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At Long Last, OCZ Z-Drive Now Shipping

Paul Lilly — Fri, 18 Sep 2009 12:45:00 -0500

While Super Talent is busy readying its RAIDDrive, OCZ today announced it has begun shipping its PCI-Express based Z-Drive. This is the same drive that was being discussed at CeBIT earlier this year, and like Super Talent's version, OCZ's model looks to leave behind the confines of the SATA bus for wider pastures on the PCI-E interface more suitable for the ultra fast flash memory.

"Traditional enterprise storage technology typically requires overly complex infrastructures as well as costly maintenance, and is often unable to deliver the level of performance required by OEM applications," said Ryan Peterson, CEO of the OCZ Technology Group. "The new OCZ Z-Drive is an all-in-one high performance plug-and-play bootable PCI-E solid state drive that addresses these challenges head on, and meets the demands of the complete range of enterprise storage and data access requirements."

Sporting an internal RAID 0 configuration, OCZ says its SLC-based Z-Drive can top out at 800MB/s reads and 750MB/s writes, whereas the MLC-based version trails just lightly behind at 750MB/s reads and 650MB/s writes. Both versions also look to consume less power than traditional hard drives.

While OCZ did say the drives have started shipping, it did not announce a price or expected availabilty date.

Image Credit: OCZ via Engadget

Super Talent Will Release First PCI Express RAIDDrive SSDs in Early October

Paul Lilly — Thu, 17 Sep 2009 12:15:25 -0500

TGDaily has found out that Super Talent plans to start shipping its first PCI Express RAIDDrive SSDs in early October, so you may want to hang on for a few more weeks if you're currently planning a dream machine build. Why is that? Because these purportedly stupid-fast drives are being designed to thrash the throughput bottleneck in your PC's storage subsystem and leave the SATA bus bandwidth limitation in the dust.

"The PCIe Gen. 2.0 x8 interface used by RAIDDrive SSDs supports 4GB/s bandwidth, more than ten times that of the SATA-II 3Gbps bus, and five times greater than the not yet available SATA-III bus," a Super Talent spokesperson told TGDaily. "Currently, there is no other way to achieve the same performance, except via Fusio-IO - but that costs approximately $10,000 for equivalent speeds."

Super Talent, meanwhile, is targeting a price point below $1,000 in hopes of appealing to both gamers and enterprise users, the spokesperson added. Three versions will be made available, including:

RAIDDrive GS: Aimed at power users and gamers, supports RAID 0 or 5, uses MLC flash, and available in capacities up to 2TB
RAIDDrive ES: For enterprise servers, supports RAID 0 or 5, fits in a 3U rack mount chassis, uses SLC flash, and available in capacities up to 1TB
RAIDDrive WS: Geared towards workstation users, supports RAID 0 or 5, uses SLC flash, available in capacities up to 1TB

Assuming it lives up to the hype, would you drop upwards of $1,000 for a super-speedy SSD configuration?

Image Credit: Super Talent via HotHardware.com

PCI Express 3.0 Hits Setback, Products Delayed Until 2011

Paul Lilly — Fri, 21 Aug 2009 13:22:36 -0500

Don't worry about your swank new motherboard soon being outdated by new models boasting PCI-E 3.0 support, the new specification is running into some unexpected snags, Fudzilla reports.

The main issue boils down to backwards compatibility and getting the PCI-E 3.0 specification to play nice with current PCI-E standards. Before the third gen PCI-E can get a stamp of approval, PCI SIG needs to verify products in the lab, and this is taking longer than expected.

"In this particular case, with pushing the technology so hard, and with PCI gen 3 providing so much more capabilities but with the need to be still backwards-compatible, we had to do the diligence required to move the date," said Al Yanes, president of PCI SIG.

The PCI-E 3.0- specification was originally supposed to be released this year, but now it looks like the second quarter of 2010 at the earliest. This would push shipments of products based on the new spec to 2011.

Image Credit: Flickr

Ask the Doctor: A Bandwidth Battle

The Maximum PC Staff — Tue, 11 Nov 2008 14:00:53 -0600

I built my computer about a month ago—it’s nothing special. I’m running an Intel Pentium D 820 on an Asus P5W DH Deluxe motherboard. For a videocard, I’m rocking a BFG 9800 GTX.

I stumbled upon the System Information at the bottom-left corner of the Nvidia Control Panel recently. When I clicked it, I took note of the plethora of information on the 9800 GTX. What caught my eye was the very last line: BUS: PCI Express x4. That seems off, given that my card uses an x16 interface. What gives?

—Juan Campos

You neglected to insert a key piece of information that would help the Doctor easily diagnose your problem. Are you using the top orange PCI Express slot or the bottom black slot? If it’s the latter, the Doctor has frequently found that this slot will be physically x16-compatible, but it will actually run at a lower setting. Still, it’s strange that your System Information panel is reporting this as an x4 slot: That’s lower than the Doc would expect, even if you were using the incorrect slot.

