Intel 900p Optane ...WOW

The benchmark I would like, and suspect will never materialize because of its eccentricity (and specificity to my needs), is a Chromium compile on an Optane vs. a solid traditional SSD. That's not actually what I work on, but it is reasonably comparable in size and scope.

I compile huge projects all day, and if there's a real needle movement on that time spent, I will open the wallet. I may still open the wallet even if the delta is tiny because I have more money than time at this point, and dammit, 15 free minutes a day with my partner still sounds pretty good if I can just effectively buy it. I pine for the days where I could just have a glass of wine and relax in the evenings. Damn new wireless standards - y'all better like 5G. Please. Make it worth blood/sweat/tears. I simultaneously love the progression of tech, and hate it because each generation brings a "crunch time" which seems to last until the next "crunch time".
 
One thing I do consistently is convert bluray .ISOs to MKVs. These are real-world things I sit there and have to wait on before I can continue on what I want to do. I often pick a single movie's .ISO so the file sizes are identical and try it on various drives.

MakeMKV is multi-threaded, so I'm never CPU-bound. It can give drastically different results, along with showing / exposing caches on certain drives.
 
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The benchmark I would like, and suspect will never materialize because of its eccentricity (and specificity to my needs), is a Chromium compile on an Optane vs. a solid traditional SSD. That's not actually what I work on, but it is reasonably comparable in size and scope.

.

Wouldn’t faster processors, and more memory make a much bigger difference in comparison to faster storage?
 
Wouldn’t faster processors, and more memory make a much bigger difference in comparison to faster storage?

I would speculate that yes, those would improve things the most. That said, I've basically done that. I am building x-platform libraries, and have a beefy Xeon for my windows builder, and a beefy TR for my linux builder (seemed sensible at the time). I am just curious if there's a delta beyond that. Some days, I need to build / retest a lot.

Realistically, I'll probably get a 905 for the win builder, and measure deltas. If it makes me a *happy camper* I will get one for the TR. too. Otherwise I will leave the solid SSDs as is and let the Optane's go to those who are *in between*.

(Sorry, I read an article on Star control 2 again, and now feel compelled to speak as an Orz, all the time. I do not want to be *noticed*.)
 
For those that own one, OP included, i was wondering what kind of drivers did you need to install?
And because this is a bit too general, lol, to specify: Was there an .inf you could just add, or does it force you to install a suite? Was it multiple ones or a single and of what kind? And does it require other software/drivers such as the despiccable ME for example?
 
I would speculate that yes, those would improve things the most. That said, I've basically done that. I am building x-platform libraries, and have a beefy Xeon for my windows builder, and a beefy TR for my linux builder (seemed sensible at the time). I am just curious if there's a delta beyond that. Some days, I need to build / retest a lot.
Realistically, I'll probably get a 905 for the win builder, and measure deltas. If it makes me a *happy camper* I will get one for the TR. too. Otherwise I will leave the solid SSDs as is and let the Optane's go to those who are *in between*.
)

Why don't you do what I did? put down $50-80 or so (including software), get a 32 gig optane and test it as a cache drive - it's relatively inexpensive to do that. I say this as I don't have a beefy Xeon or a beefy TR to play with (I have a ryzen 1700 @ 3.7). You can set up tiered storage on Linux also (LVMTS).

You would need a U2/nvme converter - but those are inexpensive and fit the aforementioned budget.

If proof of concept works with the 32 gig optane, then buy the big hulking 900p?

If you do in fact do this - please share the results. I'm sure it would help others in a similar situation
 
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You don’t have to install anything.
However, to fully utilize features and performance, firmware upgrades etc, you want to install the Intel SSD Toolbox and the Intel Optane drive for 900p.
 
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One thing I do consistently is convert bluray .ISOs to MKVs. These are real-world things I sit there and have to wait on before I can continue on what I want to do. I often pick a single movie's .ISO so the file sizes are identical and try it on various drives.

MakeMKV is multi-threaded, so I'm never CPU-bound. It can give drastically different results, along with showing / exposing caches on certain drives.

