Stereodude
Not really a
SuperSSpeed S301 Hyper Gold is the only one I know of.
SSDs - State of the Product?
- Thread starter ddrueding
- Start date
I just replaced my 120GB OCZ Vertex 3 with a 256GB Samsung 840 Pro. Made no perceptible difference speed wise in general use. Benchmarks indicate that the Samsung should be at least twice as fast as the OCZ, but I can't see it. If anything, returning from resume feels a little slower. A couple of things feel a little quicker on the Samsung.
The speed difference was no where near the change going from mechanical to the OCZ. Since the 2.25 firmware came out for the Vertex/Agility 3 line, the drives have been solid. Before that firmware, I had a number of issues on mobile platforms.
The speed difference was no where near the change going from mechanical to the OCZ. Since the 2.25 firmware came out for the Vertex/Agility 3 line, the drives have been solid. Before that firmware, I had a number of issues on mobile platforms.
If the OCZ is a Sansforce SF-22xx type, then you probably won't notice much difference unless there are heavy loads.
CougTek
Hairy Aussie
I'm more interested in the enterprise version : the SM843T. It's also available in a 960GB capacity and it would be great for our new SAN. Unfortunately, the only place on the planet where it seems to be in stock is in Australia. Australia is a fine place, but the problem with Australia is that it's on the opposite side of Earth from where I am.
CougTek
Hairy Aussie
Of course not! I'm not Mercutio.
CougTek
Hairy Aussie
I've received a server quotation from HP. They ask over 7K$ per 200GB SSD. Granted, they use SLC memory, but still. It must be their way to tell us to look elsewhere and that our money is not good enough for them.
Anyone has experience with SolidFire's Storage Systems? Probably over-the-top for our needs, but I'm checking anyway.
Anyone has experience with SolidFire's Storage Systems? Probably over-the-top for our needs, but I'm checking anyway.
timwhit
Hairy Aussie
Sounds like it's in Dave's budget.
CougTek
Hairy Aussie
Nope. 2.5" SAS. I bet it's slower than an Intel DC S3700 too, which cost roughly 550$ for a 200GB unit.
Last edited:
It looks like Samsung has a better version of the 480/960GB drives now.
The drive heights (10cm, 7cm and 7mm) make no sense though. I'm hoping for a typo.
The drive heights (10cm, 7cm and 7mm) make no sense though. I'm hoping for a typo.
Howell
Storage? I am Storage!
That was HxWxD of the one drive.
CougTek
Hairy Aussie
It must be the display.
I'm pretty sure it was a BKC error.
I decided to give the EVO a try. I picked up the 500GB version of the drive to use in my main desktop at home. It's replacing a WD raptor 300GB drive that has been showing its age. So far the difference is huge but part of it may be a new and clean OS install. Time will tell if the drive holds up well. Later down the road when I update the CPU and motherboard I'll benefit from a faster sata bus to get the rest of the performance out of this drive.
How does it compare to the TLC 840 previous generation? I'm trying to decide whether to buy more of the Crucial 960GB or the 1TB ECO. That funky cache is a concern. I don't think it would do anything useful with a typical 60 or 120GB download.
From the various sources I've read my impression is that it's above the base Samsung 840 line and slightly below the Samsung 840 pro with respect to performance and IOps. I couldn't justify the extra $120 premium for the 500GB Samsung 840 pro versus the 500GB EVO I purchased.
For my usage the TLC should last a very long time based on the figures I've read. The non scientific performance measurement I've done shows its limitations are only seen through benchmarks and my lack of having a sata III connection. Even if I did have a sata III connection for it I doubt I'd even feel the difference in anything less than extreme cases of large file transfers.
I have no idea what your workload or use case would be like to recommend one over the other. If you think of anything specific I should try I can compare the 500 GB EVO to a 256 GB 840 pro. That's the best I have to try right now.
Samsung 840 EVO rapid dram caching examined. My conclusion is that it isn't worth much except for benchmarking.
I agree. I also agree with the author that it's nice to see Samsung find alternative ways to improve the IO and performance. Perhaps future versions of the software will improve the performance and make it worth using. In the current implementation it appears only reads benefit from it but I could see a case for those of us with UPS devices being able to enable a "write back" still implementation to improve that aspect of the drive.
Bozo
Storage? I am Storage!
