SSD: SATA 3Gb maxed out?

[polonyc2]

can a single SSD max out the SATA 3Gb controller?...I'm asking because my benchmark numbers show Read speeds approaching 250 MB/s...isn't the max capabilities of SATA 3Gb around 285 MB/s?...will upgrading to a motherboard with SATA 6Gb give me higher performance?

here are my current SSD benchmarks...

 

[C-rizzle]

welcome to last year my friend.

many SSD's come close to the max 3Gbps speeds on seq. reads. But there's a lot more to a SSD than seq. reads....ie: practically zero response time & massive I/O / random read/writes.

6G will be around double the possible bandwidth but the one current 6Gbps SSD "only" hits 350mb/s

 

[Mez]

Essentially by purchasing a SATA 3 board (or card) you would be raising the ceiling of the connection which would support potential bursts but there is little point in that drastic of a upgrade for milliseconds of better performance.

The C300 SSD from Crucial - the 256GB version - has sequential reads of 350 MB/s so to perform at its optimal the SATA 3, 6Gbps, connector is necessary but only just.

Wait to upgrade to SATA 3 when newer gen, better controller SSDs that would actually make worthy use of the 6Gbps connection are released.

 

[polonyc2]

but what about my current SSD?...am I OK continuing to use the SATA 3Gb controller (based on those benchmarks) and will it make any difference if I upgrade to a SATA 6 board?...or will it only matter if I am using RAID with 2 or more SSD's?

 

[InvisiBill]

Your current SSD is SATA2 (3Gb), so going to a SATA3 (6Gb) controller will still result in a SATA2 (3Gb) connection. It will not increase the connection speed of your current SSD at all.

 

[C-rizzle]

You changed names on him & made it confusing

First, at 248Mb/s you're not maxing out your 3Gbps motherboard.

Second, unless you have a 6Gbps SSD (Crucial C300) then you don't need 6Gbps, as your drive will still run in 3Gbps mode, and still have a max of about 260-270Mb/s.


now for an FYI:

SATA1 spec = 1.5Gbps speed (bits) = real world max about 130Mb/s (bytes)

SATA2 spec = 3.0Gbps speed (bits) = real world max about 260Mb/s (bytes)

SATA3 spec = 6.0Gbps speed (bits) = real world max. estimate 550Mb/s (bytes)

SATA3 or more commonly called SATA 6Gbps is supposed to be a little more efficient so I estimated a little more than 2x faster.

However these are just pure theoretical maxes. Right now, the controllers are only maxing out the read speeds on the SATA2 or SATA 3Gbps spec. which isn't a big deal. The one drive that is SATA3 does get a boost by going from SATA2 to SATA3, however, its still only in reads. It will probably take another generation of drives to really make use of SATA3.

 

[Forceman]

now for an FYI:

SATA1 spec = 1.5Gbps speed (bits) = real world max about 130Mb/s (bytes)

SATA2 spec = 3.0Gbps speed (bits) = real world max about 260Mb/s (bytes)

SATA3 spec = 6.0Gbps speed (bits) = real world max. estimate 550Mb/s (bytes)

Not to nitpick, but you mean 130 MB/sec, 260 MB/sec, and 550 MB/sec

 

[polonyc2]

You changed names on him & made it confusing

First, at 248Mb/s you're not maxing out your 3Gbps motherboard.

Second, unless you have a 6Gbps SSD (Crucial C300) then you don't need 6Gbps, as your drive will still run in 3Gbps mode, and still have a max of about 260-270Mb/s.


now for an FYI:

SATA1 spec = 1.5Gbps speed (bits) = real world max about 130Mb/s (bytes)

SATA2 spec = 3.0Gbps speed (bits) = real world max about 260Mb/s (bytes)

SATA3 spec = 6.0Gbps speed (bits) = real world max. estimate 550Mb/s (bytes)

SATA3 or more commonly called SATA 6Gbps is supposed to be a little more efficient so I estimated a little more than 2x faster.

However these are just pure theoretical maxes. Right now, the controllers are only maxing out the read speeds on the SATA2 or SATA 3Gbps spec. which isn't a big deal. The one drive that is SATA3 does get a boost by going from SATA2 to SATA3, however, its still only in reads. It will probably take another generation of drives to really make use of SATA3.

thanks for that info...

but since I'm currently at 248Mb/s...isn't that close to the max spec of 260Mb/s?...so theoretically aren't I reaching the limits of what it can handle?...and what happens if I decide to get another 1-2 more of the same SSD, how will that effect the overall performance?

