On the brink of buying an SSD

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Ive been holding off an SSD for a while now, and its finally the time for me to take the plunge.

I have a few questions however. I decided i wanted one of the 2 drives below;

Intel X25-M 160gb - http://www.overclockers.co.uk/showproduct.php?prodid=HD-005-IN&groupid=701&catid=14&subcat=1427
OCZ Vertex Limited Edition 100GB - http://www.overclockers.co.uk/showproduct.php?prodid=HD-035-OC

First question. Is the write speed on the Intel, really as low as the specifications make it out to be in comparison with the OCZ? (70MB/sec for the Intel and 250MB/sec on the OCZ) Id rather get the cheaper drive and lose out on the extra 60GB for £60 if the write speed really can be up to 3 times faster on the OCZ.

Second question. I see OCZ are bringing out Vertex II SSD's. If im not in desperate need of an SSD, is it worth waiting for the Vertex II?

http://www.ocztechnology.com/produc...ate-drives/ocz-vertex-2-sata-ii-2-5--ssd.html

So really, i have 3 options.

Intel (160GB)
OCZ (100GB Vertex)
OCZ (100GB Vertex II)

What do you guys think?
 
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I`d hold off for the new OCZ Vertex II as they should be here soon, I already have a 128gb Crucial M225 in my laptop but my faster CPU'd main PC bugs me because it is SO much slower than my laptop in everyday use, I`ve pre ordered the 50gb OCZ :)
 
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I went into OCUK 4 weeks ago and they said that the boss thinks that 500gb SSD's will be £100 by Christmas.

Who knows if it will get anywhere near as cheap as that, but I can see an enourmous price crash soon. The only reason that the price is high at the moment (aside from the pathetic £ strength) is because Apple bought up something like 25% of the worldwide supply of SSD chips.
 
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I went into OCUK 4 weeks ago and they said that the boss thinks that 500gb SSD's will be £100 by Christmas.

http://www.pcworld.com/article/194576/why_arent_ssds_getting_cheaper.html

Just one example article.

Now, pricing is expected to flat-line until next year, when NAND flash chip fabricators will be able to reinvest their profits to ramp up production and begin selling higher-density products, industry experts say.

I think he meant Christmas 2011, maybe even 2012 lol
 
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Ordered up a 100GB OCZ Vertex II in the end.

Hopefully the world of SSDs will be as great as everyone says :)

Just done the same, looking to do a freash install of windows 7. Apart from the small change in the bios (sata settings) are there any other trip hazards before I install?
 
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Just done the same, looking to do a freash install of windows 7. Apart from the small change in the bios (sata settings) are there any other trip hazards before I install?

I have no idea myself. Im going to reinstal Windows 7 too and i have no idea what other tricks and tips i need to follow yet. I guess it will be a last minute thing for me. As in, when it comes through the door, il quickly search what extra things i need to do lol

*edit*

Just found these 2 links which look very helpful. OCZ specific too.

http://www.ocztechnology.com/res_old/images/Configuring-and-Setting-Up-SSDs.pdf
http://www.ocztechnologyforum.com/forum/showthread.php?47212-Vista-32-64-SSD-Windows-Registry-tweaks
 
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Nice find, one thing that does worry me is the following taken from the first link above.

AHCI is not official supported on OCZ SSDs and may under some circumstances affect performance, specifically during windows installation. Enabling AHCI can result in higher performance in synthetic benchmarks for SSDs and HDDs alike, but can cause hang-ups and intermittent freezes in SSDs since it allows multiple access requests to compete for a drive that is not made to address re-ordering of commands in the queue. We recommend AHCI is set to disabled in both Windows and in the BIOS. Native Command Queuing greatly increases the performance of standard rotational drives but it has no
bearing on SSDs.


This was written with Vista in mind. Is this still true with the new OCZ SSDs and Windows 7?
 
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This was written with Vista in mind. Is this still true with the new OCZ SSDs and Windows 7?

Sandforce based drives take advantage of NCQ, this is why the 4k-64 benchmark returns much higher results than the 4k.

You'll want AHCI for best performance.
 
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Nice find, one thing that does worry me is the following taken from the first link above.

AHCI is not official supported on OCZ SSDs...

This was written with Vista in mind. Is this still true with the new OCZ SSDs and Windows 7?

Yeah, i noticed that too. Can anyone else confirm they are using an OCZ SSD with AHCI with no problems?
 
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Ok this Vertex 2 is fast fast fast. When the W7-64 install got underway it was super quick. I have AHCI set in the BIOS and have had no issues as of yet.
 
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Ok this Vertex 2 is fast fast fast. When the W7-64 install got underway it was super quick. I have AHCI set in the BIOS and have had no issues as of yet.

You can say that again!

Installed and opened Firefox ready to use in 5 seconds flat.

Im impressed. Ive still got a lot of stuff to reinstal before i can really give it a good testing. Ive also got AHCI enabled, no problems yet.
 
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This is my AS SSD Benchmark result.

25ujepx.png


Had a quick look on another thread and found this though.

Use Atto bench to test the drive. There is an issue with Sandforce controller with AS SSD which gives incorrect results. OCZ forum mods recommend using Atto or IO Meter to test the drives as those programs will give consistent results which reflect the advertised speed of the drives. Below is the results of my Vertex LE based on a similar Sandforce controller.

capture1rn.png

When i get a chance, il try a different benchmarker. Unless those scores seem ok?
 
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Am I right that your vertex 2 cost £300? Would it not of made more sense to buy 2 x Intel X25 80GB and raid them? would have cost £300 (not from ocuk) and been extremely fast? Of course with the added benefit of more HD space.

:confused: Or am I missing something as I haven't looked at the vertex 2 yet in great detail.

Hmm - Ok this is pretty awesome - http://www.legitreviews.com/article/1222/6/
 
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When i get a chance, il try a different benchmarker. Unless those scores seem ok?

The scores are fine, Because the sandforce controller compresses data in real time, the more the data can be compressed the quicker it can read or write it. AS-SSD uses random data that can't be compressed so you can see the worst case performance. Real world performance will be a bit better, but nowhere near the advertised specs unless all you keep on the drive are text documents.
 
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