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@ Dragoon - ok - I reread your last two posts - I have had this same problem and don't have a fix.
What I do is reinstall from w7 dvd - very time consuming - maybe someone else here has a better fix.
I will look back at the benches of 4x x25-v that I have and see if I have an unaligned vs aligned comparison.
I had done a quick bench of 16k unaligned vs 128k aligned
everything other than sequential reads went down by ~10-15%, seq reads went up by 10mb/s
Interesting - someone else should confirm what I am seeing, at least in AS SSD and for the x24-v (very similar controller if not the same controller as x25m) my data shows very little to no improvement in moving from unaligned to aligned -
next up i will try to do some 2xRo x25v unaligned vs alligned - looks like aligned might make a difference - at least for 2x x25v on ich10.
there is a way to force acronis to align the drives, when you reinstall there is a special setting...or maybe it is when you back up there is a certain method...dont remeber jesus i read it somewhere, but i DO know this...if you are doing a backup that can be restored to an array of any size, there is a setting that you have to change when you do the backup, and when you do it in that manner, it preserves alignment no matter where or how you restore it.
i have typed alot of confusing :banana::banana::banana::banana: in my time but ^^that was pretty bad.. :) i will look it up and post back
sector by sector backup? thats what I had done, and going to an unformatted array (just re-did it with 16k stripe from 128k) it didn't align
if you can figure out what setting it is, let us all know?
Intel look they are starting a series of technical posts on their SSD forum (at last).
What they say about the V drive is interesting. I would never have thought that access time could drop read speeds by 30MB/s.
“There have been a solid handful of questions regarding a strange occurrence that takes place while benchmarking read performance across the entire drive capacity of Intel’s X 25-V SSD. The drive is specified to achieve 170 MB/s sequential read speeds, but tests show the drive achieving read speeds above 200 MB/s.
How does it do that? Well, as it turns out, the drive’s controller is doing something special. The controller has to keep track of where data is actually written in the NAND to be able to grab that data upon request from the host. As such, it also has to know where data is not written. Because accessing NAND takes some time (even if “some time” means “a ridiculously small amount of time”), the controller wants to make those NAND accesses as infrequent as possible. And that’s where the secret sauce comes in; If the controller knows that a read request is being made for an area of NAND that has no data, it doesn't read the NAND, but instead reports back zeros. Therefore, the only time spent is the time the controller takes to process the SATA request. This ends up yielding a very fast response rate and speeds in the neighborhood of 250MB/s. So what you'll see, depending on how you have partitioned and written data to your SSD, is an area that performs in the neighborhood of 170MB/s (the area where data actually is) and an area that performs above 200MB/s. Keep in mind that some benchmark tests actually write data before reading. If this is the case, you won't see any difference”.
EDIT:
http://communities.intel.com/message/98721#98721
Link?
The read speed of the X25-V has been discussed earlier and this confirms what GullLars suspected.
(On the Intels, clean/empty NAND areas return max speed without reading data, clever indeed, not very usefull though)
Interesting, I'd love to hear more about this from them, thanks!
Then again if it's not of much practical use then I guess it's not worth knowing.
EDIT: I see the link you posted now, thanks.
One of my Kingston V40s developed an issue today.
As I was about to test one of the Vertex 2s I connected it to the ICH and powered on.
Bootup was slow and in the end it rebooted, I suspected it was something going on with the Vertex as they sometimes "hang" on the UD7. (with the HDD LED continously lit)
Well, to make a long story short, the V40 was turned into a 7MB drive.
HDDerase saved the day, all data was lost though (+1 relocated sector)
The drive was completely reset, power on hours, host writes,...
A bit scary, I sort of feel it had something to do with the UD7/Vertex 2 combo.
I have since updated to the latest beta bios F7x for the UD7 as it clears up some issues with the Vertex / GB combo.
I advice you all to do the same before connecting any Vertex 2 drive to the UD7. (any GB MB in fact, they all have issues with the Vertex 2)
strange, i wonder what is causing the issue? the vertex firmware? GB may have issued a fix, but maybe the issue is the v2 firmware. weird. anxiously awaiting your results on the V2!
All the more reason just to be happy with my 2x X25-V's, for now :)
Definitely dodgy though, hope you didn't lose too much critical data.
Flamenco was right in is post on the “Vertex 2 or Callisto Deluxe or Phoenix PRO?” thread. Check out the customer feedback on the Vertex LE. The bricked drive rate is alarming. Compare that to the X25-M feedback and its chalk and cheese. I’m not saying the Intel drives are perfect, but the failure rates are significantly different. I suspect a large part of that is due to the lack of ability for smaller players to QA and refine the NAND they buy. Without doubt the NAND that Intel & Micron put in their SSD’s is better quality controlled.
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Produc...82E16820227508
@Anvil, having stated that how could the Vertex 2 have bricked the V40?
I'm not sure how but as there is an issue using GB/Vertex and this coincidentally happened when I had connected the new drive, I find it hard to believe that they are not connected somehow.
No data was lost as it was in my test rig, I do have to reinstall though, I dont keep backups of my test/bench drive. (5-10 minuttes to reinstall from a USB stick)
Well, all I'm saying is, get the new bios for the GB boards, there is a documented issue using Vertex on fw 1.11.
The issue was fixed by GB so one can't blame the SF drive, it is a bit strange that only the SF drives have issues with the GB boards though.
(enough about the SF drive in this thread, I'll post my benchmarks in my C300 vs SF thread)
I did take a picture of the HDDerase response on the V40, never seen anything like it, I'll post it later.
It does seem to be OK, I'll reinstall later today just to make sure.
"I'll post my benchmarks in my C300 vs SF thread"
Linky?
Sorry I'm smashed, governance is a mess in Australia atm, been sinking piss like a drunken sailor! :)
Just noticed a big price drop on these - a whole £6 here in the UK! :up:
Now at £76 each (with VAT) at Scan so still great value against the new 40GB Corsair Force which is at £93 - but who would buy that with the 60GB version just a fraction more at £110, and with a mounting bracket thrown in? :shrug:
Interesting times... and cheaper to come, almost certainly.
So is there a whole lot u gotta do to set up these drives?
Im new to SSD.
Can I just plug it in and start installing stuff? lol
For the Intels, and if you are using Windows 7, yes, pretty much. There is a tweak you can make to partition alignment that gives slightly better performance on other brands, but that should only be an issue in XP which doesn't natively align partitions correctly for SSDs.
After that, there are various tweaks you can do in the OS to prevent unnecessary writes, like turning off defragging (although Win 7 should turn off defragging automatically if it detects an SSD). I'm sure someone will chime in with their preferred list, but they are easily Googled and have been discussed in this subforum.
If you run Windows with a pagefile, don't be afraid to put it on the SSD if you have room for it, though - MS have published data showing that SSDs are a perfect solution for pagefiles, as there are far fewer writes than you'd think and many of the reads are big sequentials, which are exactly what tend to work well.