Noob SSD question

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OS1R1S

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I tried searching but could not find the answer to this. If i were to purchase two SandForce SSD's that utilize the full 6gb bandwidth ( i hope that's an accurate statement) and put them in raid 0, would there be any performance benefit? Because, doesn't just one of those drives already take advantage of all the throughput? To benefit from two of these drives in raid 0 wouldn't you theoretically need 12gb bus speed?

thanks for any input.
 
Freak1 said:
The bus speed is per port not for all ports on the controller.
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So then, if i utilized two ports on the mother board (1 for each SSD), then i would benefit in performance if i setup a raid 0 yes?
 
If i were to purchase two SandForce SSD's that utilize the full 6gb bandwidth
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You're confusing the interface speed (SATA 6GB/s) with the drive's actual speed.

Just because the speed limit is 6GB/s doesn't mean your drive will go that fast and none do.

RAID0 is the performance set-up and will increase speeds.
 
purchase two SandForce SSD's
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I do not recommend that. Read the articles about performance throttling. Also avoid any product made by OCZ. They have had far too many serious reliability problems in recent history.
 
Just to clear up some confusion, SATA III is 6Gbps, not 6GBps. Big difference.

Right now your best choices for SSDs are Crucial's M4 or Intel 320 series SSD.

6Gbps = 768MB/s maximum speed. You can actually get pretty close to that with the new SSDs in a RAID0, but the difference in real world performance IMO is not worth losing TRIM support. I would rather run 2 SSDs separately than using them in RAID.

Hope this helps.
 
Cmustang87 said:
Just to clear up some confusion, SATA III is 6Gbps, not 6GBps. Big difference.

Right now your best choices for SSDs are Crucial's M4 or Intel 320 series SSD.

6Gbps = 768MB/s maximum speed. You can actually get pretty close to that with the new SSDs in a RAID0, but the difference in real world performance IMO is not worth losing TRIM support. I would rather run 2 SSDs separately than using them in RAID.

Hope this helps.
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Thanks mustang for the info...please forgive me though, i haven't kept up with these forums as much as i'd have liked to. I'm not familiar with how TRIM support is good or bad. Honestly, i don't know what TRIM support is. Being that you mentioned the 320 series, i'm assuming you're recommending a SSD that has high reliability vs performance? I'm very interested in the Corsair Force 3 drives providing they can clear up the SandForce issues.

If you could elaborate on how TRIIM support would be more beneficial performance wise i'd greatly appreciate it. And if two Corsair Force 3 120gb drives in raid 0 is not the way to go, please someone let me know. Assuming there is no issue with SandForce, why wouldn't i want this configuration?

This raid 0 would act as my system drive.
 
Just to clear up some confusion, SATA III is 6Gbps, not 6GBps. Big difference.
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It does get a little confusing but when we have programs like ASSSD that give the specs as GB/s, what are you gonna do?
 
And if two Corsair Force 3 120gb drives in raid 0 is not the way to go, please someone let me know. Assuming there is no issue with SandForce, why wouldn't i want this configuration?
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You are asking things that have been discussed many times.

May I suggest you do a search for your answers?
 
drescherjm said:
Search for Sandforce. Search for TRIM. Search for throttle.
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So, based on this response, i'm assuming SandForce is not the way to go for SSD in raid 0. So what is the going recommendation for performance at today's date in the SSD market???????
 
OS1R1S said:
So, based on this response, i'm assuming SandForce is not the way to go for SSD in raid 0. So what is the going recommendation for performance at today's date in the SSD market???????
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For sata III i would go for Crucial M4 / Intel 510s. For sata II and not planing to upgrade anytime soon, Intel 320 / Samsung 470.
 
OS1R1S said:
If you could elaborate on how TRIIM support would be more beneficial performance wise i'd greatly appreciate it.This raid 0 would act as my system drive.
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[ame="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/TRIM"]TRIM - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia[/ame]

Basically it's how the controllers handle dirty sectors on the disk. Read up on it a little bit before you make your decision.

EDIT: WTF Hyperlink?
 
Well, it seems as though TRIM doesn't work if the SSD's are part of a raid volume:

The TRIM command does not work on RAID volumes. For a short time in March 2010, users were led to believe that the Intel Rapid Storage Technology 9.6 drivers supported TRIM in RAID volumes, but Intel later clarified that TRIM was supported for the BIOS settings of AHCI mode and RAID mode, but not if the drive was part of a RAID volume

So, withouth TRIM will the SSD performance continue to degrade? If so, does that mean you have to wipe the drive periodically?
 
Well, it seems as though TRIM doesn't work if the SSD's are part of a raid volume:
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Of course and no one here said it did.

So, withouth TRIM will the SSD performance continue to degrade?
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It's been discussed many times but I'll give you the short and sweet.....the guys (like me) that run these drives in RAID0 have found no disadvantage relying on GC (garbage collection that's in ALL SSDs) to clean the drives as long as you have enough empty space on the drive to let the GC work correctly.

Don't expect to fill 80-90% of your OS's drives space and get great performance without letting GC do it's job.

The wise thing is always to put the OS and programs on your C drive and move other things to a storage drive.
 
Old Hippie said:
Of course and no one here said it did.


It's been discussed many times but I'll give you the short and sweet.....the guys (like me) that run these drives in RAID0 have found no disadvantage relying on GC (garbage collection that's in ALL SSDs) to clean the drives as long as you have enough empty space on the drive to let the GC work correctly.

Don't expect to fill 80-90% of your OS's drives space and get great performance without letting GC do it's job.

The wise thing is always to put the OS and programs on your C drive and move other things to a storage drive.
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So if i understand correctly, TRIM is software based in the OS, and GC does the same kinda thing but is hardware based on the SSD itself? I'm sure two 120's in a raid 0 will be plenty enough to have at least half empty all the time.
 
GC gets the job done fine - I've been running RAID0 SSDs without TRIM for many years - since consumer SSDs came out - on my 6th or 7th generation/set now.

By 'em big and fast, R0 them together, put everything on 'em and enjoy.
 
So if i understand correctly, TRIM is software based in the OS, and GC does the same kinda thing but is hardware based on the SSD itself?
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You got a handle on it. :)

My w7 install + programs is @ 36GB.

You'll be fine.
 
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