[dominick32]

For the latest info, tips, and tweaks please check out SuperNades thread here:
http://www.ocforums.com/showthread.php?t=610121

Rather than have an abundance of different threads regardings SSD's I decided to merge information from my two threads in here (this was hyperasus's idea).

UPDATES ON SSD AVAILABILITY AND TECHNOLOGY:

10/1/2007
Newegg starts to release some SSD's from Supertalent for exorbiant amounts of money.
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Produc...82E16820609245

$4400 for 128GB's....
Current throughput on a single SATA solid state drive is maximum:
60 MB/s read and 44 MB/s write. That is much slower than most of the high end HDD's currently out on the market. However, the ACCESS TIME on SSD's are incredible (over 40 times faster than a new raptor, SSD RAT = .2, Raptor RAT = 8.5) and boot times on the OS, games, and apps would be astounding. Not to mention the OS environment would be fluid as hell.

Theoretically if we raided 3 X 32GB SSD's our throughput would encroach 180 MB/s read and around 130 MB/s write. Couple that with close to ZERO access times and you have the fastest drive setup on the planet.

This would currently be ungodly expensive but its something that when price comes down a bit, I will definitely hop on the bandwagon and provide some results for you guys.


10/8/2007
THREAD UPDATE::

Check this out guys. Just found that we have for sale a 16GB, 32GB and 64GB Solid State Drive that is faster than a single 150 raptor.

.1 ms access time, 97 MB/s read, and 80 MB/s write.
Its made by a company called Mtron and the 16GB version is currently $799, the 32GB is $1499,, ughh. The price is disgusting but the performance is supposed to be out of this world.

Single Mtron 32GB solid state drive vs. single raptor 74gig:

http://www.dvnation.com/images/MTRONvRAPTOR.jpg

Mtron 32GB solid state single drive hdtach:

http://www.dvnation.com/images/MTRON_HDTACH.jpg

Mtron 32GB X 4 solid state raid 0:

http://www.dvnation.com/images/MTRON-4X-RAID0.jpg

Originally Posted by Drew@PSU

Wouldn't Matrix RAID be superfluous on such a setup? If Matrix takes the "fastest" part of each platter, it wouldn't even apply here, yes? Since all parts of the SSD "platter" are equally fast...I'm thinking that it would be easiest/just as fast to do a standard RAID 0....

Also, do you think these drives have failure rates somewhere along current SSD thumb drives? Like 'I just put mine through the wash and it still works' style longevity. Obviously, you won't happen to leave your SSD in your pocket, but will this significantly prolong hard drive life?

As a matter of fact, the only benefit from Matrix raid would be the ability to use a dual performance/ data mirroring setup. You will no longer have to worry about latency.

It is supposed to be army durable as far as shock resistance, and drive life is 140 years at 50GB of read/write per day.

Supposedly, more tests were run by Maximum PC magazine, and the Mtron SSD's are officially the fastest drives in the world currently. Both synthetically, and real world. They have the highest STR on any non scsi drive, and they have the fastest latency of any drive in the world period. The technology is here, and its only going to get better.

These pictures are off of the DVnation website. (mtrons main distributor)
The prices are astronomical and I absolutely cannot justify the price just yet.

Regards,

Dom

10/9/2007
THREAD UPDATE

INFORMATION REGARDING THE FUSION IO

Originally Posted by thegreek

Fusion IO


Press releases:
http://www.fusionio.com/index_files/Page419.htm
http://www.fusionio.com/index_files/Page429.htm

Data sheet:
http://www.fusionio.com/iodrivedata.pdf

TG daily comment (includes two videos):
http://www.tgdaily.com/content/view/34065/135/

Performance sum-up:
STR: 800 MB/s (read) / 600MB/s (write)
IOPS: 100,000

In short, the IoDrive has STR like 4 scsi drives in raid0 and IOPS performance like a SSD [Edit, no better the best SSD has under 10,000 IOPS]. For 30$/GB.


so now, what were you saying about SSD?

SSD LINKS ADDED BY OCF MEMBERS:

Originally Posted by meionm

Anandtech review of Mtron 32gb SSD
http://anandtech.com/storage/showdoc.aspx?i=3064&p=1

Originally Posted by Rattle

HYBRID DRIVE INFORMATION
http://www.pcmag.com/article2/0,1759,1973121,00.asp
http://www.seagate.com/docs/pdf/whit...sPSD_Sep06.pdf

http://www.seagate.com/ww/v/index.js...00f5ee0a0aRCRD

10/23/07

Mtron is working on a new Professional series, one model up from its predocessor, with better firmware, and even more performance. In excess of 100 MB/s read, 100 MB/s write. Access time will obviously remain the same < .1 ms. Exact performance specs and pricing is not yet revealed but expect performance to be increased significantly. Expected to see a November to December of 2007 Launch.

