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SSDs with TRIM Support

The Maximum PC Staff — Fri, 20 Nov 2009 15:30:29 -0600

I’m looking to get a new SSD for my laptop when Windows 7 comes out, and I just read a review on Newegg warning about a drive not supporting Win7’s TRIM feature. A Google search gave me the basics on TRIM, but how important is it, really? I’m having trouble finding which drives support it and am wondering if I should wait before pulling the trigger.

I use my laptop for home and work, so I’d really like to do a clean install on a new drive (for restoration purposes when I really screw something up) and it seems like a perfect time to make the switch. I’m also moving from 32-bit Vista to 64-bit Windows 7, so—as I understand it—I need to wipe regardless.

—Steve Wale

Think of TRIM as a garbage collector for your SSD. Normally, when you delete data on a disk, whether SSD or standard magnetic hard drive, the data isn’t immediately scrubbed. Instead, it’s marked as overwriteable, so when the disk runs out of fresh blocks to write to, it goes back and writes over deleted files. But given the way SSDs store data, this can decrease your drive’s performance once there are no more fresh blocks to write to. To write data to a block, an SSD first has to copy the entire block to cache, wipe it, delete the overwriteable sectors in cache, write in the new data (in cache), and rewrite the entire block to the disk. This can lead to slowdowns. Essentially, TRIM scrubs blocks of deleted data when it’s deleted, and makes sure the disk controller knows they’re blank, speeding up the whole process and making sure your drive’s performance doesn’t degrade over time.

At press time, only a few SSDs have TRIM support (including the OCZ Vertex and Patriot Torqx) but several ship with wiper.exe, a TRIM-like command that helps restore performance. We expect more SSD vendors to release TRIM in firmware upgrades as Windows 7 gets closer to release.

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OCZ Releases 1TB Colossus 3.5" SSD, Makes Your Puny SSD Cry

Paul Lilly — Wed, 18 Nov 2009 13:00:12 -0600

There's no way around it - if SSDs are to eventually replace mechanical hard drives, manufacturers have to find a way to increase capacity at a reasonable cost. So far, every SSD vendor has failed on both accounts, which is why we're excited to see OCZ release a 1TB SSD.

Also available in the more traditional 128GB, 256GB, and 512GB capacities, the new Colossus 3.5-inch SSD series brings no-holds barred performance to the scene, at least on paper. According to OCZ, each drive is capable of up to 260MB/s reads and writes, up to 220MB/s sustained writes, and up to 14,000 IOPS. That puts the Colossus right up there with the fastest spec'd drives on the market.

"The new Colossus Series is designed to boost desktop and workstation performance and is for high power users tht put a premium on speed, reliability, and maximum storage capacity," said Eugene Chang, VP of Product Management at OCZ. "The Colossus core-architecture is also available to enterprise clients with locked BOMs (build of materials) and customized firmware to match their unique applications."

A 1TB drive certainly makes headway on the capacity front, but the question is, how much will it cost? OCZ didn't say, though previous reports had the then-upcoming drive pegged at $2,500. Ouch.

Image Credit: OCZ

G.Skill Unveils Falcon II Series SSDs

Paul Lilly — Wed, 11 Nov 2009 11:13:31 -0600

After a flurry of activity earlier this year, which seemingly saw a new SSD being released every week, we're beginning to see the SSD market cool down a little. But rest assured, manufacturers are still devoting R&D to the flash-based storage segment, as evidenced by G.Skill's new Falcon II 2.5-inch SSDs.

G.Skill says the Falcon II series comes equipped with the new Indilinx ECO controller. Seeing the ECO tag, the first thing that came to mind was what effect will that have on performance, and G.Skill rates its new SSDs at up to 220MB/s reads and 150MB/s writes (110MB/s writes on the 64GB model).

