Maximum PC

So I was lucky enough to win a new Intel 520 120GB SSD in their latest contest Solid-State Drive Challenge. (yay!)

however I'm currently using an ASUS P8Z68-v Pro board and I have:
2x Vertex3 in RAID0 on the z68 controller
an older Vertex 2 on one of the Marvell controlled port (yes it's a SATA2 SSD on a SATA3 port but I don't think that's any kind of issue)

So what should I do with the new SSD? I do not believe the Marvell ports support RAID0 do they? The specs don't specifically say:

Intel® Z68 chipset :
2 x SATA 6Gb/s port(s), gray
4 x SATA 3Gb/s port(s), blue
Support Raid 0, 1, 5, 10
Support Intel® Smart Response Technology on 2nd generation Intel® Core™ processor family
Marvell® PCIe SATA 6Gb/s controller : *2
2 x SATA 6Gb/s port(s), navy blue
JMicron® JMB362 controller : *2
1 x eSATA 3Gb/s port(s), red

So the question is - would you even consider putting an SSD this fast on a Marvell controlled port? (I was always under the understanding that Marvell controllers were distinctly slower...)

Give it to me. $50

sounds good to me

just post your address here

I'll let you know the shipping costs. I would guess about 200$ for S/H

If you have 3 vertex 3's in raid can't you just add another to that array? Either that or buy a raid controller (which will likely improve your speeds all around) The most popular ones use mini-SAS to sata since it is one physical connector on the expansion card to multiple sata connectors. Either try to get a 4 way raid on your current card or get a raid controller.

I have
two Vertex 3 in RAID0

one Vertex 2 (SATA2 SSD) on the Marvell.

how bad is performance on a Marvell controller because unless I drop $$ on a RAID card that's unfortunately where this is going to have to go.

lol my "win" might end up costing me money

Suggest a good RAID card? I see prices from like 100 to 300$.....

http://www.amazon.com/HighPoint-RocketR ... B0050SLTPC

http://thessdreview.com/our-reviews/int ... ontroller/

Although supposedly LSI makes better stuff, it costs more and most people like the high point as entry level.

or I'll give you $75 for it.

Yah I've through high point and another brand and none of the cards inspires confidence in me. Most of them had 33% or higher 1 and 2 star ratings due to compatibility issues.

Not to mention bandwidth for SATA III 6Gb/s is bigger than PCIe 2.0 so I might as well use t he slower Marvell controller since I still won't max it out.

That isn't true. The PCIe 2.0 standard doubles the transfer rate compared with PCIe 1.0 to 5 GT/s and the per-lane throughput rises from 250 MB/s to 500 MB/s. So each lane is about the speed of one sata 6 port, most cards are 4x or 8x so that isn't a problem. Most people have no issues with them. I feel that the people that do have issues don't understand how raid works, especially the one amazon review that thought he could just keep the RAID setup on his other controller when he moved it to his new controller which is impossible since the config is proprietary to the controller. And i haven't seen a bad review of that card so whatever you want to do. And you will be maxing out the onboard controllers.

hmm interesting.

I didn't realize you had to pay closer attention to the x8 and/or x4 on the PCIe card. After I read your post I took a look again at the card on newegg I was thinking about and realized it was x4 and that's where the bandwidth cap was coming from.

http://www.newegg.ca/Product/Product.as ... 6816115077

Yeah the one I linked is x8 and it does really well with SSDs. I also just realized you were in canada... although I thought Amazon shipped there, I know Amazon.co.uk ships to the US. I still don't know if it is worth it though. I would probably just sell it on ebay or use it in a laptop or something.

I think I will end up using it with the Marvell controller - although part of me wants to benchmark it on each of the different controllers and then making the call on if I want to get the RAID card or not.

I live close to the boarder too so I can get amazon to ship to a PO box and zip down and pick it up. Thanks for your help!