CougTek
Hairy Aussie
The problem with most SD and microSD cards is their very limited lifespan regarding their amount of cell rewrites. The adapter is 80$, but there are a bunch of cheap 120GB SSD, which all allow for much higher write cycle amounts, at ~100$. Therefore, I'm not sure the adapter is such a good deal, even for old unused microSD cards. I wouldn't pay more than 50$ for this adapter.
Yeah, microSD cards are not so great for performance anyway, not to mention the lack of SDXC support. It would be nice to have a similar device that accepts two UDMA 7 CF cards.
I think so too, especially outside of computer usage. I'm adding additional Crucial SSDs rather than Samsungs. The 960GB M500 has MLC flash and is cheaper than the 1TB EVO.
Stereodude
Not really a
Yeah, by all of $40. $550 vs $590
Considering the capacity difference, the prices are close enough to be the same. In any event I'd pay somewhat more for a better drive, but I don't see the Samsung as being better.
CougTek
Hairy Aussie
I'm very curious about the price of those : http://www.smartstoragesys.com/products/ulltradimm.asp
Of course, it isn't affordable, but if the 400GB model is around 2K$, it would be a very interesting option for server fast storage.
I suppose, but am not sure, that you can put standard RAM next to it. Otherwise, I don't know how to use those. Any server still has to have regular RAM to work well, plus flash storage (or mecanical drives) to store the long term data.
Imagine an HP Proliant DL360p, which has 24 DIMM slots, with 4 DIMM used for 32GB sticks (2 per socket) and the remaining 20 DIMM slots filled with 400GB UltraDIMM. You could even add up to ten 1.2TB 2.5" 10Krpm SAS drive for slower storage and either a dual port FC 16Gb or QDR Infiniband HBA in the PCI-E slot. It would smoke any 3PAR StoreServ SAN and take only 1U of space. Put two of those for redundancy and that would be a formidable SAN solution.
Of course, it isn't affordable, but if the 400GB model is around 2K$, it would be a very interesting option for server fast storage.
I suppose, but am not sure, that you can put standard RAM next to it. Otherwise, I don't know how to use those. Any server still has to have regular RAM to work well, plus flash storage (or mecanical drives) to store the long term data.
Imagine an HP Proliant DL360p, which has 24 DIMM slots, with 4 DIMM used for 32GB sticks (2 per socket) and the remaining 20 DIMM slots filled with 400GB UltraDIMM. You could even add up to ten 1.2TB 2.5" 10Krpm SAS drive for slower storage and either a dual port FC 16Gb or QDR Infiniband HBA in the PCI-E slot. It would smoke any 3PAR StoreServ SAN and take only 1U of space. Put two of those for redundancy and that would be a formidable SAN solution.
Last edited:
ddrueding
Fixture
Interesting. I'm assuming some fancy device driver or some such would be needed to present this to the OS as storage. It almost sounds fast enough to use as actual non-volatile RAM in a system for instant boot-up or the ultimate in power savings.
How do you partition system RAM access such that data for storage only writes to the UltraDIMM modules rather than the traditional RAM modules?
I appreciate the engineering that went into this product but I pause at finding a practical application for it. The read speeds of the UltraDIMM modules seem to be a magnitude slower than conventional RAM at 150 microseconds vs ~10ns and the implementation of this product would be cumbersome if not for replacing all your RAM modules with these. If there was a way to stuff a feasible size of these into a RAM drive module like a DDRDrive then I could see it being an interesting solution but at an expensive cost.
CougTek
Hairy Aussie
It's expensive, but it's probably not THAT expensive. Considering the money Cisco asks for its SSD, filling one of their 2U server with 24 SSD would probably cost more than what I described above. Assuming a cost of 2000$ per 400GB UltraDimm, the DL360p setup I imagined would cost approximately 60,000$. Of course, until we have a real price for the UltraDIMM module, this only is speculation, but I doubt I'm very far from what it will be.
I've requested more informations about their modules by e-mail. I'll see what they'll reply.
CougTek
Hairy Aussie
Apparently, the SSD into RAM socket idea isn't that bad. According to this article on enterprisetech.com, it allows to deliver a lot more IOps :
More than 3 times the IOps than a server without it. Not bad. Not bad at all. I didn't know that another company than Smart Storage Systems (Sandisk) made those.
CougTek
Hairy Aussie
Sorry for the lack of spacing. I have issues with the forums on my work laptop.
Mercutio
Fatwah on Western Digital
So I sent an 830 back to Samsung a couple weeks ago.
Or at least I thought I did.
Turns out, I didn't.
