SSD Interface Comparison: PCI Express vs SATA (And not only one, but two reviews of the Plextor M6e!) (FREE SSD GIVEAWAY INFO AT THE END!) Introduction: Remember. What's the difference between RAID 0 and RAID 1? RAID (redundant array of independent disks) is a storage technology that combines multiple disk drive components into. A solid-state drive (SSD) is a solid-state storage device that uses integrated circuit assemblies as memory to store data persistently. SSD technology primarily uses.

HDD: Performance and Reliability. Also see: SSD vs. HDD Pricing: Seven Myths That Need Correcting. The reason that the SSD vs. HDD debate is so critical for the enterprise is the sheer weight of today’s data.

Part of the challenge is that this hugely growing data is threatening traditional computing infrastructure based on HDD, or hard disk drive storage. The problem isn’t simply growth. If that’s all there was to it, then data center administrators would simply slap more spindles, install a tape library, and send secondary data to the cloud where it becomes the provider’s problem.

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But the problem isn’t just growth; it is also the speed at which applications operate. Processor and networking speeds have kept up with application velocity and growth but production storage has not. Granted that computing bottlenecks may exist other than in the HDD. Switches fail, bandwidth overloads, VM hosts go down: nothing in the computing path is 1. But disk drives are the major slowdown culprit in high IO environments.

The nature of the mechanical device is the offending party. Very fast SSD performance is the increasingly popular fix for the problem. However, SSDs are not the automatic choice over HDDs. First, one- to- one, SSD pricing is a good deal more expensive than HDDs. There are certainly factors that narrow the purchasing gap between SSDs and HDDs, and in practice the cost for SSDs can be less. HDD Pricing: Seven Myths That Need Correcting) A second factor is what to replace: SSD performance will be faster than disk, but this does not necessarily mean that IT needs this performance level for secondary disk tiers. A third factor that mitigates against universal replacement is reliability: are SSDs reliable enough to replace HDDS in the data center?

In fact, that is a trick question. SSD/HDD reliability depends on many factors: usage, physical environment, application IO, vendor, mean time before failure (MTBF), and more. This is big discussion topic, so to keep this performance/reliability discussion to a useful focus, let’s set some base assumptions: 1. SSDs have a big place there especially for devices carried into hostile environments. However, the enterprise has a distinct set of requirements for storage based on big application and data growth, and the to- use- or- not- to- use question is critical in these data centers. This limits the universe of flash technology as the discussion point: DRAM is not a flash technology at all. And in the case of NAND SSDs, remember that while NAND is always flash, flash is not always NAND.

These are big stories in and of themselves but do not represent the majority of the SSD market today, particularly in mid- sized business and SMB. Performance: SSD Wins. Hands down, SSD performance is faster. HDDs have the inescapable overhead of physically scanning disk for reads/writes. Even the fastest 1.

RPM HDDs may bottleneck a high- traffic environment. Parallel disk, caching, and lots of extra RAM will certainly help.

But eventually the high rate of growth will pull well ahead of the finite ability of HDDs to go faster. DRAM- based SSD is the faster of the two but NAND is faster than hard drives by a range of 8. SSDs and high- end enterprise SSDs.

The root of the faster performance lies in how quickly SSDs and HDDs can access and move data: SSDs have no physical tracks or sectors and thus no physical seek limits. The SSD can reach memory addresses much faster than the HDD can move its heads. Internet Download Manager Last Version With Cracked Minecraft.

The distinction is unavoidable given the nature of IO. In a hard disk array, the storage operating system directs the IO read or write requests to physical disk locations. In response, the platter spins and disk drive heads seek the location to write or read the IO request. Non- contiguous writes multiply the problem and latency is the result. In contrast, SSDs are the fix to HDDs in high IO environments, particularly in Tier 0, high IO Tier 1 databases, and caching technologies. Since SSDs have no mechanical movement they accelerate IO requests far faster than even the fastest HDD. Reliability: HDD Scores Points.

Performance may be a slam dunk but reliability is not. Granted that SSD’s physical reliability in hostile environments is clearly better than HDDs given their lack of mechanical parts. SSDs will survive extreme cold and heat, drops, and multiple G’s. Solid state architecture avoids the same type of hardware failures as the hard drive: there are no heads to misalign or spindles to wear out. But SSDs still have physical components that fail such as transistors and capacitors. Firmware fails too, and wayward electrons can cause real problems. And in the case of a DRAM SSD, the capacitors will quickly fail in a power loss.

Purchasing a new hard drive (HDD) or solid state drive (SSD) for your desktop or laptop can result in a significant performance boost while also providing addit. Solid state drives can extend the lifecycle and dramatically improve the performance of a PC with higher speeds, greater stability and legendary Kingston reliability.

Unless IT has taken steps to protect stored data, that data is gone. Wear and tear over time also enters the picture. As an SSD ages its performance slows. The processor must read, modify, erase and write increasing amounts of data. Eventually memory cells wear out. Cheaper consumer TLC is generally relegated to consumer devices and may wear out more quickly because it stores more data on a reduced area.

Part of the reason may be that newer and denser SSDS, often termed enterprise MLC (e. MLC), has more mature controllers and better error checking processes. So are SSDS more or less reliable than HDDs? It’s hard to say with certainty since HDD and SSD manufacturers may overstate reliability. Understandably, HDD vendors are sensitive to disk failure numbers.

When they share failure rates at all, they report the lowest possible numbers as the AFR, annualized (verifiable) failure rates. Koi Live Wallpaper For Android Free Download. This number is based on the vendor’s verification of failures: i. Not environmental factors, not application interface problems, not controller errors: only the disk drive.