Supertalent is working on an upgraded drive as well, with better firmware, and they hope to achieve speeds of no worse than 90 MB/s read and 70 MB/s write which is an increase of 30 MB/s throughput over its predocesser. They also hope to decrease there maximum access time from .3ms to <.1ms to be on par with the Mtron unit. The product line will be known as the Supertalen "Elite" solid state drive. Looking at a November to December 2008 launch. Expect launch pricing to be slightly higher than current Newegg offerings.

FusionIO. As previously stated, I will be talking directly with Fusion IO before years end and hopefully get a hand on an IO Drive for you guys. I will hopefully get the hardware and produce a nice article on this technology for everyone around January of 2008. Expect my usual benchmarks to be thorough and rigorous in the Storage realm.

Thread Update *11/4/07*

Just got word about a few new updates from Mtron.
The end of this month we will have a new product from called the MSP7000 "Pro Series" SSD. Sustained Read will increase 20MB/s over the original unit to 120 MB/s read, and write will gain an additional 10MB/s over the original bringing the final figures to 120 MB/s sustained read, 90 MB/s sustained write. Access Time will still remain below .1ms. Upgraded firmware will make all of the bugs and tech support requests from the original drives obsolete. SATA availability is slated for the end of this month. Currently no information on pricing. Initial capacity offerings are looking to be 16GB and 32GB.

There is also an Ultra Rugged model titled the MSX series which is being R&D'ed currently with production next year. They are offering enhanced durability as well as extreme temperature operation in rugged enviroments (below freezing) and above 100*F . It looks as though the MSX series will be more tailored toward military and aviational grade applications. But also look for enhanced transfer rates and updated firmware.

UPDATE
11/14/07

Originally Posted by Evilsizer

samsung updates their ssd's to now use the SATAII interface
http://www.extremetech.com/article2/...129TX1K0000532

the one thing i cant get over is how samsung offers them in 1.8in size, while the others are 2.5ins....

11/15/07

Originally Posted by Vio1

this sounds interesting: PCI-E slot memory cards:

http://gizmodo.com/gadgets/storage/s...ort-322412.php

'

UPDATE 11/25/07

Big News Guys/Gals!

MTron has currently released the fastest consumer level priced drive available to the public. The Mtron Mobi SSD is being offered in 16GB or 32GB flavors and you lose your warranty if it is used in a server environment. It is made for Windows Vista/XP operating systems and was built for gaming, workstation, desktop, enthusiast usage.

100 MB/s read, 90 MB/s write, .1ms, and here is the catch: $499 is release pricing for the 16GB unit

They also finally released there new professional line the MSP7000. These drives have a 120 MB/s read and 100 MB/s write. This unit is being offered in three flavors 16,32, and up to 64GB. The professional line is going to be 16gig $800, 32gig $1500, and 64gig $2000.

As you can see, by there pricing point most of these SSD's are being sold for military/government usage in rugged environments so by marketing the new Mobi Consumer Desktop line they are targeting guys like us and lowering price by 40&#37; compared to there server line. But if you are caught using the Mobi in a server environment your warranty is automatically void preventing business from purchasing the cheaper mobi drive.

Well, Mtron finally gave us gamers/overclockers a relatively lower priced SSD. Whos gonna buy one?

http://www.dvnation.com/images/HD-Tach-MTRON-PROs.jpg

Mtron 16GB Solid State Drive - Professional Series
Preliminary Information on my solid state. I will have much more information and testing as it becomes available. This is just a taste.
Well, I am extremely happy with the performance of this little puppy. However, if you have an Intel Southbridge I would definitely hold off until either #1 Intel revises a chipset to not throttle solid state drives over 80 MB/s. or #2 SSD's are built with backward compatibility on all chipsets with the ability to bypass this throttle.

So, yes everything that I presumed happened. The random access times are insane and Windows Vista boot is rediculous. I actually provided a movie for you guys of vista boot. However, sustained read and write are severely limited on the Intel ICH motherboard. For some reason even Mtron had only recommended using the Nvidia 680chipset for all Solid State Drives. And I had even saw a full report on Anandtech. He had the exact same issues, but when he plugged the drive in a 680i, his benchmarks magically improved up to 50% in some instances including attaining the promised 100 MB/s read.

