Asus P8P67 Pro SSD issues

ochadd

ochadd

[H]ard|Gawd
Joined
May 9, 2008
Messages
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My windows experience score went from 7.5 to 5.9 after swapping out motherboards last
night. P35 board is bottom and P67 on top. Seems to be using the same drivers and it's plugged into the intel SATA 300 ports. Any ideas?


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Edit: 1/29/2011

Added another drive and went to RAID0 and did a fresh install of Windows 7. 4k scores are still terrible.

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Edit 1/29/2011 v2

Forgot to enable write-back cache on the volume. The overall score is lower but the 4k writes are twice as fast and the 4k-64 read is much slower.

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Edit 1/31/2011
I'm out of ideas and Intel is now recalling the P67 chipset. The 4k numbers are still 25-30% slower than on P35. According to today's stories it may be awhile before replacements are available. I'm getting the numbers on both sets of SATA ports so the recall issue may not be my issue but paranoia has set in...

Edit 2/7/2011
Updated the SSD firmware to the revision released 1/26/2011. Verified the latest Intel RAID drivers. Running in RAID 0 with a 128k stripe. Write cache enabled. On the SATA 6Gbps ports. Windows 7 Ultimate 64 bit.

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This is with the Intel driver vs the MS AHCI driver. Slight improvement but nowhere close to where it was.

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when i reinstalled my os it did the same thing. let the pc idle and trim do what it does then rerun the test.
 
I assume by SATA 300 you mean the Sata 3 6Gbs port? I too have the Intel X25-M G2 and a 2600K and Asus P8P67 Deluxe. I'm trying to figure out which SATA port I should plug into? Theoretically it won't saturate the SATA II 3Gbs ports so I'm thinking that would be best and I shouldn't even plug into the SATA III 6Gbs???
 
Pretzel said:
I assume by SATA 300 you mean the Sata 3 6Gbs port? I too have the Intel X25-M G2 and a 2600K and Asus P8P67 Deluxe. I'm trying to figure out which SATA port I should plug into? Theoretically it won't saturate the SATA II 3Gbs ports so I'm thinking that would be best and I shouldn't even plug into the SATA III 6Gbs???
Click to expand...

It is plugged into the Intel SATA II 3Gbps ports. Believe there are six of them. Have the SSD on port five and a hard drive on port four. I'm not at home currently but I did run the Intel SSD toolbox trim a couple times before running the benchmark.

I can definetly feel the slower performance in booting windows and also loading games.
 
Can you try RAID mode? You can easily use it by running an application called RAIDFix and using its process, then rebooting and enabling RAID mode, and then going into Windows and installing the latest Intel RST drivers. You can still switch back to AHCI/IDE mode after if you want to.
 
You may try removing everything else that's on the Intel controller and just running the SSD. That seemed to be an issue for me. It's not a solution, but it might point you towards the right direction.
 
Tried switching to RAID mode. No boot. Tried idling for 30 min or so. No dice. Reran the Intel trim tool several time. No dice.
Will try and remove everything but the SSD tomorrow. Very frustrating losing 50% of the 4k performance. You can tell it's off when restarting allot and loading apps constantly.
 
Still no luck.
Moved to another 3G port.
Moved to a Sata 6G port.
Tried Raid instead of AHCI.
Let it idle for an hour.

It's about 1/2 as fast as it used to be on 4k writes. Any other ideas?
 
I have the same board and 2 of the Crucial 64 gigs in RAID 0 and they are screaming. I am using the 2 Intel 6gb SATA ports and all seems to be fine. My score in AS SSD Benchmark is 867. I didn't post this to brag, rather to assure you that there IS hope!
 
Good to know that it should work.

Finally switched over to the Intel RAID driver and got Windows 7 to boot. Results still suck and are actually worse.
4K= 20.07 read 22.52 write
4k-64thrd= 123.05 read and 28.30 write

Only idea I have left is to wipe the drive and reinstall. Have nearly a half day sunk into this :(
 
G_Sup said:
I have the same board and 2 of the Crucial 64 gigs in RAID 0 and they are screaming. I am using the 2 Intel 6gb SATA ports and all seems to be fine. My score in AS SSD Benchmark is 867. I didn't post this to brag, rather to assure you that there IS hope!
Click to expand...

How about starting a thread with your AS-SSD score?

I'd really like to see how the Crucials do with Intel's SATA 6GB/s ports.
 
OP - I'm running with the same drive and mobo as you, and my as-ssd scores are actually better than your p35 scores (total score of 411). The only difference I can see is that I did a fresh install of win7, whereas you swapped.

Did the SSD toolbox diagnostics flag anything? Is SuperFetch disabled? Did you try a diagnostic scan?

It would suck if a reinstall was needed. The only thing I can imagine is some old/crusty drivers messing you up.
 
I would just make sure you're using the native sata ports rather than the Marvell ones (top 2).
 
robododo said:
OP - I'm running with the same drive and mobo as you, and my as-ssd scores are actually better than your p35 scores (total score of 411). The only difference I can see is that I did a fresh install of win7, whereas you swapped.

