SSD VS HDD RAID -0 VS Single HDD Comparison

the_real_7

the_real_7

[H]ard|Gawd
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SSD VS HDD RAID -0 VS SINGLE HDD COMPARISON ;)
Last week when I was looking around for a ssd I wasn’t sure where I was going to land in this world of this new solid state drive technology , but I knew it was faster than my current raid 0 setup without the raid, but that it also had its problems , price , controllers , brands, trim or no trim , raid or no raid , memory degration , supported operating systems , windows 7 ssd tweaking , Microsoft or Intel drivers and the list goes on , so like never before I really had to do my research, which paid off and got my what I wanted, A faster snappier more responsive system . Reason I’m posting this up here is for anyone else looking, they can check out my benches to help them make a decision if it is worth the jump going from a single hdd or a raid-0 hdd setup to a ssd setup, I’m not showing raid benchmarks on the ssd, because it just not a logical choice right now without trim, but benchmark wise raid 0 ssd is extremely fast no doubt about it
Benchmark Setup
Gigabyte GA-EP45-UD3P “ Intel ICHR10 Controller”
Intel Quad Core Q9650 @ 4050
G.SKILL P.I. Black (2 x 2Gb) DDR2 900
Windows 7 Pro with Intel® Rapid Storage Technology Driver 9.6.0.1014
SINGLE SSD: Intel x25m G2 80
RAID-0: 2 X WD Blue WD6400AAKS 640GB
SINGLE HDD: WD Black WD1001FALS 1TB



Recommended Items needed to make jump easy
1. A motherboard that let you wipe the drive and update bios by selecting legacy ide mode “I’ve heard of some amd boards having problems.
2. Pick a ssd drive that supports trim so your drive will maintain its speed , by windows 7 maintaining it
3. You can pick any operating system but XP and Vista have to be manually adjusted, Windows 7 will automatically adjust everything for a maintenance free drive
4. Fresh os install with updated drivers for motherboard
My system was loaded last week and is used

Round 1 Speed Benchmark

SINGLE HDD: WD Black WD1001FALS 1TB
HDTune_Benchmark_WDC_WD1001FALS-00J.png


RAID-0: 2 X WD Blue WD6400AAKS 640GB
HDTune_Benchmark_Intel___Raid_0_Vol.png


SINGLE SSD: Intel x25m G2 80
HDTune_Benchmark_INTEL_SSDSA2M080G2.png


As you can see here the the raid-0 easily beat the single drive, but when put against the single ssd put up a good fight but still took a heavy lose

WINNER: SINGLE SSD: Intel x25m G2 80

Round 2 File Benchmark

SINGLE HDD: WD Black WD1001FALS 1TB
HDTune_File_Benchmark_WDC_WD1001FAL.png


RAID-0: 2 X WD Blue WD6400AAKS 640GB
HDTune_File_Benchmark_Intel___Raid_.png


SINGLE SSD: Intel x25m G2 80
HDTune_File_Benchmark_INTEL_SSDSA2M.png


Here again we see the single drive taking a beating as it cannot keep up with the massive read and write bandwidth the raid-0 and ssd setup can do, but when put
head to head the sdd hits a whopping 250mb write while the raid tops out at 175mb

WINNER:SINGLE SSD: Intel x25m G2 80

Round 3 Random Access

SINGLE HDD: WD Black WD1001FALS 1TB
HDTune_Random_Access_WDC_WD1001FALS.png


RAID-0: 2 X WD Blue WD6400AAKS 640GB
HDTune_Random_Access_Intel___Raid_0.png


SINGLE SSD: Intel x25m G2 80
HDTune_Random_Access_INTEL_SSDSA2M0.png


Here you can see the SSD really shine , there's just no comparison blazing access times , what makes your system snappie happy , if you have like
multitasking this is where you should be

Winner: SINGLE SSD: Intel x25m G2 80

Im sure there's a lot, I didn't get into but I wanted to show some comparisons to help you make your choice , for me there's no going back after using one of these new ssd drives :D
 
Last edited:
great write up. I've been trying to find good tests like this. I wonder how it scales when more disks are added to the RAID0?