Fair enough in a limited sort of way, although IT is only going to care that their drive isn’t working; verified or not. General AFR rates for disk- only failures run between . However, what the HDD manufacturers do not report is the number of under- warranty disk replacements each year, or ARR – annualized rates of return. If you substitute these numbers for reported drive failures, you get a different story. We don’t need to know why these warrantied drives failed, only that they did.

These rates range much, much higher from about 0.

Feed your greed for speed by installing SSDs in RAID 0. Tired of waiting while your top- of- the- line SSD loads files? Is what once seemed blindingly fast just not cutting it any more?

Relax, you’re not the only one suffering with Greed for Speed (GFS). Plenty of velocity addicts are stricken with the same affliction. Let us help. In this, the first step in PCWorld’s exclusive one- step program for the amelioration of GFS symptoms (extreme anxiety at the least pause in program launch, tantrums over large file load times, etc.), we’ll show you how to nearly double the performance of even the fastest SSD. RAID 0 works far better with SSDs than it does with hard drives. That’s right. You’ll soon be able to spend those hundreds of lost milliseconds on a variety of pursuits. Programs and files will pop up so fast, you won’t have time to contemplate the even faster SATA Express (capable of delivering 1. SATA over PCIe) or the up- and- coming NVM Express (aka NVMe, which is PCIe optimized for the non- volatile memory in SSDs).

So here it is: Relief. Enlightenment. That’s the whole kit and kaboodle. One acronym and a numeral describing a rather old technology. Of course zero isn’t just a numeral to a GFS sufferer, it’s symbolic of the race track. Any pony or Formula One lover knows that from the betting guide. Chomp, chomp; zoom, zoom. What RAID 0 provides is two (or four, if you’re rich) separate conduits to carry your data to and from two (or four) SSDs.

RAID 0 works far better with SSDs than it does with hard drives, because mechanical drives aren’t fast enough to take full advantage of the increased bandwidth. In most cases, running SSDs in tandem works really, really well. This tip is primarily for desktop PC owners, of course. Laptops that can accommodate dual hard drives—solid state or otherwise—are few and far between. For more information on RAID, read.

RAID made easy. Our recent review of Intel’s 7. SSD piqued our interest in the concept of striping SSDs. You see, Intel asks reviewers to try a RAID 0 setup with their drives. That’s probably because benchmark results indicate that the 7. Run them in tandem or in packs, and they blossom. Stacking 7. 30s gives Windows an instantaneous feel. Really nice. The skull on Intel’s 7.

Series SSD mark indicate Intel’s is targeting enthusiasts. But it takes running two drives in RAID 0 to really deliver the goods. To see just how much a typical desktop rig might benefit from an RAID 0 SSD upgrade, we tested the three pairs we have in the lab (we have many more single drives, of course, but we typically don’t benchmark RAID performance). Those drives were the bargain- class San. Disk X1. 10, Intel’s enterprise- influenced 7.

Series, and the enthusiast- class Plextor M6e SSD- on- a- PCIe- card. We set up the first two using the Intel Rapid Storage controller on our Asus Z8. Pro motherboard; the Plextor required Windows software RAID. A kick in the pants. The performance of both the Intel 7.

Series and the Plextor M6e drives improved immensely when paired up in a striped array—between 4. We performed a write test by copying a single large file (1. GB) to the drive under evaluation, and a read test by copying that same file from the drive. We repeat this sequence with a 1. GB collection of small files and folders. As I mentioned earlier, the 7. Series SSD produces middling numbers when running solo.

It wrote the single large file at 4. MBps and read that file at 3.

MBps. It wrote our 1. GB collection of small files and folders at 4. MBps, and it read them at 3. MBps. When we paired two of these drives in RAID 0, large- file write and read speeds skyrocketed to 8. MBps and 7. 07. 3. MBps respectively, while the collection- of- small- files write and read speeds exploded to 8. MBps and 5. 82. 3.

MBps respectively. That’s an overall average of 7. MBps reading and writing. Intel tells us running four 7. Series drives in RAID 0 can achieve average speeds of 1. GBps. Now that’s haulin’ the freight.

Intel’s 7. 30 Series SSDs deliver huge benefits when you run two drives in RAID 0. The Plextor M6e’s PCIe interface helps it perform much faster than SATA 6. Gbps drives do. A lone drive wrote our 1. GB file at 5. 26. MBps and read it at 5. MBps. While that’s fast for a single SSD, two of the drives in RAID 0 performed the same tasks at 8.

MBps, respectively. Their performance with our collections of small files was equally striking, writing the group at 7. MBps and reading it at 6. MBps. PCIe drives in pairs rock. The Plextor M6e’s PCIe interface delivers higher performance than the older SATA 6.

Gbps can muster. Bargain drives like the San. Disk X1. 10 will benefit, too, although we didn’t see such large deltas. But two X1. 10’s in RAID 0 did outperform any single drive that’s ever come through the lab. Just do it. Until SATA Express and NVMe (with its parallelism and multiple queues) shows up, combining SSDs with RAID 0 is the sure cure for performance anxiety. Even when the new technologies arrive in force (Intel’s latest chipsets already support SATA Express), RAID will help.

If you have the cash and the appropriate infrastructure, we highly recommend running SSDs in RAID 0. You will notice the difference. And if you’re suffering from GFS, you’ll sleep better at night. One final word of advice: Be sure to have a routine backup plan in place. If any drive in a RAID 0 configuration fails, you could lose all your data. To comment on this article and other PCWorld content, visit our Facebook page or our Twitter feed.