Did the SSD toolbox diagnostics flag anything? Is SuperFetch disabled? Did you try a diagnostic scan?

It would suck if a reinstall was needed. The only thing I can imagine is some old/crusty drivers messing you up.
Click to expand...

The toolbox wants to disable superfetch, always has, but I'd prefer to leave it on. Now that I've got 8 gig of memory might as well load it up. Everything else is ok. Don't think I've run a diagnostics scan unless you're refering to the screen where the tool and the superfetch warning is. Will take a look tonight.

I've verified I'm not in the Marvell ports as I've got them and Jmicron ports disabled completely in the bios since I've been troubleshooting this. Switching to the 6gbps ports improved things slightly buy I'm still around 50% of what it was.

My vote is also on drivers but I've updated everything remotely related to storage that I know of. This is the first time I've ever swapped motherboards without an install. Reinstall isn't the end of the world but it is a pain in the butt. Outside of this storage problem everything has been seamless. Makes me wonder if a less knowledgeable or less anal user would even notice the hit.

I appreciate all the suggestions so far. Would like to figure this out even if a fresh install would fix it. The problem has gotten under my skin.
 
Make sure you install the "Intel Rapid Storage Technology driver software V10.0.0.1046 for Windows 32/64bit XP/Vista 32bit/Vista 64bit/Win7 32bit/Win7 64bit--(WHQL)" Link That driver alone changed my Windows user experience for hard drive performance from 5.8 to 7.7 for my SSD.
 
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Pretzel said:
Make sure you install the "Intel Rapid Storage Technology driver software V10.0.0.1046 for Windows 32/64bit XP/Vista 32bit/Vista 64bit/Win7 32bit/Win7 64bit--(WHQL)" Link That driver alone changed my Windows user experience for hard drive performance from 5.8 to 7.7 for my SSD.
Click to expand...

I do have this installed. I can open the software and view both the SSD and my secondary hard drive. One thing I notice in here is that the SSD is not marked as being a "System" disk while the hard drive is even though Windows is installed on the SSD.
 
dandragonrage said:
actually, there's a 10.1 version.
Click to expand...

I upgraded to 10.1 and it helped. Took writes from the 20s into the 30s. Still not there yet. The drive only has about 7.5 gigs free. Not sure what it was at when I first benched it. That play a roll?
 
I'm just going to chalk the problem up to the lack of free space and let it go. Will wait for the C400 next month and either pick one of those up or grab another Intel device and move to RAID 0.
Thanks for the input.
 
ochadd said:
The toolbox wants to disable superfetch, always has, but I'd prefer to leave it on. Now that I've got 8 gig of memory might as well load it up. Everything else is ok. Don't think I've run a diagnostics scan unless you're refering to the screen where the tool and the superfetch warning is. Will take a look tonight.
Click to expand...

I just went into the SSD Toolbox. There are two buttons: Run Fast and Run Full Diagnostic Scan. That's what I was referring to. I'm not sure if they'll turn anything up, but who knows.

As for being full, I didn't realize that made a difference. I thought SSDs had a lot of extra space reserved to ensure that they remained efficient.
 
robododo said:
I just went into the SSD Toolbox. There are two buttons: Run Fast and Run Full Diagnostic Scan. That's what I was referring to. I'm not sure if they'll turn anything up, but who knows.

As for being full, I didn't realize that made a difference. I thought SSDs had a lot of extra space reserved to ensure that they remained efficient.
Click to expand...

The diagnostics all said ok. I also didn't think it would make much of a difference but apparently if that is the case it's a 40-50% hit on small writes.

I wanted to upgrade just to upgrade anyway and going with another identical X25-M. When I move my Steam folder and other games off I'll free up 40+ gigs and re-run the test. If performance doesn't come back it will have to be a Windows or driver issue.
 
ochadd said:
The diagnostics all said ok. I also didn't think it would make much of a difference but apparently if that is the case it's a 40-50% hit on small writes.

I wanted to upgrade just to upgrade anyway and going with another identical X25-M. When I move my Steam folder and other games off I'll free up 40+ gigs and re-run the test. If performance doesn't come back it will have to be a Windows or driver issue.
Click to expand...

I just recreated your issue by moving a P45/Q8200 Win7 64-bit install to the P67 Pro board with a 2600K. I used a 160GB G2 X25M (37.7GB free) and even after updating the INF file, MEI and RIST drivers the various HD bench programs all showed a significant performance drop. A new OS install cured it. That said we will be providing some tips and tricks on improving storage performance shortly in an updated guide, this includes the best driver set to utilize along with proper C-State settings to ensure best performance of various SSDs.
 