Try reseating your 9800 GTX into your motherboard’s orange PCI Express slot. If the problem still isn’t corrected—or if your card has been in this slot all along—you’ll want to triple-check that you’ve firmly inserted the card into the PCI Express connector. If you’re still receiving the same x4 information after that, update your motherboard’s BIOS. It’s possible that some form of communication error between the mobo and Nvidia’s application is causing the confusion.

SUBMIT YOUR QUESTION Are flames shooting out of the back of your rig? First, grab a fire extinguisher and douse the flames. Once the pyrotechnic display has fizzled, email the doctor at doctor@maximumpc.com for advice on how to solve your technological woes.

Asus Xonar D2X

Gordon Mah Ung — Wed, 18 Jun 2008 20:23:19 -0500

Much hay has been made of the incredible speed advantages PCI Express offers over PCI. Beyond GPUs, however, we haven’t found much worthy of occupying those slots. Asus hopes to change that with its Xonar D2X card—the first soundcard we’ve reviewed that makes use of the PCI Express interface. The D2X is basically a PCI-E version of the Xonar D2 (reviewed April 2008). In our review of the Xonar D2 we lamented the card’s lack of advanced EAX support—EAX 3 and above are proprietary to X-Fi-chipped soundcards, making those cards the obvious choice for gamers who want the best audio quality.

Or maybe not. With the Xonar D2X, Asus has done an end run to get a level of advanced EAX support in the card—but it’s not without controversy. The D2X instructs games that it has EAX 5, and the card’s drivers then shunt the EAX calls into its own effects engine. The results are far from perfect. Using EAX compliance tools, we found that the drivers didn’t support many EAX functions, such as reverb and filtering. Asus even admits to this. But the hack at least gives the card access to some functions that were previously locked up, such as support for additional audio streams in Battlefield 2—one of the handful of EAX games even available.

We’re more troubled by this card’s PCI Express support. Our D2X simply wouldn’t work on two different EVGA 680i SLI motherboards, and users have reported issues with nForce 790i boards as well. Asus tells us the problems are related to a BIOS issue that is being corrected by board vendors. Nvidia confirmed that it is working on a BIOS update that should be out by the time you read this. The D2X worked fine on Intel P35, AMD 790FX, and MSI nForce 750i boards.

The Xonar D2X uses the same audio codecs and offers the same I/O ports and Dolby Digital Live support as the D2. The D2X, however, requires a floppy connector for power.

In game frame rates, the PCI Xonar D2 was slightly faster than the D2X. We surmise this is due to superior drivers for the D2 or the PCI-to-PCI-E bridge chip on the D2X. Either way, the differences are minimal, and frankly, frame rates should no longer be the primary factor in soundcard decisions. Far more important is audio quality and gaming API support. In these areas, the Xonar D2X does well. The audio quality, rated at 118dB, is quite good, with no transient audio ghosts. The Auzentech X-Fi Prelude (reviewed April 2008) edges the D2X in our 24-bit/96KHz audio-file listening test, but honestly, both cards sound great and far exceed onboard audio.

So what would we buy? It depends. The advanced EAX in the Xonar is flawed, but it sorta works. If you want a full EAX 5 card, you have to go X-Fi. But that limits you to PCI, as the PCI-E version of the X-Fi lacks advanced EAX support. That makes the Xonar D2X the most feature-rich PCI-E card today, and that’s not a bad place to be—even if the EAX is faked.

Maximum PC's 2008 Geek Quiz

The Maximum PC Staff — Tue, 11 Mar 2008 13:35:27 -0500

Geeks. We can go about our day unnoticed, quietly making sure the systems that allow the workplace to operate efficiently continue to run. Some people might consider us downright dull—and that’s just fine by us. Because when something out of the ordinary happens—when a car appears in someone’s office, a cubicle is transformed into a fish tank, or livestock roams the halls—we manage to fly right under the radar, and thus remain free to commit evermore elaborate shows of ingenuity without reproach.

In addition to testing your tech knowledge, this year’s Geek Quiz celebrates the best geek pranks of all time, which, unlike baser schoolyard antics such as swirlies and wet willies, showcase intelligence, skill, and guile. If you think you’ve topped the ones we’ve listed here, be sure to contact us at input@maximumpc.com.

<a href="http://www.mystudiyo.com/act61895/go/maximum_pc's_geek_quiz">Maximum PC's Geek Quiz</a>

No BS Podcast #19 - The Early Edition

Maximum PC Staff — Fri, 01 Jun 2007 17:56:59 -0500

This week on the podcast, Tom, Will, Gordon, Dave, and Jeremy discuss:

PCI Express 2.0 and PCI Express specs for GPUs
Intel creating the world's thinnest laptop
The best ways to annoy your office cubemates
DDR3 Memory
An intriguing way to prevent laptop theft
Car telemetry

All that, plus a live update from the lab, Ask the Doctor and Gordon's rant of the week.

Subscribe: http://feeds.feedburner.com/maximumpc/1337

Post comments below or email them to maximumpcpodcast@gmail.com