2x Intel X25-M 80GB SSD in RAID 0 vs. Crucial RealSSD C300 256GB
category: offtopic [glöplog]
What to buy ...
2x Intel X25-M 80GB SSD: €390
Crucial RealSSD C300 256GB: €650
Anyone have experience with SSD RAIDs?
2x Intel X25-M 80GB SSD: €390
Crucial RealSSD C300 256GB: €650
Anyone have experience with SSD RAIDs?
Yeah, me: 2x Intel X25 40GB SSD in Raid 0.
http://xtr1m.com/rating2.png
http://xtr1m.com/rating2.png
I wouldn't bother with 80GB. The reviews on the RealSSD were good (it's as fast as / faster than the Intel SSDs), though it is pretty much hindered by the "slow" SATA-II interface.
I'd buy one myself if it wasn't 650€...
I'd buy one myself if it wasn't 650€...
One thing I know is that depending on your RAID controller, the RAID overhead might reduce your total IOPS, as RAID controllers are very often targeted towards magnetic drives with relatively high response times. In terms of IOPS, a good SSD will outperform a very good HDD by a factor of 100. So a bad RAID controller would easily become a severe bottleneck, even if it increases the sustained read/write speeds some.
Another potential problem is forwarding TRIM commands via the RAID controller. AFAIK few RAID controllers support TRIM at all, which means if you do a lot of writing to an SSD array, you may have to occasionally copy all your files off it, reformat, and copy the files back on, or your performance will degrade over time as the flash memory is used up.
I suggest you download Filemon and have a look at what your typical disk activity is. Pretty much regardless of what you're doing, I suspect you'll find lots and lots of small random-access reads, and then that's what you should think about optimising. Don't worry too much about read/write speeds (worry some, but not too much.) Depending on what the setup is for, you might be just as well served with a single X25-M 160GB.
Personally, I have a single X25-M 80 GB for Windows XP, apps, dev libraries, source code and stuff, and then for mass storage (where performance is less critical) I use regular HDDs cause they're way cheaper. I doubt I would get any benefit at all from adding a second X25-M in RAID0, and with my cheap onboard RAID controller it's probably even counterproductive.
FWIW.
Another potential problem is forwarding TRIM commands via the RAID controller. AFAIK few RAID controllers support TRIM at all, which means if you do a lot of writing to an SSD array, you may have to occasionally copy all your files off it, reformat, and copy the files back on, or your performance will degrade over time as the flash memory is used up.
I suggest you download Filemon and have a look at what your typical disk activity is. Pretty much regardless of what you're doing, I suspect you'll find lots and lots of small random-access reads, and then that's what you should think about optimising. Don't worry too much about read/write speeds (worry some, but not too much.) Depending on what the setup is for, you might be just as well served with a single X25-M 160GB.
Personally, I have a single X25-M 80 GB for Windows XP, apps, dev libraries, source code and stuff, and then for mass storage (where performance is less critical) I use regular HDDs cause they're way cheaper. I doubt I would get any benefit at all from adding a second X25-M in RAID0, and with my cheap onboard RAID controller it's probably even counterproductive.
FWIW.
I would consider putting SSDs in RAID0 to be redundant. Just stick to a single disc for your OS.. and go for the Intel X25.
i would buy one fast 80GB/160GB SSD and a 1TB HDD.
Nightly/Weekly Backups on the HDD and you're done "cheap".
Nightly/Weekly Backups on the HDD and you're done "cheap".
How about the new 'combined' disks? A decent sized HDD with a built-in tiny SSD that holds the most accessed files. I saw a review of one a while back, it sounded actually pretty good - much faster than a regular HDD for boot, builds and stuff but plenty of space too.
Still a rotating platter. Uses more energy, is not silent and not shock-resistent...
Well, if it's a desktop drive that's not likely to matter too much. Most people will be using an SSD with a HDD anyway, because a decent sized SSD is a long way from affordable. It's another option anyway.
I myself would never use RAID0 due the fact that it DOUBLES the risk for failure.
and with SSD you should have a good RAID controller to get performance of it. so no software-raid-controllers like the onboard ones but maybe a real high performance hardware raidcontroller, too bad they costs about the same as the SSD drives aswell..
and with SSD you should have a good RAID controller to get performance of it. so no software-raid-controllers like the onboard ones but maybe a real high performance hardware raidcontroller, too bad they costs about the same as the SSD drives aswell..
Het kan me geen raid schelen!
Steek die schijf maar in je raid!
don't forget TRIM won't work in RAID mode: TRIM require the microsoft driver to be installed while RAID require the INTEL driver
Chucky: Actually software RAID may be better for SSDs, because you won't have those hardware-imposed IOPS limits. But good luck booting from a software RAID. ;)
Isn't booting from software raid just a bios function? I've done it before on a mac, so it's possible, and i'll be amazed if no motherboard maker ever thought to add it
By software RAID I mean stuff like "dynamic disks" in Windows or raidtools for Linux, not the cheap RAID controllers on some motherboards. I don't see how you'd be able to access those arrays (the actual software arrays) without loading the software first. Unless the OS provides the support in the boot sector, but then it's still not up to the BIOS.