Rubbish - you're always CPU bound. MakeMKV will fill a portion of memory as a buffer, then slowly feed that as the processor chugs through the conversion/compression process. Your speed bottleneck isn't storage. Memory latency will make a little difference though.
 
Rubbish - you're always CPU bound. MakeMKV will fill a portion of memory as a buffer, then slowly feed that as the processor chugs through the conversion/compression process. Your speed bottleneck isn't storage. Memory latency will make a little difference though.
BS - I get drastically different speeds depending on which SSD I use to perform the operation, and no one single core is anywhere close to being fully utilized.
 
seems that I was thermally throttled on the 950 on the previous tests. I got a heatsink. Doing more testing now.

As for MakeMKV - can you recommend a BR to use? I'll test it.
 
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905p just got announced. Damn I'm sold on optane too but these prices are too high for my liking.
 
905p just got announced. Damn I'm sold on optane too but these prices are too high for my liking.

I just saw the news about the 905p, I really wish the prices were sane. I would love to pick up a 1.5 or 1TB as an OS/boot drive, but not at these prices.
 
I don’t understand why folks need such huge boot drives? Keep your OS drive lean n mean and buy a 512GB-1TB Sam 970 for games / programs etc.
 
I think many want the speed of Optane for game load times.
 
This thing is no joke. Cloned a 512GB NVMe 960 Pro to this 900p (280GB U2).
Low-QD Random Read is where it’s at folks. The hype is real. This drive is disgusting fast for an OS drive.

Got it on sale at NewEgg too. Really wished I would’ve grabbed another for another box.

Highly recommended!

This review says it all:
http://www.tomshardware.com/reviews/intel-optane-ssd-900p-3d-xpoint,5292.html

Help me fully understand, you copied a 512gb drive onto a 280gb drive? How much actual data?

Dont you need a 1 to 1 to do a clone? Or at least a partition of the same size? How long did the clone take?

Just trying to understand how this shows this is a fast drive.
 
Help me fully understand, you copied a 512gb drive onto a 280gb drive? How much actual data?

Dont you need a 1 to 1 to do a clone? Or at least a partition of the same size? How long did the clone take?

Just trying to understand how this shows this is a fast drive.

I only use 80-100GB for OS volumes. Specifically for the portability/size. and over-provisioning benefits for NAND. I will say the clone job from the 960 Pro to 900p was ridiculous fast!
 
And if you're an AMD user, this drive is irrelevant. Just throwing that out there.

I understand using it as a system cache is limited to specific Intel chipsets, does not the drive function as a reg NVME storage device on it's own?
 
does not the drive function as a reg NVME storage device on it's own?
I understand using it as a system cache is limited to specific Intel chipsets,


It does and you can use it as cache with primocache under windows. However primocache is not free software.

Also AMD has a free option with the new chipset / and also TR.

https://www.amd.com/en/technologies/store-mi
 
That's why i asked.. thanks.
I like new toys, but new Intel toys always come with asterisks; and it seems it's the case here as well. No problem here sticking with Samsung. And yes, no problem to Intel either :)

just personally had enough with all this; at some point i had this yuuuuge(tm) eureka moment, when i realised that single digit differences were truly irrelevant and all the fun was in setting, building and using. My priorities since then have shifted.
I want fewer dependencies, fewer software suites, simpler and more direct access or tools; even at the cost of "performance", no probs.

(the above without discounting that yes, for casual/everyday usage, the Optane appears to be significantly better)
 
Every SSD improvement has been very small until Optane. No other flash solution has offered low-QD random reads anywhere near where Optane plays at. Truly a huge step in flash evolution. NVMe was great evolution for sequential performance.
 
a huge step

I'd dare say Gargantuan! Godzilla-esque! Never before had we a new hard drive technology that was faster than its predecessors! Rejoice ye faithless!

In all seriousness, and again, its performance granted and notwithstanding? I'll buy the non-Intel equivalent in 6 months; at about..half the price; oh, and without the asterisks ^^
 
Equivalent in 6 months for half price? Good luck with that! XPoint is XPoint. Do some research ye ignoramous!
 