My HDTach and synthetic benchmarks were capped at 81.4 MB/s read and 84 MB/s burst. A full 19% below the advertised 100 MB/s on the Nvidia Chipset. Also, I am sure that IOP's are reduced severely on this Intel chipset as well.

Now to the good stuff. This drive is rediculously fast. As you will see in the following video: Windows Vista Boot VIDEO on Mtron Solid State

http://strippoli.com/ssd.jpg

http://strippoli.com/ssd2.jpg

Contacted the distributor about the Intel ICH throttling problems and he recommended either swapping out the motherboard for an Nvidia 680i or trying out another 16Gb in Raid 0. Obviously I am not chaning my mobo setup so I should be getting another one overnighted to me for tomorrow so I can start this review.

2 X 16GB SSD's in Raid 0... LOL 160 MB/s .1 ms

Dont worry, I still plan on benchmarking the single drive for the majority of the review.

I just completed my full review of the Mtron Professional SSD line:
http://www.ocforums.com/showthread.php?t=537182

You will be the first people in the world to have a full review on this product.

UPDATE
12/16/07

Originally Posted by Evilsizer

some interesting news from INTEL about SSD's.
http://www.pcworld.com/article/id,14...s/article.html

Originally Posted by frankkesel

Again new kids on the blocks

OCZ

'' OCZ will launch two Solid State Drives in 32GB and 64GB capacities. It promises faster than 100MB write and 120MB read speeds which is surely faster than any mechanical drives in market.

.....64GB should cost at least $500 to $600 at launch.''

Ciao.
The IO Drive:

Just a Few Thread Updates on some particular items. 3/26/2008


Just received the brand new Memoright GT 120/120

Originally Posted by OliverBGD

Damn just when I was finishing saving for MTRON, Memoright GT comes out I still might stick to MTRON but the 5x more IOPS on Memoright than on MTRON is still bugging me a bit

I actually just received my new updated Memoright GT 120/120 read/write SSD from the Neostore: a supplier wanting a review done from my website Next Level Hardware. It turns out the Memoright only has higher IOP's in write capability. It is about 5X faster when writing in a 100% random situation. The numbers have been close to 100 random write IOP's on the Mtron and well over 500 random write IOP's on the Memoright. The Mtron unit caps at almost 18,000 IOP's during my IOMeter testing when 100% Random Reading. I have done a short test on the Memoright GT 120/120 last night and this drive only caps off at around 9,000 IOP's in a 100% random read situation.

Short sum up: Mtron Pro is 2X more powerful than Memoright GT in random read access patterns. Memoright GT 120/120 is 5X more powerful than Mtron Pro is random write. So, an SSD manufacturer has finally eliminated some of the inherent write issues of Solid State Flash.

From the 15 minutes of usage last night on my 64GB Memoright GT, it has performed excellent. I can definitely realize the benefits from the additional write capability on tap.

I should have a full SSD roundup review done on this drive within the next couple of days. It will include my old results on the Mtron Pro 16GB, the Mtron Mobi 32GB, and now the latest iteration of the Memoright GT 120/120 and lets not forget the good old WDRaptor 150 for some SATA mechanical comparison.

UPDATES ON FUSION I/O

Originally Posted by Surfrider77

Last I heard from Dom, the Fusion I/O representative who had originally offered to let him do the exclusive benchmark and review had just stopped responding to Dom's emails. I dont think he was getting any response at all from them.

Haven't heard a word about Fusion I/O since.

Yes, Surf is indeed correct. I spoke directly to the CTO and the CEO of Fusion last year well before the holidays. They had promised me a review drive in early January. Sometime after X-mas they had stopped responding to all correspondance from me and we still do not have any kind of launch on the drive.

Regards,
Dom

PS- Sorry I havent been around much lately. Had some personal things going on outside of the computer realm.

****UPDATE**** 8/18/08

Great news ladies and gents. I have just received an email from FusionIO about the new Windows ioDrive. The President/CEO just contacted me through email and said to me in a short sum up "dominick, how about that windows beta ioDrive we owe you?". It looks like my private review site Next Level Hardware will be receiving an ioDrive after all!

I have been MIA for quite some time on here, waiting for some newer SSD releases before publishing any information. I had tested a pre-production OCZ SSD as well as the Memoright GT 120 with dissapointing results which I decided not to publish. But the ioDrive article will be published and brought to OCF ASAP and first as always.

Regards,

Dominick

[Vento1]

Great idea.
What we want are the big OEM manufacturers to start using these then the price might get down to where i can aford some.

[meionm]

Anandtech review of Mtron 32gb SSD
http://anandtech.com/storage/showdoc.aspx?i=3064&p=1

[ajrettke]

Definetly going to be the new wave of storage in the next decade IMO. I look forward to the day when I can afford 4+ of these drives in RAID 0!