This was full software raid 0, no hardware raid support at all. I think it's just a bios feature, but then the OS and bios must both support it and know exactly what to expect. Probably fairly easy for apple as they make both, hard for MS and the million board makers.
xTr1m: that's one badass system drive :-)
Doom: Thanks for the extensive response - yes, I've also heard that Intel doesn't support TRIM for their SSDs in RAID0 configuration.
My RAID controller would be the one on my motherboard - Gigabyte X58A - Marvell SE9128
Article:
Fusion-io vs Intel X25-M SSD RAID, Grudge Match Review
My RAID controller would be the one on my motherboard - Gigabyte X58A - Marvell SE9128
Article:
Fusion-io vs Intel X25-M SSD RAID, Grudge Match Review
Quote:
Performance Summary:
So, what have we learned here today? First, there is little question that RAID 0 performance with Intel's X25-M SSD is ever-more impressive than a single drive installation, as we expected. That said, at least from a cost/performance ratio perspective, the sweet spot seems to be a two drive RAID 0 setup, which offers about 80% if the performance of a four drive array in terms of read performance, but perhaps not as much in terms of write intensive operations. Then of course there is the practicality of a four drive RAID 0 setup, which invokes four points of possible failure in the event an SSD should go bad. Obviously this isn't the sort of setup you should store critical files on, though the reliability of Intel's X25-M SSD has been solid and as an OS and application volume, its not quite as risky as it appears on the surface. Alternatively, we'd advise a strong hardware RAID controller solution behind it and a RAID 5 setup, if a quad-SSD array is your goal.
Steel: I have no doubt that you can increase read/write speeds with SSDs in RAID0. But note this chart here:
In terms of sustained read speed, the ioDrive isn't much faster than the 2x X25-M array, but still it does MUCH better at the simulated application tests. The article is pretty shitty for not trying to come up with an explanation, but you can get a hint on the following pages:
Very clearly, as long as you're not just copying BluRay rips around, what matters is response time and IO operations per second, not sustained read/write speeds. But then again, it looks like the X58 is at least fast enough to run two X25-Ms in RAID0, so I guess you're good to go. ;)
In terms of sustained read speed, the ioDrive isn't much faster than the 2x X25-M array, but still it does MUCH better at the simulated application tests. The article is pretty shitty for not trying to come up with an explanation, but you can get a hint on the following pages:
Very clearly, as long as you're not just copying BluRay rips around, what matters is response time and IO operations per second, not sustained read/write speeds. But then again, it looks like the X58 is at least fast enough to run two X25-Ms in RAID0, so I guess you're good to go. ;)
I run 2x 32gb ssds (cbf looking up specs - will provide if cbf levels go up)with different os's and 2 larger sata drive as storage/program files. Ext3 on 1 of the ssds & ntfs on the other. NO RAID. Both os's boot nice and fast. win7 plays all the Crysis games smoothly + bf2, 2142, Tomb Raiders, Assasin's Creed etc. with the game files stored on the larger drives. Biggest problems I've had is the bios mucking up boot orders of the ssd's & the fact that the sata cables aren't the 'click' in type so *occaisinally* if I kick the box the cable can come loose and need reseating, then again this machine is a couple of years old - blutack is my friend ;-). I should clarify that the computer I'm talking about is my "games machine" and is not used everyday for work - hence putting in the boot. Pic semi-related.
Not sure if this is relevent or helpful but while I was looking into new SSDs for some machines at work I came across this:
http://www.anandtech.com/show/3788/oczs-revodrive-pcie-ssd-preview-an-affordable-pcie-ssd
If you are looking for a strong IOPS drive this might work. It looks like you are looking for 160GB+ but maybe you could squeeze everything into 120GB instead?
http://www.anandtech.com/show/3788/oczs-revodrive-pcie-ssd-preview-an-affordable-pcie-ssd
If you are looking for a strong IOPS drive this might work. It looks like you are looking for 160GB+ but maybe you could squeeze everything into 120GB instead?
Spuddy: The RevoDrive is not yet available in stores
Everyone else:
With prices like these:
I believe you get the most bang for your buck by going in Intel RAID0 way (if your RAID controller is good enough) - and hopefully in the future they'll improve their RAID support to include TRIM.
Everyone else:
With prices like these:
Quote:
2x Intel X25-M 80GB SSD: €390
Crucial RealSSD C300 256GB: €650
I believe you get the most bang for your buck by going in Intel RAID0 way (if your RAID controller is good enough) - and hopefully in the future they'll improve their RAID support to include TRIM.
2x Intel X25-M 80GB SSDs in the mail ... :-)
i built some workstations with 2x Intel SSDs a few weeks ago. average read was ~520 MB/s, but you need to use intel rapid storage driver. with matrix storage drivers the speed does not seem to scale well from what i observed.