The drives, which are available in 64GB, 128GB, and 256GB capacities, also boast 64MB of DRAM cache and advanced wear leveling algorithms. G.Skill says the Falcon II series also feature the latest Indilinx 1819 version firmware, which purports to offer improved support for the Windows 7 TRIM command, something Intel's 34nm SSDs have struggled with as of late.

No pricing information was available.

Image Credit: G.Skill

Intel Confirms Bricked SSD Bug, Starts Working on a Fix

Paul Lilly — Fri, 06 Nov 2009 11:15:04 -0600

Late last month, several owners of Intel's X25-M G2 solid state drives cried foul when a firmware update promising a 40 percent performance boost ended up bricking their drives instead. Oops! That marked the latest in a what's becoming a string of problems plaguing the 34nm SSDs, and once again, Intel says a fix is on the way.

"Intel has replicated the issue on 34nm SSDs -- X25-M -- and is working a fix," wrote Alan Frost of Intel's NAND Solutions Group. "Intel is pursuing the resolution of this as a high priority. Intel is seeking direct feedback on this issue from members of the [Intel Support Community]... asking them to send their drives directly to Intel to expedite the analysis of the issues. This action will enable us to more quickly generate a resolution for this issue."

Frost added that there have been no reports of related issues by users who were able to successfully upgrade to the 02ha firmware via the firmware upgrade tool, which would suggest the problem isn't the firmware itself, but a bug in the loader software.

Shrinking Free Space

The Maximum PC Staff — Fri, 30 Oct 2009 19:30:11 -0500

I have a month-old computer with a 64GB Falcon SSD for my OS and my most frequently played games. After I first installed the OS and all my games I had roughly 13GB of free space. Everything I’ve downloaded and installed since then has gone on my secondary drive; I have not added anything new to the primary drive. Despite this, I now have just 137MB free on my primary drive and am getting warnings of low disk space. Where is my available space going? I did a disk clean-up and that hardly freed any space. I’m running 64-bit Vista SP1. Any help would
be appreciated.

—Devin Binning

Without knowing more about the programs you’re installing (for example, Adobe Creative Suite 3 requires substantial C: drive space even if you’re installing it on a different drive), it’s hard for us to give useful advice. Our gut says to check your Documents folder. By default, Vista stores saved games and other application data in your Documents folder on the C: drive; you might be filling up with game data or even temporarily stored Internet files. We suggest downloading and installing a visual data manager like WinDirStat (http://windirstat.info) or SpaceSniffer (http://bit.ly/ssniff), which will show you exactly which files are taking up all of your space. You can then move them to your secondary drive or delete them at your leisure.

Graphical drive-space utilities like WinDirStat (shown) and SpaceSniffer let you see at a glance exactly which files are taking up precious hard disk space.

TRIM Firmware Problems Continue to Plague Intel's 34nm SSDs

Paul Lilly — Wed, 28 Oct 2009 13:45:59 -0500

Like Wile E. Coyote after failing to catch the Road Runner for the umpteenth time, it's back to the drawing board for Intel, who must figure out what the heck is going on with its 34nm solid state drives (SSDs). Allow us to elaborate.

Earlier this summer, the chip maker halted shipments of its X25-M G2 drives when it was discovered that a BIOS bug could lead to data corruption. More recently, Intel released its new TRIM firmware, which was supposed to inject a 40 percent boost to sequential write speeds, but just one day after its release, Intel has pulled the update due to corruption issues in Windows 7. Apparently, the firmware has been doing more harm than good and managed to brick a few drives.

"Yes, we have been contacted by users with issues with the firmware upgrade for our 34nm SSDs and we are investigating. We take all sightings and issues seriously and are working toward resolution. We have temporarily taken down the firmware link while we investigate," Intel said in a statement to Engadget.

When Intel will have a new update is anyone's guess. In the meantime, there's a 6 page (and growing) discussion taking place on Intel's support form where you can keep up with the latest developments.