[Neuromancer]

I would be happy with just 2 in a stripe

[dominick32]

Originally Posted by meionm

Anandtech review of Mtron 32gb SSD
http://anandtech.com/storage/showdoc.aspx?i=3064&p=1

Thanks for the link. I will go ahead and add that to the original post.

Dom

[SeasonalEclipse]

I guess imma start saving!

[redwraith94]

These look really sweet, and it will be wonderful when the price comes down to around 200 or so, but until then I can't get past the company called Mtron...For any of you who have ever played with legos...

[meionm]

Originally Posted by SeasonalEclipse

I guess imma start saving!

Don't worry habrid drives are on its way.

[krag]

Oooosh~! A single drive costs more than my whole rig~! Just goota wait a bit more and alow the prices to drop--hopefully.

[JigPu]

Oooooo... Shiny.... Looks like they beat out the iRAM in terms of $/GB.

I really want to know what kind of memory technology these things use. Articles suggest NAND, but that's kinda hard to swollow given the speed, capacity, and price. NAND is used in most flash drives today. I can RAID0 two SanDisk Extreme III 8GB Compact Flash cards from Newegg for $270 and get 40MB/sec from it. Newegg's 16GB Samsung costs $100 less and gets 10MB/sec more performance according to reviews. Don't even bring up that a SSD would likely withstand more than the average flash's 1 million writes, or else price differences become unbelievable.

JigPu

[David_N]

I'll be getting my first SSD within a month hopefully, I'm quite excited!

[aja]

Originally Posted by David_N

I'll be getting my first SSD within a month hopefully, I'm quite excited!

What are you getting exactly, and from where?

Remember to post benchmarks!

[Rattle]

http://www.pcmag.com/article2/0,1759,1973121,00.asp

[Evilsizer]

if i had money to play with some i would go with these from samsung.
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Produc...82E16820147021
while only 57/mb read,38mb/s write for IDE vs this SATA
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Produc...82E16820609234

while the sata does have higher read/writes i find it hard to fork over twice the amount for the same size.

SSD has been in devolpment for a while, i rememeber reading about IBM's 1gig protype back when i was in high school.

these are going to be the "NEXT" thing for your pc, whats not to like? about zero acces times,no moving parts so if you a silence nut this is perfect.

[dominick32]

Originally Posted by Rattle

http://www.pcmag.com/article2/0,1759,1973121,00.asp

Thanks for the link Rattle.
I will add this to the original post.

[Rattle]

there's lots of info on the hybrids, i guess they are starting them out at notebook drives.
http://www.seagate.com/docs/pdf/whit...sPSD_Sep06.pdf

http://www.seagate.com/ww/v/index.js...00f5ee0a0aRCRD

[Evilsizer]

Originally Posted by Rattle

there's lots of info on the hybrids, i guess they are starting them out at notebook drives.
http://www.seagate.com/docs/pdf/whit...sPSD_Sep06.pdf

http://www.seagate.com/ww/v/index.js...00f5ee0a0aRCRD

dont forget this page too.
http://www.seagate.com/www/en-us/pro...00_psd_hybrid/
more importanly the HD spec PDF's
http://www.seagate.com/docs/pdf/mark...s_5400_psd.pdf
http://www.seagate.com/docs/pdf/mark...s_5400_psd.pdf

from the second PDF they have 256MB of NV cache on top of the standard 8MB of cache....umm i want that on my HD in my puter!!

[dominick32]

Originally Posted by Evilsizer

dont forget this page too.
http://www.seagate.com/www/en-us/pro...00_psd_hybrid/
more importanly the HD spec PDF's
http://www.seagate.com/docs/pdf/mark...s_5400_psd.pdf
http://www.seagate.com/docs/pdf/mark...s_5400_psd.pdf

from the second PDF they have 256MB of NV cache on top of the standard 8MB of cache....umm i want that on my HD in my puter!!

OP Updated.

[Trap05]

Looks extremely promising.

[thegreek]

Fusion IO


Press releases:
http://www.fusionio.com/index_files/Page419.htm
http://www.fusionio.com/index_files/Page429.htm

Data sheet:
http://www.fusionio.com/iodrivedata.pdf

TG daily comment (includes two videos):
http://www.tgdaily.com/content/view/34065/135/

Performance sum-up:
STR: 800 MB/s (read) / 600MB/s (write)
IOPS: 100,000

In short, the IoDrive has STR like 4 scsi drives in raid0 and IOPS performance like a SSD [Edit, no better the best SSD has under 10,000 IOPS]. For 30$/GB.


so now, what were you saying about SSD?

