OCZ Vertex 4 Review (256GB, 512GB)
by Anand Lal Shimpi on April 4, 2012 9:00 AM ESTPCMark 7
The storage suite in PCMark 7 validates a lot of what we've seen thus far. Despite great write performance, the Vertex 4 can't outperform the Vertex 3 because of its read speed limitations. From OCZ's perspective however, the gap is narrow enough in overall tests to make the shift away from SandForce likely worthwhile. The Vertex 4 doesn't care about compressible vs. incompressible data and it keeps more of the drive's BOM cost in house compared to the Vertex 3.
It's worth noting that for sufficiently light workloads, the difference in performance between any modern SSD is going to be limited right off the bat. We're talking about a 6% spread between the slowest and fastest drive here. For many users, simply finding the right balance of price and reliability is sufficient - which happens to be one of the reasons we've been such big fans of Samsung's SSD 830.
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Freddy G. - Wednesday, April 4, 2012 - link
I want an SSD now for my gaming system, as boot and games drive, what u guys think should be better? Crucial m4 or Corsair Force GT? BTW Im going to start with a 120gb version in the meantime.kyuu - Wednesday, April 4, 2012 - link
Whichever is cheaper. Performance-wise, you won't notice a difference. I promise.tynopik - Wednesday, April 4, 2012 - link
don't think you said what you meantAnand Lal Shimpi - Wednesday, April 4, 2012 - link
I think you're quite right :) Fixed.Take care,
Anand
ViviTheMage - Wednesday, April 4, 2012 - link
I have two M4's, I find the iops to be as delicious as milk shakes.gloinsir - Wednesday, April 4, 2012 - link
What's up with the huge variance in performance between the Samsung 830 512MB and 256MB drives? On the light workload test - http://www.anandtech.com/show/5719/ocz-vertex-4-re... - The 256MB version is 25-50% faster on all tests. That's an enormous difference.Is there a firmware difference between the two drives?
Thanks for a great review. I hope the firmware updates and reliability work out. Competition is good!
Anand Lal Shimpi - Wednesday, April 4, 2012 - link
There is indeed a firmware difference between the drives - unfortunately Samsung's latest firmware won't install on the 512GB drive for whatever reason, so it's left with lower performance.Take care,
Anand
ckryan - Wednesday, April 4, 2012 - link
Are you sure that's a FW difference? I didn't really notice much of a difference overall between my 256GB and 512GB 830s, but there are differences.My 512 on 01FW pulls down substantially higher QD1 4K RWs than the 256 on 01 or 03FW, but there are other differences. I think there are slightly different characteristics between the 32gbit and 64gbit dies.
ViviTheMage - Wednesday, April 4, 2012 - link
Seriously, these are probably the most nutritious, and scrumdidaliumpcious iop looking SSD's I have seen.edlee321 - Wednesday, April 4, 2012 - link
Im another one of those crucial m4 fans, you cannot get better bang for the buck than these drives, especially for power consumption and reliability.The difference between 4k read from one ssd to another is not important, reliability and idle power consumption is whats important.
If anand can run a one month stress test using random uncompressable data on all the current drives in his possession that would be great. I want to see what drive lasts out the longest.