Anyone use Black Magic Disk Speed test from the App Store?

[jamesryanbell]

Originally Posted by johnhurley

Sounds like the samsung is a stronger performer than even I was aware of!

Does your machine run fast enough for you? That's the bottom line right?

Just enjoy it and have fun and don't worry about arbitrary benchmark results.

I wish I'd have bought a used Samsung 256GB drive now off of eBay for less money. It's way, way faster from everything I read.

Does it run fast enough for me? That's relative. For almost $500 out the door, I'd hope it'd be way faster than what I'm seeing. The bottom line is that I want way more speed than stock, faster boot up times, and more storage. I got one of the three. Wouldn't you think I'd be able to reproduce something remotely close to manufacturer claims? I've run AJA (works now for some reason), Black Magic, and XBench, and all of them produce numbers that aren't even remotely close.

I'll try. haha. It's just a money thing I guess.

[SDColorado]

Originally Posted by jamesryanbell

I have to be honest...

I really feel like I got hosed. If this was a $100 drive, then "whatever" would be my attitude....

I don't blame you. But I just don't get the numbers you are posting. If you look at the figures I posted for Black Magic, which was the 5MB test, they are pretty much dead on the same as the 5MB line in the QuickBench scores I posted. I mean they are within .10's, so I am not sure where OWC seems to think Black Magic is somehow being incredibly optimistic as opposed to QuickBench.

Even running the test on my MBP I get read and write scores both of 110-ish on my 750GB 7200rpm HDD.

You could ask OWC if there is some setting I am missing when I run QuickBench, but otherwise I am not sure how they explain how the results between Black Magic and QuickBench are statistically the same on my drive.

I don't know. I am the furthest thing from an expert when it comes to SSD drives. So maybe I am missing something.

[jamesryanbell]

Originally Posted by SDColorado

I don't blame you. But I just don't get the numbers you are posting. If you look at the figures I posted for Black Magic, which was the 5MB test, they are pretty much dead on the same as the 5MB line in the QuickBench scores I posted. I mean they are within .10's, so I am not sure where OWC seems to think Black Magic is somehow being incredibly optimistic as opposed to QuickBench.

Even running the test on my MBP I get read and write scores both of 110-ish on my 750GB 7200rpm HDD.

You could ask OWC if there is some setting I am missing when I run QuickBench, but otherwise I am not sure how they explain how the results between Black Magic and QuickBench are statistically the same on my drive.

I don't know. I am the furthest thing from an expert when it comes to SSD drives. So maybe I am missing something.

Pretty much my thoughts exactly. Thanks for the feedback.

[SDColorado]

Originally Posted by jamesryanbell

Pretty much my thoughts exactly. Thanks for the feedback.

Besides, doesn't this quote from What's New in Version 2.1, contradict their statement in Email 1:

"Some SSD's use hidden compression when writing data to make their benchmarked speeds appear faster. Disk Speed Test will now measure the true speed of these SSD's so you know if they are suitable for high quality uncompressed video capture."

It sounds to me as though Black Magic is using the uncompressed test that OWC recommends.

Edit: Also, clearly *not* for HD only as OWC states in email 2.

[InSaNeBoY]

84.4/139.5 are the highest numbers I've seen on my OWC drive using the black magic speed test...

(not an air though, 2008 mac pro, stumbled on this thread via google search)

[jamesryanbell]

Originally Posted by SDColorado

Besides, doesn't this quote from What's New in Version 2.1, contradict their statement in Email 1:

"Some SSD's use hidden compression when writing data to make their benchmarked speeds appear faster. Disk Speed Test will now measure the true speed of these SSD's so you know if they are suitable for high quality uncompressed video capture."

It sounds to me as though Black Magic is using the uncompressed test that OWC recommends.

Edit: Also, clearly *not* for HD only as OWC states in email 2.

You're right on.

[iRCL]

OP sorry to hear that

Is your SSD quite full? Or has it been at some point in time? Due to the whole TRIM mess and so on, what you can try to do is move all your data to an external HDD, completely format your SSD and then put all of your data back. Think of it like a defrag. This will likely improve your speeds.

However all the stuff OWC said is a bunch of crap. I think that company is pure overpriced garbage TBH and yes I would be upset if I were you. There's always ebay..

[rwh202]

People seem to be getting confused by the compression here.

The OWC is a SandForce drive - this does compression to achieve the rated speeds.

For example, the drive may only be able to physically write 100MB/s to the NAND, but if it can achieve 3:1 compression, then it appears as a 300MB/s write.

However, not all data can be compressed. If you give it progressively more compressed data to start with, it can't be compressed as much so you will hit the 100MB/s (or whatever) limit sooner.

The updated BlackMagic seems to write heavily compressed data to stop these drives 'cheating' so gives a worst case performance to cater for demanding video capture.

My Sandforce powered 275/285MB/s drive in a MBP also only manages 80/160 on the BlackMagic test so I don't think there is anything wrong. It's still blinding fast in normal use.

[jamesryanbell]

Originally Posted by iRCL

OP sorry to hear that

Is your SSD quite full? Or has it been at some point in time? Due to the whole TRIM mess and so on, what you can try to do is move all your data to an external HDD, completely format your SSD and then put all of your data back. Think of it like a defrag. This will likely improve your speeds.

However all the stuff OWC said is a bunch of crap. I think that company is pure overpriced garbage TBH and yes I would be upset if I were you. There's always ebay..

