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Broken In
A quick recap on what a SSD is: You know those flash chips that are used in usb sticks and various memory cards? A SSD is basically several of those chips working in parallel with a controller to bring you higher speed.
There are many advantages to a SSD compared to a traditional spinning mechanical hard drive, such as:
What about those reports of SSD slowing down over time?
They are true, but let me explain this quickly for you:
SSD are similar to hard drives in the way that they delete files: They don’t. They simply flag the files as deleted.
What’s the problem with that? With a hard drive, when you want to use the space occupied by the previous file, the hard drive would simply overwrite it. In the case of a SSD, it needs to erase the file prior to writing again.
Until recently, SSD would delete the file right before writing the new one. Needless to say, this slows down write operations a lot, especially as your SSD gets filled up and you need to erase pretty much any previously deleted file to write new data.
TRIM
TRIM is here to change that through. What TRIM does is erase the file right away, allowing you to write at full speed without waiting to erase previously used space.
Now, to use TRIM, you need a OS that supports it, such as Windows 7, Mac OS X and some variants of Linux being the only ones as far as I know. You also need a SSD that supports TRIM obviously. Note that OCZ, Intel and a few other SSD manufacturers offer an utility that mimics what TRIM does, for OSes that don’t support TRIM.
If you want to learn more about SSDs and TRIM, I highly recommend The SSD Anthology: Understanding SSDs article from Anandtech, a very complete and detailed article on SSD. A must read in my opinion. Also from AnandTech, The SSD Anthology: Understanding SSDs is another must read if you want to learn more about SSDs.
With that said, let’s move on to my recommendations.
TRIM with RAID:
From AnandTech:
“For months now you all have been asking me to tackle the topic of RAIDing SSDs. I’ve been cautious about doing so for a number of reasons:
1) There is currently no way to pass the TRIM instruction to a drive that is a member of a RAID array. Intel’s latest RAID drivers allow you to TRIM non-member RAID disks, but not an SSD in a RAID array.
2) Giving up TRIM support means that you need a fairly resilient SSD, one whose performance will not degrade tremendously over time. On the bright side, with the exception of the newer SandForce controllers, I’m not sure we’ve seen a controller as resilient as Intel’s.”
So in short:
You can use two or more SSDs in RAID, you just need to pick the right SSDs. My recommendation would be use either one of these, in this order:
Keep in mind:
I’ll use this opportunity to remind you that this article is only a guideline for the prices I’ve seen on August 14th. You’re letting yourself down if you’re not looking for deals when you decide to purchase.
Here are a few things to keep in mind when you read this list:
There are many advantages to a SSD compared to a traditional spinning mechanical hard drive, such as:
- There are no noise, as there are no moving parts.
- Less heat emission compared to hard drives, as again, there are no moving parts.
- Lower power consumption, because you’ve guessed it, there are no moving parts, which results in longer battery life for laptops and mobile devices.
- SSD are much more resistant to shocks than hard drives are.
- Much lower latency (in the 0.07ms compared to 7-9ms).
- Higher transfer rates for reading (Up to 330 MB/s+) and writing files.
What about those reports of SSD slowing down over time?
They are true, but let me explain this quickly for you:
SSD are similar to hard drives in the way that they delete files: They don’t. They simply flag the files as deleted.
What’s the problem with that? With a hard drive, when you want to use the space occupied by the previous file, the hard drive would simply overwrite it. In the case of a SSD, it needs to erase the file prior to writing again.
Until recently, SSD would delete the file right before writing the new one. Needless to say, this slows down write operations a lot, especially as your SSD gets filled up and you need to erase pretty much any previously deleted file to write new data.
TRIM
TRIM is here to change that through. What TRIM does is erase the file right away, allowing you to write at full speed without waiting to erase previously used space.
Now, to use TRIM, you need a OS that supports it, such as Windows 7, Mac OS X and some variants of Linux being the only ones as far as I know. You also need a SSD that supports TRIM obviously. Note that OCZ, Intel and a few other SSD manufacturers offer an utility that mimics what TRIM does, for OSes that don’t support TRIM.
If you want to learn more about SSDs and TRIM, I highly recommend The SSD Anthology: Understanding SSDs article from Anandtech, a very complete and detailed article on SSD. A must read in my opinion. Also from AnandTech, The SSD Anthology: Understanding SSDs is another must read if you want to learn more about SSDs.