If various C-states need to be disabled to get I/O performance to where it should be, then someone has done something wrong... Not that it would be the fault of Asus if so. That said, good to know, if that's how it is...
 
dandragonrage said:
If various C-states need to be disabled to get I/O performance to where it should be, then someone has done something wrong... Not that it would be the fault of Asus if so. That said, good to know, if that's how it is...
Click to expand...
Actually, on the SB platform disabling C-states adversely affects everything but 3D performance (which depending on the C-state disabled will provide a minor improvement).
The problem in setting up the P67 platform is that most of the items a user would change/disable on X58/P55 to improve performance will not provide optimum performance on P67 (EIST, Turbo, C-States, etc), so the user needs to think differently when tuning the system now.
 
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So basically I have to turn off all power-saving features if I want my system to perform well?

I wish I could cancel my SB order now... but it's waiting at my doorstep for me today.
 
Gary Key said:
I just recreated your issue by moving a P45/Q8200 Win7 64-bit install to the P67 Pro board with a 2600K. I used a 160GB G2 X25M (37.7GB free) and even after updating the INF file, MEI and RIST drivers the various HD bench programs all showed a significant performance drop. A new OS install cured it. That said we will be providing some tips and tricks on improving storage performance shortly in an updated guide, this includes the best driver set to utilize along with proper C-State settings to ensure best performance of various SSDs.
Click to expand...


It has been nice to see the Asus folks active on the boards with the sandy bridge launch. Thanks Gary!
 
dandragonrage said:
So basically I have to turn off all power-saving features if I want my system to perform well?

I wish I could cancel my SB order now... but it's waiting at my doorstep for me today.
Click to expand...

No, turning off PM routines (C-states, EIST, Turbo) will adversely affect performance in almost all cases. There are certain C-state read routines that you can disable to eek out that last 1~2% in the 3DMarks but otherwise you want it all enabled, except S3 when you are trying to get above a 50x multiplier with most retail K series processors. I have seen 2600/2500K processors wall at 50x even with Internal PLL voltages enabled and hit 51x~52x with S3 disabled. It just depends on your CPU and board setup.
 
Oh, so I WANT the power saving? Perfect! I've long thought that the power saving features should be enabled all the time without the option to disable them.
 
avatar[djedi];1036725811 said:
It has been nice to see the Asus folks active on the boards with the sandy bridge launch. Thanks Gary!
Click to expand...

I have to say.... I was never intending to be an SB early adopter because of the likelihood of issues - and lo, [H] is full of all kinds of SB teething problems. If Asus is actively participating that is very, very good news and has just earned them a lot of credibility in my books. Thumbs up!
 
dandragonrage said:
Oh, so I WANT the power saving? Perfect! I've long thought that the power saving features should be enabled all the time without the option to disable them.
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Yes, you want the power saving options enabled or set to auto except for rare cases (high multis above 51x or benching 3DMark for a record).
 
I just got my P8P67 Pro installed, in RAID mode, dropped from 7.5 (X58 in RAID mode, SSD not in an array) to 7.4 (P67 in RAID mode, SSD not in an array)... I did move from RAID OROM 10.1 to 10.0 with this board and unfortunately there are no tools for me to use to get 10.1 back, but I'll deal. At least it's not the ancient 8.0 Asus refused to move beyond on X58.
 
So am I reading this right in that if I were to just switch my mobo/cpu/ram without doing a full reinstall of Win7 I'd get decreased performance out of my SSD? Or is there something specific and situational going on here?

I've been planning to do a SB build and was in fact leaning toward this exact motherboard, but I'm at that point where I've had my current Windows install going *just* long enough now to get everything exactly the way I want it. I was hoping to avoid a full reinstall when I went for the upgrade and I'd read more than one positive experience from people who did exactly that, but with older hardware.
 
ThinJ said:
So am I reading this right in that if I were to just switch my mobo/cpu/ram without doing a full reinstall of Win7 I'd get decreased performance out of my SSD?
Click to expand...

You are reading that that "may" be the case. It wasn't with me to any substantial amount. I run Win7 x64. I swapped from X58 to P67 and all I did was install the new chipset drivers and the management engine driver. Edit to note, if anyone cares, that I have an OCZ Vertex LE (Sandforce SF1500)
 
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dandragonrage said:
You are reading that that "may" be the case. It wasn't with me to any substantial amount. I run Win7 x64. I swapped from X58 to P67 and all I did was install the new chipset drivers and the management engine driver.
Click to expand...

Ok, that's much more inline with some other anecdotal evidence I've read. I was just worried whatever's going on here was something more widespread. Thanks.
 
Gary Key said:
I just recreated your issue by moving a P45/Q8200 Win7 64-bit install to the P67 Pro board with a 2600K. I used a 160GB G2 X25M (37.7GB free) and even after updating the INF file, MEI and RIST drivers the various HD bench programs all showed a significant performance drop. A new OS install cured it. That said we will be providing some tips and tricks on improving storage performance shortly in an updated guide, this includes the best driver set to utilize along with proper C-State settings to ensure best performance of various SSDs.
Click to expand...

Thank you for the follow up. This is the type of thing that has kept me using Asus boards for many years.If there are any tests you would like me to run, remote/webex included, please let me know.
 
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