 

[InvisiBill]

but since I'm currently at 248Mb/s...isn't that close to the max spec of 260Mb/s?...so theoretically aren't I reaching the limits of what it can handle?...and what happens if I decide to get another 1-2 more of the same SSD, how will that effect the overall performance?

That's per channel. Each SSD you hook up will have that 3Gbps available to it.

 

[bigdogchris]

thanks for that info...

but since I'm currently at 248Mb/s...isn't that close to the max spec of 260Mb/s?...so theoretically aren't I reaching the limits of what it can handle?...and what happens if I decide to get another 1-2 more of the same SSD, how will that effect the overall performance?

The max spec is 300MBs. They usually do not hit the theoretical limitation. For example, USB II is a max spec of 48MBs but I can't get anything over 45MBs, regardless of my disk speed I'm reading from.

Anyways, I wouldn't worry if I was you. Unless your rendering movies or absolutely enormous photographs in photoshop, there is no situation where you would need a sustained 250MBs throughput from a drive in a home. You will absolutely not notice a performance decrease except with numbers in benchmarks that don't mean anything outside of eye candy.

 

[C-rizzle]

thanks for that info...

but since I'm currently at 248Mb/s...isn't that close to the max spec of 260Mb/s?...so theoretically aren't I reaching the limits of what it can handle?...and what happens if I decide to get another 1-2 more of the same SSD, how will that effect the overall performance?

I quoted 260 MB/s as thats REAL world max ie: what the best drives are getting but many drives get slightly less than that, around 250Mb/s + or - depending on other variables, IDE/AHCI mode, CPU speed, chipset & drivers, etc.

Theoretically it should have spec of 300 MB/s, but real world at 248 MB/s you're getting the maximim performance you can out of your drive within the margin of error.

I don't think you're really grasping the concepts.

EVEN if you get a 3gbps motherboard, your drive will only do what its currently doing + OR - 10Mb/s, b/c the chip that controls your SSD (inside of the SSD) is only a SATA2 chip which can only do approx. 250+- MB/s. You could actually even get lower performance!

The results you see are for people with 260MB/s have EVERYTHING correctly set up with a fast CPU, good/new intel chipset, good drivers, clean install, with out extra crap running in the background.

Maybe you should read this: http://www.hardocp.com/article/2010/02/19/sata_6gbs_on_your_new_motherboard

 

[polonyc2]

thanks for the info...so getting the Crucial C300 would be the only way to increase my speeds (with a SATA 6GB motherboard)...I'm statisfied with my current performance and will wait for 500GB+ capacities before buying another SSD

 

[C-rizzle]

thats the only way to increase your sequential read speeds, which are CLOSE to the maximum.

You could increase your overall performance a little with a better drive, like an Intel X25-M 160Gb, Vertex LE, etc. As the real world performance is much more affected by the random reads & writes, not sequential. As I stated several posts back.

But there's a lot more to a SSD than seq. reads....ie: practically zero response time & massive I/O / random read/writes.

 

[polonyc2]

You could increase your overall performance a little with a better drive, like an Intel X25-M 160Gb, Vertex LE, etc. As the real world performance is much more affected by the random reads & writes, not sequential. As I stated several posts back.

are my Random Read scores not good?

 

[C-rizzle]

your 4k random writes are low, but not necessarily for your brand drive. A lot of drives suffer from low random write performance or lag, and that can cause that lag that some SSD's have.

an Intel X-25M will get about 65Mb/s for the 80Gb version & 100Mb/s for the 160Gb version.

Other than that everything looks good.

 

[polonyc2]

your 4k random writes are low, but not necessarily for your brand drive. A lot of drives suffer from low random write performance or lag, and that can cause that lag that some SSD's have.

an Intel X-25M will get about 65Mb/s for the 80Gb version & 100Mb/s for the 160Gb version.

Other than that everything looks good.

those were Random Read scores I posted earlier...my 4k Random Write score is 62 MB/s

 

[C-rizzle]

Your first CrystalDiskMark score only showed 19.81 for the 4K run, which is low.