Supersspeed S301 64GB, Areca vs Z77, S301 vs C300 vs Mtron Mobi

[SteveRo]

OK - so this is very much a non-scientific compare:

1. Array of Supersspeed S301 64GB on Z77 vs Areca 1261 2GB vs Areca 1882 4GB .
(I do not have a Haswell set up (yet) but I may add that in the future. :) )

A couple thoughts going into this.

I have always rather looked down on onboard RAID - AMD and Intel ICH9, ICH10 and PCH. I've had a preference for PCI-E controllers that offload storage related computing from the main cpu and had plenty of onboard cache to allow cached reads (of previously accessed data) or combined writes to improve overall write performance. However I must say the Supersspeed S301 - on the Z77 PCH looks rather spectacular, when compared to the Areca 1882 (when taking the Areca cache out of the picture).

2. I also want to show how the performance of arrays of SSDs have improved over time by comparing arrays of -

- 5x (5 drives) RAID 0 (R0) Mtron Mobi 16GB to
- 5xR0 Crucial RealSSD C300 64GB to
- 4xR0 Supersspeed S301 64GB

Some general info on drives:

Mtron Mobi 16GB - circa 2008 - sata1 (sata150) only, no NCQ, supposed to be 100 MB/s sequential read/write, very expensive in 2008 when new due to SLC memory.

Crucial RealSSD C300 64GB - sata3 (sata600), NCQ, very popular MLC drives - reasonably good read speeds (355 MB/s (spec)), relatively slow writes (75 MB/s (spec)) due to small size/lack of internal parallel writes compared to larger drives.

Supersspeed S301 64GB - sata3 (sata600), NCQ, SLC drive using the popular sandforce SF-2281 controller. Even though the 2281 is rather long in the tooth, the SLC flash makes this perhaps the fastest 64GB "xtreme" drive currently available. For additional S301 info see -
http://www.xtremesystems.org/forums/showthread.php?280689-Review-SuperSSpeed-HYPER-SLC-%28Sandforce-SF-2281-Intel-SLC-25nm%29
http://www.xtremesystems.org/forums/showthread.php?283035-Chris-Ram-Signature-Edtion-SLC-SSDs-Ready-to-Ship-SuperSSpeed-S301-but-with-a-Twist
http://www.xtremesystems.org/forums/showthread.php?286679-S301-CR-edition-(2)-128GB-SLC-drives-Haswell-R0


Supersspeed S301 64GB unboxing -


http://imageshack.us/a/img23/3605/zth3.jpg (http://imageshack.us/photo/my-images/23/zth3.jpg/)

Uploaded with ImageShack.us (http://imageshack.us)



1x Supersspeed S301 64GB on Z77 PCH, iaStor (raid) driver -


http://img94.imageshack.us/img94/213/wz76.png (http://img94.imageshack.us/i/wz76.png/)


2xR0 Supersspeed S301 64GB on Z77 PCH, 64k stripe -


http://img24.imageshack.us/img24/2483/zbfa.png (http://img24.imageshack.us/i/zbfa.png/)

http://img18.imageshack.us/img18/8953/9h7p.png (http://img18.imageshack.us/i/9h7p.png/)

[SteveRo]

4xR0 Supersspeed S301 64GB on the Z77 PCH, 64k stripe, WBC on -



http://img20.imageshack.us/img20/4053/fhiu.png (http://img20.imageshack.us/i/fhiu.png/)

http://img268.imageshack.us/img268/4201/nsg.PNG (http://img268.imageshack.us/i/nsg.PNG/)



4xR0 Supersspeed S301 64GB on the Areca 1882, 4GB cache , 128k stripe -



http://img5.imageshack.us/img5/9877/z09c.png (http://img5.imageshack.us/i/z09c.png/)

http://img51.imageshack.us/img51/9051/zppy.png (http://img51.imageshack.us/i/zppy.png/)

http://img27.imageshack.us/img27/2691/83c2.png (http://img27.imageshack.us/i/83c2.png/)

[SteveRo]

Just for comparison - here is 4xR0 Supersspeed S301 on the Areca 1261, 2GB cache -


http://img443.imageshack.us/img443/8213/bua2.png (http://img443.imageshack.us/i/bua2.png/)

http://img842.imageshack.us/img842/2584/m12e.png (http://img842.imageshack.us/i/m12e.png/)

[SteveRo]

Oldest, old and new (well maybe just "not as old") -



http://imageshack.us/a/img703/9659/xak1.jpg (http://imageshack.us/photo/my-images/703/xak1.jpg/)

Uploaded with ImageShack.us (http://imageshack.us)



5xR0 Mtron Mobi 16GB on the Areca 1882, 4GB -




http://img856.imageshack.us/img856/7238/83d3.png (http://img856.imageshack.us/i/83d3.png/)

http://img19.imageshack.us/img19/9818/rwk1.png (http://img19.imageshack.us/i/rwk1.png/)



5xC300 64GB on the Areca 1882, 4GB -



http://img809.imageshack.us/img809/1842/dgem.png (http://img809.imageshack.us/i/dgem.png/)

http://img18.imageshack.us/img18/5973/bnjg.png (http://img18.imageshack.us/i/bnjg.png/)



4xSupersspeed 64GB on the Areca 1882, 4GB (same as previous) -



http://img51.imageshack.us/img51/9051/zppy.png (http://img51.imageshack.us/i/zppy.png/)

http://img27.imageshack.us/img27/2691/83c2.png (http://img27.imageshack.us/i/83c2.png/)

[SteveRo]

The S301s seem to work well on Haswell :)
4xR0 Supersspeed S301 using 4670K/M5G intel onboard controller -

http://img716.imageshack.us/img716/6584/tvhu.png (http://img716.imageshack.us/i/tvhu.png/)


http://img38.imageshack.us/img38/2172/afj0.png (http://img38.imageshack.us/i/afj0.png/)


http://img513.imageshack.us/img513/6969/3gqw.jpg (http://img513.imageshack.us/i/3gqw.jpg/)

[Don_Dan]

Welcome back! :wave:

[SteveRo]

Not at all practical - but 5xC300 R0 on the Z77 PCH seems to perform very well! -


http://img34.imageshack.us/img34/843/for8.png (http://img34.imageshack.us/i/for8.png/)