No, I have 100GB of free space. I may try that with the external drive. Thanks!

[ZipZap]

Originally Posted by rwh202

People seem to be getting confused by the compression here.

The OWC is a SandForce drive - this does compression to achieve the rated speeds.

For example, the drive may only be able to physically write 100MB/s to the NAND, but if it can achieve 3:1 compression, then it appears as a 300MB/s write.

However, not all data can be compressed. If you give it progressively more compressed data to start with, it can't be compressed as much so you will hit the 100MB/s (or whatever) limit sooner.

The updated BlackMagic seems to write heavily compressed data to stop these drives 'cheating' so gives a worst case performance to cater for demanding video capture.

My Sandforce powered 275/285MB/s drive in a MBP also only manages 80/160 on the BlackMagic test so I don't think there is anything wrong. It's still blinding fast in normal use.

Interesting...thanks for the info.

Would be nice if we could get the Blackmagic folks to comment on this. Seems OWC's do not show the expected rates.

Has anyone contacted OWC for comment?

[rwh202]

Originally Posted by ZipZap

Would be nice if we could get the Blackmagic folks to comment on this. Seems OWC's do not show the expected rates.

The BlackMagic help file also explains their process in the final section -"Important note about Solid State Disk (SSD) speeds"

Also, just as an experiment, I changed the BlackMagic test directory to somewhere more accessible, ran the test, copied the test file to the desktop and right clicked and chose "compress ...."
The 541MB file was 'compressed' to 542MB! This shows that the data that is being written by BlackMagic really is is highly compressed, i.e. incompressible any further by a SandForce drive.

[jon08]

Disk Speed Test v. 2.1

Write: cca. 180-240 MB/s
Read: cca. 460-490 MB/s

OWC Mercury Extreme PRO 6G 120GB.

So is this good?

[KPOM]

Originally Posted by jon08

Disk Speed Test v. 2.1

Write: cca. 180-240 MB/s
Read: cca. 460-490 MB/s

OWC Mercury Extreme PRO 6G 120GB.

So is this good?

Yes, the read speeds are about twice as fast as the native drives. The main difference is that the SSD you are using supports the faster version of SATA.

[ZipZap]

With an MBA and an OWC Drive....I dont get a performance reading anywhere close to expected.

I have the original 3g SSD 180GB

[jamesryanbell]

Originally Posted by ZipZap

With an MBA and an OWC Drive....I dont get a performance reading anywhere close to expected.

I have the original 3g SSD 180GB

I guess it's the compressed data issue every time.

[hh83917]

The OWC sandforce drives use compression technology.
The OWC email did said this new compression technology will not show it's full potential under any benchmark other than Quickbench, because it's the only one that can include this compression technology in the benchmark.

As far as I can tell from this thread, no one posted any results of OWC drives using Quickbench. The only Quickbench result I see here is the Samsung drive, which is not we are concerning about.

Unless someone can post some Quickbench result from the OWC drive vs the Samsung drive, there is no proof that the OWC drive is slower.

BTW, The 6G OWC drive should not be considered because it's simply a faster SATA interface and that's in a different category.

Edit: Found a benchmark regarding this on Barefeats: http://www.barefeats.com/mba11_03.html
They said the OWC drive is faster after testing with Quickbench.

[jon08]

^^ I've performed QuickBench tests on my OWC Mercury Extreme Pro (120GB) before and got the following results on:

Write: 440-470 MB/s
Read: 500-510 MB/s

[bdodds1985]

I use this app but recenlty its telling me that my macintosh hd is read only. which is wrong. it works perfect for my optical bay hd. also ive noticed any time i copy or add something to the normal hd it asks me for a password. finder says "you can only read"... any idea on how to fix this so i can run the speed test?

[hh83917]

Originally Posted by jon08

^^ I've performed QuickBench tests on my OWC Mercury Extreme Pro (120GB) before and got the following results on:

Write: 440-470 MB/s
Read: 500-510 MB/s

Yes, but I thought your test is on the "Mercury Extreme Pro 6G" which is a much faster SATA interface, hence the 6G.

We are talking about just normal SATA 3G here.

[jon08]

Yeah, it's the 6G one...

[portishead]

I have a 120GB Electra in my iMac, and I am only getting 100MB/s read, and about 180MB/s write using Blackmagic Disk Speed Test.

In an older version I was getting close to 500MB/s both ways. I know it's measuring Incompressible rates now, but still, those numbers look pretty slow. I wouldn't buy OWC.

[jamesryanbell]

Thanks for all of the input. Sorry that I'm responding late.

[IngerMan]

Originally Posted by jamesryanbell

Thanks for all of the input. Sorry that I'm responding late.

Is the slower test results issue resolved? Did you hear back from OWC with satisfaction?

I am curious because I consider them an option for the future. But service and performance is a big factor.

[MacShopper]

Wow, I thought mine was fast, but it's slower than everyone else's above.

But mine is BIGGER!

512 GB SSD
Model: Apple SSD TS512C
Mfgr: Toshiba

[katmeef]

I had an agility 3 in my last mbp and found after a year or so things slowed down. I cloned it to an external, 'secure erased' it using the manufacturer supplied Linux boot disc (only took a few seconds to complete) and cloned it back, things seemed much faster afterwards.

Also I found Aja system test to give higher results on read/write scores as opposed to black magic, although since Lion I noticed I need to launch it with sudo for it to be able to create the test file at the root of the drive.