OCZ Vertex 4 Review (256GB, 512GB)
by Anand Lal Shimpi on April 4, 2012 9:00 AM ESTTRIM Performance
I started out this review with a mention of estimated write amplification and how OCZ was able to significantly reduce it with the Vertex 4/Everest 2 compared to Octane/Everest 1. By reducing write amplification, OCZ should have also significantly improved worst case write performance when TRIM isn't available or before it's able to act.
To find out, I wrote sequential data across all user addressable LBAs and then wrote random data (4KB, QD=32) for 20 minutes across all LBAs. Finally I used HDTach to give me a simple visualization of write performance across all available LBAs (aka the Malventano Method):
This is a huge improvement over what we saw with the Octane. Behavior here isn't quite what we see with Intel's controllers, but again it's a huge step above what we saw in the previous generation.
The Vertex 4 does support idle time garbage collection, but at very low priority. The drive must be idle for at least an hour for the background GC to kick in. I'm glad to see that OCZ has taken a more conservative route here as I've never been a huge fan of idle time garbage collection to begin with.
If you don't leave the drive alone long enough to trigger the idle GC, as soon as 85% of the blocks on the drive are used up the Vertex 4 will automatically trigger its garbage collection algorithms. This is more of what I'd like to see, however I'd prefer it even more if OCZ lowered the limits of when it would start recycling blocks in order to try and maintain good performance under heavily fragmented conditions.
TRIM is alive and well on the drive – a single TRIM pass is able to restore performance to new:
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rw1986 - Friday, April 6, 2012 - link
This seems very speculative. OCZ has admitted collaboration with Marvell (for example on their new Kilimanjaro platform for the Z-Drive R5 PCIe SSD).here is the link to the OCZ Everest 2 announcement: http://www.ocztechnology.com/aboutocz/press/2012/4...
In the announcement, OCZ makes some specific claims surrounding Everest 2 -- for example:
"the Everest 2 SSD controller reduces latency to 0.043ms for read operations and 0.026ms for write operations, yielding an improvement of approximately 80 percent over the previous Everest SSD controller generation"
"The advanced, multi-level BCH ECC engine with progressive error correction adapts to the specific error characteristics of different NAND devices. The programmable ECC engine achieves an effective correction power of up to 128 bits per 1KB of data while significantly reducing the uncorrectable bit error rate (UBER)."
The Marvell sheet emphasizes some similar things (high performance, error correction technology) but these are more general claims than what OCZ has listed in their Everest 2 spec sheet.
Is the foundation of your assumption that Everest 2 is just the 88SS9187 that the spec sheets sound similar? That does not seem conclusive to put it generously
jwilliams4200 - Saturday, April 7, 2012 - link
There is no hard evidence that is publicly available since OCZ is keeping it quiet for obvious reasons.The Octane uses a rebadged Marvell 88SS9174, and the Vertex 4 uses a rebadged Marvell 88SS9187.
rw1986 - Saturday, April 7, 2012 - link
I'm just curious how you can make these claims so authoritatively when, as you say "there is no hard evidence that is publicly available" to support your position.What you seem to be suggesting is that OCZ made a 32 million dollar acquisition in April of 2011 (Indilinx) and then decided to simply license and rebadge controllers from Marvell rather than build internally (which is completely contrary to what OCZ has told investors and the public). On a Thursday conference call OCZ's CEO was quite adamant that Everest 2 is completely their IP and will improve their profit margin strucutre as a result (since they don't have to pay a fee to Sandforce for each controller as before). If what you are saying is true then OCZ has misled their investors at best.
This is a pretty serious accusation you are making here and it would be nice if you had a little more to say in support of it than "trust me, i know." If you were really in a position to know then I doubt you would be posting on the comments section at AT.
I'd be interested to hear some experts weigh in on this exchange. How could we verify or disprove that the Everest 2 is really not Indilinx but instead a rebadged 9187? Surely some analysis can be done on the ASIC
jwilliams4200 - Saturday, April 7, 2012 - link
It isn't very important to me either way, since I have no financial interest. But OCZ has a history of dishonesty, and it bothers me to see them get away it.If it is important to you, you could start by contacting the appropriate people at OCZ and asking whether the controllers in the Octane and the Vertex 4 have similar or identical circuits with Marvell controllers.
jwilliams4200 - Wednesday, April 11, 2012 - link
http://www.anandtech.com/show/5741/ocz-confirms-oc...hackztor - Friday, April 13, 2012 - link
Good job on being correct. I think alot of people feel betrayed again by ocz. Last time i will purchase their product no matter what.pookguy88 - Wednesday, April 4, 2012 - link
so wait, right now they'll (256gb, 512gb) ship with 1gb DRAM but later on 512mb? Is it just me or is that going to be a huge deal for customers once they realize that they basically got jacked 512mb of RAM vs early adopters?pattycake0147 - Wednesday, April 4, 2012 - link
I inferred that the smaller drives will ship with 1GB but only 512MB will be used on the drive.Voo - Wednesday, April 4, 2012 - link
Considering that was explicitly stated in the article there's not much to infer here is it?"Oh no I was jacked from 512mb that were deactivated anyhow - what a scandal!"
antef - Wednesday, April 4, 2012 - link
Why is your standard recommendation still the Samsung SSD 830? Given the performance, prices, and most notably, the incredibly excellent reviews on sites like Newegg, the Crucial M4 would still be my recommendation to new shoppers.