With that said, let’s move on to my recommendations.
TRIM with RAID:
From AnandTech:
“For months now you all have been asking me to tackle the topic of RAIDing SSDs. I’ve been cautious about doing so for a number of reasons:
1) There is currently no way to pass the TRIM instruction to a drive that is a member of a RAID array. Intel’s latest RAID drivers allow you to TRIM non-member RAID disks, but not an SSD in a RAID array.
2) Giving up TRIM support means that you need a fairly resilient SSD, one whose performance will not degrade tremendously over time. On the bright side, with the exception of the newer SandForce controllers, I’m not sure we’ve seen a controller as resilient as Intel’s.”
So in short:
You can use two or more SSDs in RAID, you just need to pick the right SSDs. My recommendation would be use either one of these, in this order:
- A SandForce based SSD, such as Corsair Force series or OCZ Vertex 2/Agility 2 series.
- Toshiba controller based SSDs (Mostly some Kingston models).
- Any Intel SSD.
Keep in mind:
I’ll use this opportunity to remind you that this article is only a guideline for the prices I’ve seen on August 14th. You’re letting yourself down if you’re not looking for deals when you decide to purchase.
Here are a few things to keep in mind when you read this list:
- Prices and availability change everyday. I can’t keep up with accurate pricing everyday, but I can suggest to you great SSD that you won’t regret buying at the price ranges that I list.
- This list is based on the best U.S. prices from NewEgg and Amazon. In other countries or in a retail stores, things might be different. All prices are based on new SSD prices.Best SSD for ~$80:
*images17.newegg.com/is/image/newegg/20-233-122-TS?$S180W$*www.ftjcfx.com/image-3067296-10440897
Corsair Nova CSSD-V32GB2-BRKT 32GB*www.ftjcfx.com/image-3067296-10440897
If you’re looking for a bottom cost SSD, that is still reliable and supports TRIM, the Corsair Nova CSSD-V32GB2-BRKT 32GB*www.ftjcfx.com/image-3067296-10440897 , at a cost of $80 is the way to go.
With 32GB, it’s also the SSD with the lowest capacity in this guide, so if you want an higher capacity SSD, keep reading.
Based on the Indilinx Barefoot controller, it does ok with RAID and lack of TRIM support, but no where as well as Intel or SandForce controllers based SSD, hence why I would recommend spending a tad more and get two (or more) Intel X25-V 40GB if you want a low-cost RAID array.
Best SSD for ~$110:
*images17.newegg.com/is/image/newegg/20-167-025-TS?$S180W$*www.ftjcfx.com/image-3067296-10440897
Intel X25-V 40GB*www.ftjcfx.com/image-3067296-10440897
If you’re looking for a SSD to upgrade an older machine, or simply to host the OS along with a few important applications/games, go with the Intel X25-V 40GB*www.ftjcfx.com/image-3067296-10440897.
It was recommended by AnandTech as the best 2010 Value SSD (Close to or below $100), offering better overall performance than the OCZ Onyx and Kingston SSDNow V series, not to mention the larger capacity (40GB vs 30/32GB).
It’s also the best performer compared to the OCZ Onyx and Kingston SSDNow V series when it comes to gaming performance (scroll down to the last graph).
It’s not the best SSD, not the one with the largest capacity, but for $110, it’s a great choice to give a second life to older machine or laptops that don’t need much capacity, or as a boot drive that hosts the OS along with a few important applications/games.
Best SSD for ~$145:
*images10.newegg.com/NeweggImage/ProductImageCompressAll200/20-148-357-02.jpg*www.ftjcfx.com/image-3067296-10440897
Crucial RealSSD C300 64GB*www.ftjcfx.com/image-3067296-10440897
With SATA III 6.0Gbps support, the C300 is capable of hitting up to 355MB/s read transfer rates. It’s also backward compatible with SATA II 3.0Gbps, although you’ll obviously lose some performance.
This is a great drive for starters, with excellent performance, a capacity of 64GB, TRIM support and a price under $150.
Note that I don’t recommend getting more than one, for example with RAID, since the Crucial RealSSD C300 write performance drops horribly (~20MB/s) without TRIM. With one drive and TRIM, you’ll be fine though.
keep it up bro.