*silly me - edited for accuracy*
 
Last edited:
jadams said:
great write up. I've been trying to find good tests like this. I wonder how it scales when more disks are added to the RAID0?

I'd also like to see some numbers on some SSD's with trim enabled in raid0.
Click to expand...

Thanks dude , I had the numbers with the SSD in raid-0 was amazing scaled way better than HDD do , but since there's no trim in raid , the more I deleted stuff I downloaded the faster the system performance would degrade , but on a positive note not matter how degraded it got, its still faster than a HDD setup will ever be

AFAIK there still isn't any way to enable trim in raid 0.
Click to expand...

No way right now because HDD raid controllers are not programed to understand trim
 
the_real_7 said:
Thanks dude , I had the numbers with the SSD in raid-0 was amazing scaled way better than HDD do , but since there's no trim in raid , the more I deleted stuff I downloaded the faster the system performance would degrade
Click to expand...

Then why don't you reserve some space, so you don't need TRIM at all? This also works for RAID0 arrays; simply create a partition smaller than the full capacity. This only works on fresh SSDs; if you've used the SSD prior you need to do a Secure Erase before this trick will work.
 
This may be a dumb question, but for these tests, what option did you use for the SATA controller in the BIOS? (IDE, RAID, or AHCI)

If I recall, the Intel driver requires RAID or AHCI, correct?
 
Here's mine in RAID vs. my previous Caviar Black:

capture369.png
capture370.png


I haven't used TRIM and have noticed absolutely no degradation in performance over the last couple of months...and I've trashed my OS. Dead registry entries, crap left behind from uninstalls, recycle bin uninstalls, you get what I'm saying. ;)

And another graph done just a few seconds ago trying this proggy I just found:

hdspeed.png
 
Last edited:
HossWTC said:
This may be a dumb question, but for these tests, what option did you use for the SATA controller in the BIOS? (IDE, RAID, or AHCI)

If I recall, the Intel driver requires RAID or AHCI, correct?
Click to expand...

actually its a real good question I used AHCI, to get ncq and trim , you can set to raid but ssd drives still have to run in single mode to get benefits

I haven't used TRIM and have noticed absolutely no degradation in performance over the last couple of months...and I've trashed my OS. Dead registry entries, crap left behind from uninstalls, recycle bin uninstalls, you get what I'm saying.
Click to expand...

Can you please tell us what drives your using because if its not degradation your score doesn't look as high as it should for raid-0 SSD
 
Hmmmm how come the graph in HDTUNE for SSD are not consistent? I just installed and flash my kingston 40gb V and I am getting a similar graph so I am guessing this is normal.

HDTune_Benchmark_KINGSTON_SSDNow_40.png


So much snappier compared to my short-stroked 640gb AAKS raid-0 setup. Best $75 toy I have ever spent haha.
 
the_real_7 said:
Can you please tell us what drives your using because if its not degradation your score doesn't look as high as it should for raid-0 SSD
Click to expand...

Yeah, they are the Kingston SSDNow V Series 40GB drives using Intel controllers. Tests had a single drive hitting about 170MB/sec when they debuted. Of course they inherited the terrible write speeds as well yet it has not affected my experience.

My results are on par with other tests results I've seen using the same drives in RAID.

Of course if I used HD Tune, my results would probably look quite different. The CrystalDiskMark tests are from day zero. The other, below, from today.
 
the_real_7 said:
Thanks dude , I had the numbers with the SSD in raid-0 was amazing scaled way better than HDD do , but since there's no trim in raid , the more I deleted stuff I downloaded the faster the system performance would degrade , but on a positive note not matter how degraded it got, its still faster than a HDD setup will ever be



No way right now because HDD raid controllers are not programed to understand trim
Click to expand...


I am considering trying 2 SSD's in RAID-0, I realize TRIM will not work but I will be using these for just my OS (windows 7) + other programs/software only so I am thinking that there shouldn't me TOO much adding/deleting of files so maybe it will last a while. I also figure in a year or how ever long if things are sluggish, for a couple hundred bucks I can buy some new SSD's and be back up to top speed again. Drives should bve cheaper in the next year + anyways.

That is my plan so far
 
Jason: without TRIM make sure you reserve space on the SSDs and never use that space. If you do this properly you won't need TRIM.
 
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