Tweakboy just bought a SSD. Alert!

[Dkcode]

Im getting 7.3 on WEI ,,,, shouldnt it be higher,,,,,,,,,, ?

Also my sequential read is 247Mbps ,, shouldnt it be 300mbps since its sata 2 ?

No, it won't run at 300MBps.

I have an Intel 510 128GB, SATA III speeds run at around 500MBps and SATA II runs around 280MBps.

As for the performance did you do a clean install? If so how was it quick to boot directly after Windows 7 had installed?

Is the time in seconds your PC takes to boot from power on including BIOS POST or just the time it takes from the Windows load screen to your desktop being presented?

My 510 takes 15 seconds from Windows load screen to presented desktop. I recorded a video which i'll upload when I get back, and i'll also run some SSD benchmarking tools so I can compare with you and give you an idea of what to expect. I think the Intel 510 and Crucial M4 are similar (same controller) and I am running SATA II. It also scores 7.6 on the WEI.

Edit: Appologies I should have read the thread properly.

So you took a clone of your existing drive and by the sounds of it, it is very elaborately configured with professional apps.

You really need to do a fresh install on this drive to find out what it is capable of doing for you, especially regarding boot times. You already have your old hard drive, so you could easily do a fresh install of Windows on the SSD to see where you stand. If its better, book a weekend out to rebuild your machine. If you see no improvement plug your old hard drive back in and clone again.

Make sure you get the latest chipet drivers and Intel RST drivers from the Intel website.

Also check this guide out:

http://www.overclock.net/t/1156654/seans-windows-7-install-optimization-guide-for-ssds-hdds

The Windows installation guide is very simple, as is the 'System setup after installation' part. You don't need to bother with the 'Optimizations after System Setup' either but it might be useful in some parts to you.

 

[tweakboy]

Thanks for the response Dkcode.


Next time I do a clean format with all the audio stuff I need to install is when I get a new Haswell or something after that.

YOu get 7.7 wei ,, I get 7.3 ? is that because its 512k cluster size and not 4096... I tried align tool and it said its already aligned and wa=nted to do my other drives...

 

[tweakboy]

My final question is this

Is my score 7.3 ..... I hear people getting 280 to 300mbps on sata 2 and scsore 7.9

 

[Dkcode]

Thanks for the response Dkcode.


Next time I do a clean format with all the audio stuff I need to install is when I get a new Haswell or something after that.

YOu get 7.7 wei ,, I get 7.3 ? is that because its 512k cluster size and not 4096... I tried align tool and it said its already aligned and wa=nted to do my other drives...

I really don't know about that to be honest.

What I was trying to explain regarding the fresh install:

You cloned your SSD from your old drive right? So you could do a fresh install of Windows on your new SSD, just to test the performance. That would rule out or identify your performance issue being down to not doing a fresh install of Windows.

If installing fresh makes your computer run faster you then have two options:

1) You reinstall all your audio stuff and apps on your fresh install.
2) You plug in your old hard drive and just clone the SSD again like you did in the first place, but live with the inferior performance.

If a fresh install of Windows makes no difference just plug in your old hard drive and clone it to the SSD, and you are back where you was before.

 

[tweakboy]

Thank you Dkcode very nice explanation... I dont know I told myself never install OS again until I get a new rig... or the one I have breaks down. Im happy with gaming performance, desktop performance and DAW performance...

 

[Rubycon]

If you're running 512 byte allocation units (as opposed to 4KB) performance does suffer. The only time I see that is on an installation that was FAT32 that was converted to NTFS.

Cloning usually results in a misaligned partition. This will also reduce performance. Unlike the aforementioned problem, this is correctable without starting out with a fresh install.

Running the disk on SATA2 will definitely hamper performance but in most cases in benchmarks only. You will never see the full 3Gbps speed as you never see the full 6Gbps speed of SATA3. AS-SSD scores with the M4 running on SATA2 were in the mid 500s IIRC.

Don't get worked up over WEI. If you want to use this do it from the command prompt. Type 'winsat disk' - sans quotes - from a command prompt. Do this before and after re-aligning your partitions. Paragon makes a free partition alignment tool that will fix you up.

Bottom line if you want the best performance for your system you must do a fresh install. Good news is doing this will go faster than before. It's a PIA. Make a disk image right after loading Windows and then another when you finish with all your settings and you will be good for a while. It's also a good idea to make a full image before doing anything major on the system so in case it goes wrong you can restore it properly.

 

[tweakboy]

I got paragon align tool

it said drive didnt need to be aligned my C ,,,,,,,

I need to get this to 4096kb form 512k ......... hmmmmmmmm

 

[mv2devnull]

I need to get this to 4096kb form 512k ......... hmmmmmmmm

You have repeated that phrase about ten times in this thread. Do you have a faintest clue what that actually means? You have not shown any. You have simply repeated the same noninformative phrase again and again. We asked you to be more clear and tell more, but you just repeat the same phrase. We told you facts, but you just repeat the same phrase.

You have not shown any proof that you have a "need".

 

[Rubycon]

You have repeated that phrase about ten times in this thread. Do you have a faintest clue what that actually means? You have not shown any. You have simply repeated the same noninformative phrase again and again. We asked you to be more clear and tell more, but you just repeat the same phrase. We told you facts, but you just repeat the same phrase.

You have not shown any proof that you have a "need".