Equivalent in 6 months for half price? Good luck with that! XPoint is XPoint. Do some research ye ignoramous!

I thought Micron was getting ready to put out their own branded version of XPoint drives. They were a partner with Intel in their development. Hopefully if they start selling them we could see some better prices.
 
Half price in 6 months is simply unrealistic, whatever way you cut it, lol. Samsung already blew their load with the 970s and they were just a very minor refresh. We won't see anything out of them for another year-ish.
 
X-Point is kinda cool now for a real fast SSD, but it could evolve into something really game changing. That and some of the other promising ultra-fast NVM techs could actually change how systems (HW and OS) are fundamentally designed.

Things are what they are because of entrenched heirarchies of speed/cost tiers. If something blurs or changes those lines, Things Get Interesting.

I look forward to Things Getting Interesting.
 
Wait til we get into shared memory computing. Holy crap.
Flips everything we know upside down.
 
Wait til we get into shared memory computing. Holy crap.
Flips everything we know upside down.

I've thought about this briefly- and aside from being able to essentially 'sleep' the system with the power off and then have it come instantly back, I don't see much of an innovation here. And I agree that it is an innovation that will be leveraged, just not sure how it will 'flip everything we know upside down' ;).
 
I've thought about this briefly- and aside from being able to essentially 'sleep' the system with the power off and then have it come instantly back, I don't see much of an innovation here. And I agree that it is an innovation that will be leveraged, just not sure how it will 'flip everything we know upside down' ;).

Because of the pros and cons of potentially having everything in a unified address space, and an elimination of data movement between previously separate layers. You wouldn't "load" a file anymore. You just read the data as it's already directly visible by the processor. It changes the bookkeeping problems quite a bit - which is why it may basically never happen writ large, but may in specialized/constrained cases like DB servers and smartphones.
 
I thought Micron was getting ready to put out their own branded version of XPoint drives. They were a partner with Intel in their development. Hopefully if they start selling them we could see some better prices.
Micron is calling their version "QuantX", but they haven't announced much about it, or shipped any products. Also, Micron and Intel recently announced an end to their joint venture for NAND flash, but apparently the joint venture for 3D Xpoint is still going on.
 
Bit of an update 950pro (2gb) using the 32gb optane as L2 with primocache, block size in primo set to 4k - new heatsink on the 950 pro.
950pro2gb.JPG


No cache 950 pro (w/heatsink)
950pro2gb nocache.JPG


Results speak for themselves
 
Atto tells a different story

Cache on(950 pro) (low block writes still high0
950pro2gbattocache.JPG


Cache off
950pro2gbattoNOcache.JPG


I'm guessing that the 2x pci-e lane situation is the limitation and wondering if I should tweak the cache size so that when it gets to 1.5-2 gig it hits the disk instead.
 
Rubbish - you're always CPU bound. MakeMKV will fill a portion of memory as a buffer, then slowly feed that as the processor chugs through the conversion/compression process. Your speed bottleneck isn't storage. Memory latency will make a little difference though.

I figured MakeMKV was limited by the speed at which my BluRay drive spins.
 
Bit of an update 950pro (2gb) using the 32gb optane as L2 with primocache, block size in primo set to 4k - new heatsink on the 950 pro.
View attachment 77504

No cache 950 pro (w/heatsink)
View attachment 77505

Results speak for themselves

I've always wanted an Optane for some reason. I think the theory is neat.

Looks like I could possibly justify one for my 960 Evo, based on your results.

How easy is the software to set up and tweak? I have multiple drives I'd like to try it on. Will that be an issue?
 
I've always wanted an Optane for some reason. I think the theory is neat.

Looks like I could possibly justify one for my 960 Evo, based on your results.

How easy is the software to set up and tweak? I have multiple drives I'd like to try it on. Will that be an issue?


I have some further results here: https://hardforum.com/threads/optane-memory-is-it-for-you-opinion-review.1961497/ and suggest you move comments there as this is going way off topic here.

Ill quote your post/reply there
 
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