General hardware forum

[RodBarnes]

I would like some input on drive configuration but, of course, these would not generally be Windows-specific questions. Does anyone have a favorite hardware community where I could post such a question as that below?

I am looking at disk performance in my current system and trying to determine how best to configure and arrange the drives. Currently, I have AHCI running on a mbrd that has six SATA 2 ports and a PCIe card to provide four SATA 3 ports. The drives are currently connected as shown at bottom and the performance results are pretty dismal when compared to expected values given the specs. (Yeah, I know we never reach spec, but this is really, really low.) I've included only the seq 4KiB read/write tests but the randoms are correlative to those.

Each of the SSD drives are spec'd to support up to 540 MB/s. I've read that SATA 3 should provide about 600 MB/s real-world performance. So I'm left wondering why I wouldn't see something above 500 MB/s. However, I've also read that performance from PCIe cards using Marvell chips is pretty poor -- so maybe that is the issue.

Similarly, I've read that SATA 2 provides 300 MB/s real-world performance. The HDDs attached to those ports are spec'd to provide up to 175 MB/s. So, again, trying to determine why I'm seeing less than 100 MB/s with those.

C - MBRD SATA 2 Port 0 - Samsung SSD 850 EVO 250GB; seq 4KiB read, write: 284.860 MB/s, 272.903 MB/s
I - PCIe SATA 3 Port 0 - Samsung SSD 850 EVO 500GB; seq 4KiB read, write: 204.669 MB/s, 173.793 MB/s
J - PCIe SATA 3 Port 2 - Samsung SSD 850 EVO 500GB; seq 4KiB read, write: 205.725 MB/s, 173.818 MB/s
K - PCIe SATA 3 Port 3 - Samsung SSD 850 EVO 500GB; seq 4KiB read, write: 205.771 MB/s, 173.819 MB/s
L - MBRD SATA 2 Port 1 - Samsung HDD 753LJ 750GB; seq 4KiB read, write: 82.239 MB/s, 81.245 MB/s
M - MBRD SATA 2 Port 4 - Samsung HDD 753LJ 750GB; seq 4KiB read, write: 88.062 MB/s, 81.877 MB/s
N - MBRD SATA 2 Port 5 - Samsung HDD 753LJ 750GB; seq 4KiB read, write: 93.264 MB/s, 88.237 MB/s

 

[whoosh]

I would like some input on drive configuration but, of course, these would not generally be Windows-specific questions. Does anyone have a favorite hardware community where I could post such a question as that below?

I am looking at disk performance in my current system and trying to determine how best to configure and arrange the drives. Currently, I have AHCI running on a mbrd that has six SATA 2 ports and a PCIe card to provide four SATA 3 ports. The drives are currently connected as shown at bottom and the performance results are pretty dismal when compared to expected values given the specs. (Yeah, I know we never reach spec, but this is really, really low.) I've included only the seq read/write tests but the randoms are correlative to those.

Each of the SSD drives are spec'd to support up to 540 MB/s. I've read that SATA 3 should provide about 600 MB/s real-world performance. So I'm left wondering why I wouldn't see something above 500 MB/s. However, I've also read that performance from PCIe cards using Marvell chips is pretty poor -- so maybe that is the issue.

Similarly, I've read that SATA 2 provides 300 MB/s real-world performance. The HDDs attached to those ports are spec'd to provide up to 175 MB/s. So, again, trying to determine why I'm seeing less than 100 MB/s with those.

C - MBRD SATA 2 Port 0 - Samsung SSD 850 EVO 250GB; seq read, write: 284.860 MB/s, 272.903 MB/s
I - PCIe SATA 3 Port 0 - Samsung SSD 850 EVO 500GB; seq read, write: 204.669 MB/s, 173.793 MB/s
J - PCIe SATA 3 Port 2 - Samsung SSD 850 EVO 500GB; seq read, write: 205.725 MB/s, 173.818 MB/s
K - PCIe SATA 3 Port 3 - Samsung SSD 850 EVO 500GB; seq read, write: 205.771 MB/s, 173.819 MB/s
L - MBRD SATA 2 Port 1 - Samsung HDD 753LJ 750GB; seq read, write: 82.239 MB/s, 81.245 MB/s
M - MBRD SATA 2 Port 4 - Samsung HDD 753LJ 750GB; seq read, write: 88.062 MB/s, 81.877 MB/s
N - MBRD SATA 2 Port 5 - Samsung HDD 753LJ 750GB; seq read, write: 93.264 MB/s, 88.237 MB/s

I have forwarded your question to the admins.

 

[Josephur]

Which motherboard are you using exactly?

 

[kemical]

Thread moved to correct section.

 

[RodBarnes]

Which motherboard are you using exactly?

Gigabyte EP45C-DS3R

 

[RodBarnes]

Also, I found the SSDReview site and have posted this question there.

 

[RodBarnes]

Just wrapping this up for future reference: I ended up purchasing a Syba 4 Port SATA III RAID HyperDuo PCIe 2.0 x4 Card and connecting all four SSD (including the boot drive) to that card. The HDDs were left connected to the SATA 2 ports on the motherboard. Performance is great. All of the SSDs are benchmarking at 550+ MB/s so I am very satisfied.

Side note: I originally purchased IO Crest 4 Port SATA III PCI-e 2.0 x1 Controller Card Marvell Non-Raid and tried that. But I hadn't realized that PCIe 2.0 is limited to 250 MB/s for each lane. :-( Being a x1 card and the chip is the Marvell 88SE9215 (a single-lane chip), I was seeing about 280 MB/s. The other board (listed at top) is a x4 with a Marvell 88SE9230 which is a dual-lane chip and thus gives me the 550+ MB/s.