[Evilsizer]

Originally Posted by thegreek

Fusion IO


Press releases:
http://www.fusionio.com/index_files/Page419.htm
http://www.fusionio.com/index_files/Page429.htm

Data sheet:
http://www.fusionio.com/iodrivedata.pdf

TG daily comment (includes two videos):
http://www.tgdaily.com/content/view/34065/135/

Performance sum-up:
STR: 800 MB/s (read) / 600MB/s (write)
IOPS: 100,000

In short, the IoDrive has STR like 4 scsi drives in raid0 and IOPS performance like a SSD [Edit, no better the best SSD has under 10,000 IOPS]. For 30$/GB.

so now, what were you saying about SSD?

damn up to 640gigs!! i wonder what they cost....

[dominick32]

the fusion io is absolutely stunning, however at a price tag of 20,000 it is more tailored as an enterprise solution. I might buy the 80gb version!!!! Lol

Thanks for the great info, I will definitely update the original post with this info.

[thegreek]

what would you rather have? a Mtron 32GB for $1499 or a Fusion IO 32GB for $960

[krag]

Originally Posted by thegreek

what would you rather have? a Mtron 32GB for $1499 or a Fusion IO 32GB for $960

Well...(heh)...alot cheaper than that~

I'm still on Vista-U Raid O 2x74g 16mb Rappys NV 680i style. {Which to my jaw droppin' suprise took 62gb of OS for teh install}

Massively hopin' for x48 Matrix raid with SLI GOODNESS~~!

[dominick32]

Originally Posted by thegreek

what would you rather have? a Mtron 32GB for $1499 or a Fusion IO 32GB for $960

check out fusions website. They are starting there offerings at 80gb and up. That means you need to shell out around 2400 for entry level. But for this breakthrough level of performance it may even be worth it. Imagine two of these in raid 0? 1.6 GB/s throughput..

[bing]

With that kind of STR, I believe a dedicated high end Raid card on PCI-E or better at PCI-X is required.

Built-in mobo raid controller just won't cut it. e.g.: ICH9R max internal bandwidth is 750MB/s.









.

[dominick32]

Originally Posted by bing

With that kind of STR, I believe a dedicated high end Raid card on PCI-E or better at PCI-X is required.

Built-in mobo raid controller just won't cut it. e.g.: ICH9R max internal bandwidth is 750MB/s.









.

Yeah Bing,
I was doing a little reading on Fusion I/O's website and any kind of multi card setup would require some sort of external integrated raid box. However, they are guaranteeing 800 MB/s with a single Fusion IO card using Direct Memory Access "DMA" through the 4X Pci-express slot. This technology sounds incredible man. I cant believe everything coming out for Q4 '07 and Q1 '08. Hopefully it produces some more traffic on OCF.

Again, the only problem for me on the fusion is pricing. We are looking at $30 per GB for this device, and the smallest offering from fusion is an 80GB device. But for under $1000, I can definitely justify spending the money on a technology that would in essence remove mechanical rotating drives from my system completely, not to mention no longer have my HDD as the bottleneck in my system.

DMA access is basically direct to the heart (CPU) on the mobo. The future is now ladies and gents.

[Jhonas]

I think we need to know a budget solution for SSD's- What the cheapest is, in terms of storage per $, cause I dont think that the speed is actually worth it if im having to pay that much money for only 80 gig of space.
People arent going to buy ssd's if they cost too much, and so they wont go down in price if there's no demand for them.

[thegreek]

Originally Posted by dominick32

Yeah Bing,
I was doing a little reading on Fusion I/O's website and any kind of multi card setup would require some sort of external integrated raid box. However, they are guaranteeing 800 MB/s with a single Fusion IO card using Direct Memory Access "DMA" through the 4X Pci-express slot. This technology sounds incredible man. I cant believe everything coming out for Q4 '07 and Q1 '08. Hopefully it produces some more traffic on OCF.

Again, the only problem for me on the fusion is pricing. We are looking at $30 per GB for this device, and the smallest offering from fusion is an 80GB device. But for under $1000, I can definitely justify spending the money on a technology that would in essence remove mechanical rotating drives from my system completely, not to mention no longer have my HDD as the bottleneck in my system.

DMA access is basically direct to the heart (CPU) on the mobo. The future is now ladies and gents.

I'd still buy the 80GB drive - think about it - you'll NEVER need another HD other than for stroage. You'll have the fastest drive possible for a long time.

Also, 80GB is more than enough for OS, programs and a game or 2 or 3