Since I actually registered the drive for warranty purposes (because I bought it "late" in its life and didn't want to lose eight months of warranty based on date of manufacture), when it was time to RMA the stupid thing I actually went through the Samsung portal that lists all the Samsung products I own and started the RMA from there, just like I have for TVs, monitors, Hard drives, tablets etc.
The RMA process was completed successfully and I was directed to ship my drive to Greenville, South Carolina. Of interest at this point is that Samsung's web site (I still have that tab open) and RMA confirmation E-mail both gave the incorrect postal code for that address BUT it is a street address I've used to ship products back to Samsung in the past.
I got a notification that the package was delivered a week ago, so imagine my surprise when I got an E-mail this morning that my RMA had been cancelled because Samsung had not received the drive. The message directed me to call Samsung's main US customer service number, where, after five transfers (I was initially routed to TVs, then appliances and then phones before finally getting to the DVD and SSD people), I was informed that Samsung has no service facility in South Carolina. There's a CSR at Samsung who basically told me that a proper drive RMA for his business unit should include pre-paid shipping to New Jersey and that he'd look in to what needs to be done.
UPS says the package was delivered to the address as it was given to me, so the only thing it's willing to do is have the regular route driver stop by and ask for my box back (I'd have to pay to have it shipped again). The building in question is either a photography studio or a vintage clothing store in Greenville's downtown. *I* say that Samsung should just ship me a drive and they can eat the cost of whatever it was that screwed up, but so far I've exchanged four phone calls and a dozen e-mails with their CSR. Samsung's CSR says they need the broken drive before they can move ahead with a replacement. I'm not faulting this guy - he spent all afternoon trying to find out what's going on, but there are so many mysteries involved in all of this that I really want to say that Samsung's web site must be haunted.
Or at least I thought I did.
Turns out, I didn't.
Since I actually registered the drive for warranty purposes (because I bought it "late" in its life and didn't want to lose eight months of warranty based on date of manufacture), when it was time to RMA the stupid thing I actually went through the Samsung portal that lists all the Samsung products I own and started the RMA from there, just like I have for TVs, monitors, Hard drives, tablets etc.
The RMA process was completed successfully and I was directed to ship my drive to Greenville, South Carolina. Of interest at this point is that Samsung's web site (I still have that tab open) and RMA confirmation E-mail both gave the incorrect postal code for that address BUT it is a street address I've used to ship products back to Samsung in the past.
I got a notification that the package was delivered a week ago, so imagine my surprise when I got an E-mail this morning that my RMA had been cancelled because Samsung had not received the drive. The message directed me to call Samsung's main US customer service number, where, after five transfers (I was initially routed to TVs, then appliances and then phones before finally getting to the DVD and SSD people), I was informed that Samsung has no service facility in South Carolina. There's a CSR at Samsung who basically told me that a proper drive RMA for his business unit should include pre-paid shipping to New Jersey and that he'd look in to what needs to be done.
UPS says the package was delivered to the address as it was given to me, so the only thing it's willing to do is have the regular route driver stop by and ask for my box back (I'd have to pay to have it shipped again). The building in question is either a photography studio or a vintage clothing store in Greenville's downtown. *I* say that Samsung should just ship me a drive and they can eat the cost of whatever it was that screwed up, but so far I've exchanged four phone calls and a dozen e-mails with their CSR. Samsung's CSR says they need the broken drive before they can move ahead with a replacement. I'm not faulting this guy - he spent all afternoon trying to find out what's going on, but there are so many mysteries involved in all of this that I really want to say that Samsung's web site must be haunted.
CougTek
Hairy Aussie
Well, you've used UPS so you're partly to blame from not knowing better.
However, it's not hard to imagine that Samsung's RMA system is some kind of a maze. It's sad to read that they haven't figured out how to properly give support to their customers. It's sadder to think that it's probably been designed like that on purpose in order to discourage customers from replacing their faulty products and therefore to cut service cost. While it may save them money on the short to middle term, this is the kind of scheme that will hurt their income big if it's not corrected and it's also the kind of service that makes people spell another asian company's name S*ny.
However, it's not hard to imagine that Samsung's RMA system is some kind of a maze. It's sad to read that they haven't figured out how to properly give support to their customers. It's sadder to think that it's probably been designed like that on purpose in order to discourage customers from replacing their faulty products and therefore to cut service cost. While it may save them money on the short to middle term, this is the kind of scheme that will hurt their income big if it's not corrected and it's also the kind of service that makes people spell another asian company's name S*ny.