It sounds like he's talking about cluster or allocation unit size. Back when FAT32 was fairly common folks would use convert.exe to convert to NTFS. Unfortunately this would result in 512 byte clusters. Great for reducing slack but definitely a performance killer. I remember having a notebook with a 4200 rpm drive and 512 byte clusters was like using 128MB ram in XP...

Unfortunately there is no way to convert back. A fresh install is required if you want 4096 byte clusters.

 

[tweakboy]

Thanks Rubycon ,,,,,,,,, I wish I had the balls to do a fresh install and listen to you. I want to, but I got too much stuff. How about if I run a Windows Repair ??

 

[mv2devnull]

How about if I run a Windows Repair ??

That will do you no good. The physical sector size of your SSD is what it is and you cannot change that. The logical sector size is just as locked. You have told us that your partitions start aligned. The NTFS allocation unit size you can change by reformatting the filesystem. You obviously have to recopy files after the format. How good is Windows backup&restore?

 

[Rubycon]

Repair isn't going to change it unfortunately.
Since you're running off an image of the old disk why not put the old disk aside, wipe the SSD clean and load Windows up on it fresh so you can see the difference in performance?

Then you can decide if it's worth it to install everything from scratch. I've done this a lot in the past and use a lot of pro a/v software with over 100 plugins so I know it's a royal PIA.

 

[Blain]

No fresh install... No exhaustive benchmarking...
Exactly why did you buy a SSD?

Have you taken over tweakboys account?
What have you done with tweakboy?

 

[Makaveli]

its his brother from another mother

 

[tweakboy]

No fresh install... No exhaustive benchmarking...
Exactly why did you buy a SSD?

Have you taken over tweakboys account?
What have you done with tweakboy?

Blain I would love to format install OS fresh ,, but I just have too many plugins and synths in my DAW.

Soo I gotta use sata 2 , photoshpo cs5 64bit first launch takes 2 seconds.

 

[tweakboy]

I bought SSD for my DAW, and everything else being flawless and not bottlenecked..gl

 

[slpnshot]

The smallest unit of space in a HD is called a sector which is usually consists of 512 bytes.

To better manage these sectors, sectors are combined into group call clusters or allocation units.

Every file must be stored on an integer number of cluster. For example, if your cluster is 4096 bytes and the file is 4097 bytes, the file takes up 2 cluster and the remaining space on the second cluster is wasted.

SSD write/read data in 4096 byte chunks. So it makes sens to make have a cluster size equal to a multiple of 4096. A larger cluster just results in more waste space.

Thanks for the explanation. However I'm a bit lost when it comes to image writing/restoring.

What does this mean when it comes to image restoring from HDD>SSD and vice versa?

Outside of inefficiency when it comes to file storage, is there any other issues with cloning across the two drive types?

 

[tweakboy]

Nope, maybe your cluster size will stay I guess. gl

 

[tweakboy]

Ok I got some numbers.

Photoshop CS5 x64 = 2 seconds launch
Computer boots up in 20 to 25 seconds


I think Im happy where Im at even tho Im 512k cluster,,,and limited to sata 2 ...thx

 

[mv2devnull]

Photoshop CS5 x64 = 2 seconds launch
Computer boots up in 20 to 25 seconds

What were those times with the HDD?

 

[tweakboy]

What were those times with the HDD?

My friend mv2devnull it took 3 minutes to 4 minutes to boot up.

The reason its soo high is because I broke the ReadyBoot ,,,,, I deleted it so no readyboot ,, so it went from 1 minute to 3 or 4 minute and when Windoz is up you cant use it yet, as hard drive thrashing would occur.....

 

[tweakboy]

and SSD doesn't use "readyboot" or superfetch , etc....

 

[tweakboy]

I hear you thank you Ruby as well. Cant wait for my sata 3 card to arrive from newegg, which is about 30 minutes drive

If you're running 512 byte allocation units (as opposed to 4KB) performance does suffer. The only time I see that is on an installation that was FAT32 that was converted to NTFS.

Cloning usually results in a misaligned partition. This will also reduce performance. Unlike the aforementioned problem, this is correctable without starting out with a fresh install.

Running the disk on SATA2 will definitely hamper performance but in most cases in benchmarks only. You will never see the full 3Gbps speed as you never see the full 6Gbps speed of SATA3. AS-SSD scores with the M4 running on SATA2 were in the mid 500s IIRC.

Don't get worked up over WEI. If you want to use this do it from the command prompt. Type 'winsat disk' - sans quotes - from a command prompt. Do this before and after re-aligning your partitions. Paragon makes a free partition alignment tool that will fix you up.

Bottom line if you want the best performance for your system you must do a fresh install. Good news is doing this will go faster than before. It's a PIA. Make a disk image right after loading Windows and then another when you finish with all your settings and you will be good for a while. It's also a good idea to make a full image before doing anything major on the system so in case it goes wrong you can restore it properly.

 

[tweakboy]

Amazing I have it conn to mobo sata 2 and it gives 260Mbps read seq. Tomorrow I get the pcie bracket SATA 3 . 2 conn. This will bottlneck to 400Mbps unles you have pci 3.0 which I have 1.0 so ya,,,,,,,,400mbps is good enough for me,

 

[beginner99]

What kind of SATA-3 card did you get? They can be pretty lackluster and are usually not worth it. With the mostly used marvel controller you will get around 360 MB/s in sequential however random stuff will be worse than on the intel Sata-2 ports...