drive reliability, however OCZ has been investing heavily in improving its manufacturing. I suspect that this next SSD war will be fought both along performance and reliability lines. Unfortunately for us, the latter is very difficult to quantify without a significant sample of drives.
With new controllers from SandForce, Intel and Marvell due out this year we're going to see SSD performance go through the roof and SSD prices to continue to fall. We're still a couple months away from knowing exactly what to buy, but if you've been putting off that move to an SSD - 2011 may be the year to finally pull the trigger.
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Chloiber - Thursday, February 17, 2011 - link
It's correct, Anand answered the exact same question already on page 1/2 of the comments.7Enigma - Thursday, February 17, 2011 - link
Yup, saw that on my second read through. A little clarification in the article would have made it a bit more explainable but at least the numbers are right.teldar - Thursday, February 17, 2011 - link
Hope this gets seen.I used to go to a site frequently for info on drive reliability.
storagereview.com
I don't believe its really being updated anymore. I would love to side you be able to integrate a site like theirs (or theirs completely) into here.
argosreality - Thursday, February 17, 2011 - link
They've been updating the site for the last six months or so with new reviews. Actually, they just reviewed the new Vertex2 drives with 25nm flashtomoyo - Friday, February 18, 2011 - link
Ya storagereview is quite alive now. They were dead for over a year, but I'm glad to have another good source of hdd/ssd info again.KenPC - Thursday, February 17, 2011 - link
OCZ needs a distraction - NOWSo serve up a prototype (even without a case yet) drive and get fabulous bench results and lots of press to drown out the behind the scenes downgrading of many of the on-market products.
Yes, this new controller/architecture for this particular prototype is faster. Yes, it appears to be very promising technology in the SSD space.
But now folks will be using THIS prototype review to measure the purchase decisions for drives sold months from now that may/may not have the same performance
MeSh1 - Thursday, February 17, 2011 - link
Wow, thats some tasty hardware :). 400GB @ $1350. The Revo X22 480GB is just under that, hmm..... decisions. Revo Drive uses SF1200 I wonder if they can slap a SF200 on the Revo :)Breit - Friday, February 18, 2011 - link
you can bet on that. ocz will definitely roll out a new revodrive with sf2000 on it when the time comes, trust me. :)geniekid - Thursday, February 17, 2011 - link
Don't know if anyone from AT will get this far in the comments, but...1) I like how the beginning of the article rehashes how SSDs work instead of linking back to earlier articles. The redundancy makes it a lot easier to read the article.
2) I think the real world usage of these things is invaluable. Theoretical limits almost never ever mirror real world usage. *Thumbs up*
TrackSmart - Friday, February 18, 2011 - link
I agree completely on the REAL WORLD tests. Looking at the PCMark Vantage scores, it's clear that the incredible speeds of the Vertex 3 will only yield marginal gains in *total system performance* compared to the current crop of SSDs (Agility 2, Vertex 2, etc). Hopefully the price of the new drives will be similar to the old ones. Or lower, forcing even more affordable pricing on the existing, fast-enough models.