Image Credit: HotHardware

Intel X-25M 160GB MLC SSD

Nathan Edwards — Tue, 27 Oct 2009 20:30:00 -0500

Intel's killer solid state drive gets a capacity increase, but is it still the best?

Last fall, Intel slapped the solid state drive market on the back of the head with the release of the 80GB X25-M MLC drive. That drive absolutely trounced the competition with its 200MB/s read speeds, incredibly low random-access times, and best of all, no random-write stuttering or cache overflows. The first X25-M garnered a Kick Ass Award and defeated all comers in our last SSD roundup (November 2008), but the market has come a long way since then. With powerful competition from drives sporting Indilinx and Samsung controllers, can the 160GB X25-M maintain Intel’s crown?

The 160GB X25-M ships in a silvery chassis, unlike its predecessor’s black, and is 7mm tall—an included spacer accommodates 9.5mm drive bays. Intel’s kicked the flash manufacturing process down from 50nm to 34nm, and retained native SATA and Native Command Queuing from its previous iteration.

The new X25-M ships with a spacer so it can fit in 9.5mm as well as 7mm 2.5-inch drive bays.

First, the good news. The 160GB X25-M is even faster than the 80GB, offering 209MB/s sustained reads and 79.5MB/s sustained writes in our h2benchw benchmark, compared to the 80GB version’s 206MB/s and 64MB/s, respectively. Random-access reads and writes are within .01ms of the 80GB version, and Premiere Pro times are five percent faster. Oddly, though, its PCMark Vantage score is only 23,288—faster than nearly every drive but its predecessor, which amassed a cool 30K.

Unfortunately, the X25-M just isn’t the coolest kid on the block anymore. Not since we’ve seen other drives come along and smash the 100MB/s sustained-write barrier, or which feature either a Samsung or Indilinx drive controller with cache that eliminates the random-write stuttering that plagued early JM602-based drives. Both Samsung’s 256GB drive (reviewed August 2009, retailing as the Corsair P256) and Patriot’s Torqx (September 2009) nearly match X25-M’s read speeds and obliterate its sequential writes, with the Torqx and its fellow Indilinx Barefoot MLC drives (OCZ Vertex, G.Skill Falcon) offering write speeds close to 175MB/s.

The X25-M still reigns supreme in random-write times, though, with a latency of just .08ms compared to the Torqx’s .31ms. And it does so without the Indilinx controller’s 64MB of DRAM cache.

The X25-M remains a rock-solid choice for SSDs, and its read speeds and random-write response times are second to none. But in sustained-write speeds, it’s no match for the Patriot Torqx and its peers. But hey, the 160GB X25-M is $.10/GB cheaper than the Torqx, and 160GB is enough room for your OS and a dozen of your favorite games.

Intel Introduces Tools to Optimize 34nm SSD Performance in Windows 7

Pulkit Chandna — Mon, 26 Oct 2009 17:44:13 -0500

Intel today announced the availability of a couple of new tools and a new firmware for its 34nm X25-M SATA SSDs. The Intel SSD Optimizer and the new firmware, both of which leverage the Windows* 7 ATA Data Set Management Command (known as Trim), are designed to preserve the out-of-box performance of Intel SSDs, while the Intel Solid-State Drive (SSD) Toolbox contains applications to better monitor the health of SSDs.

According to Intel, the Trim attribute of the ATA Data Set Management Command "synchs the operating system's view of deleted files with those that are deleted, but not erased on the drive."

Trim helps the SSD identify unused blocks of data, thereby lending stability to the health and performance of the SSD. Intel said in the press release that 34nm X25-M 160GB owners can expect an improvement of around 40 percent in sequenstial write speeds with the firmware update, which amounts to write speeds of up to 100MB per second.

"Not only will Windows 7 users receive the performance enhancements of the Trim command, but so will our Windows XP and Vista users," said Pete Hazen, director of marketing, Intel NAND Solutions Group.

Image Credit: Intel