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OCZ Vertex 2 in a 15" i7 benchmarks

B

bugout

macrumors 6502a
Original poster
May 11, 2008
722
41
is everything!
Just got an OCZ vetex 2 installed in my 15" i7 MBP. It's installed in an optibay from newmodeus and I have the WD 1TB drive in the original HD location.

A note for anyone planning on doing this. If you want bootcamp, install the SSD in the original HD location first. I could not get windows to load using the superdrive via USB. I put the superdrive back in its original location and it worked fine. Interesting note: it benches faster in OS X then windows.

First the original 500GB HD.
stock15.png


Now the Vertex 2 Xbench
screenshot20100430at314.png


Vertex 2 quickbench
screenshot20100430at320.png


The WD 1TB:
screenshot20100430at315.png


Win 7 64 Bootcamp benches:

attot.jpg


crystal.jpg


hdtuney.jpg
 
Does hibernation work for you having the SSD installed in the optibay or did you have to disable this feature?

AFAIK, hibernation was not able to function correctly for the 2009 MBPs with the boot drive in the optibay, so I am interested if anything changed with the new MBPs.
 
I'd like to see the QuickBench Extended 20MB-100MB Test results in 5 cycles. (Are you running version 4.04? It should give an average in numeric view.)
 
yashioba said:
Does hibernation work for you having the SSD installed in the optibay or did you have to disable this feature?

AFAIK, hibernation was not able to function correctly for the 2009 MBPs with the boot drive in the optibay, so I am interested if anything changed with the new MBPs.
Click to expand...

Not sure.. I haven't reached the point of having it hibernate yet.
 
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Cool.. But that 1tb drive is only 5200rpm right? What made u choose this configuration? I want the 7200rpm 500gb and ssd combo when the price drops a bit, but thats because I'd think those 1tb drives would be too slow for my live audio needs (low latency, big 32bit wav sample libraries etc)
 
Hitrate said:
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Cool.. But that 1tb drive is only 5200rpm right? What made u decide configuration? I want the 7200rpm 500gb and ssd combo when the price drops a bit, but thats because I'd think those 1tb drives would be too slow for my live audio needs (low latency, big 32bit wav sample libraries etc)
Click to expand...

You'll probably be better off with the 500/7200 option. I don't have a need for that speed for data storage.
 
Thanks, Bugout, for the QuickBench Extended results. That's as good as or better than any SSDs I've tested recently:
http://barefeats.com/mbpp19.html

And the Vertex 2 has the SandForce controller and firmware with enterprise-level features that keep it running fast no matter how heavy the usage.

I refer all you and others to the testing by Lloyd Chambers where he beats on the SSD to see if it slows down. The OWC (based on the same SandForce chip as the Vertex 2) does not suffer slowdown. The Crucial M226 and C300 both have serious issues after heavy use:
http://macperformanceguide.com/SSD-RealWorld.html

A good review of the Vertex 2 versus other SSDs was posted on the 28th:
http://anandtech.com/show/3681/oczs-vertex-2-special-sauce-sf1200-reviewed/1
 
The scary part...

This single OCZ Vertex 2, is FASTER in writes then my 2 Intel X25-M G2 160's in RAID on my Mac pro!!

xbenchmp.jpg


qbmpstand.jpg


qbextmp.jpg
 
Can you reliably sleep your Mac with the Vertex 2? Does Boot Camp work? Does their Mac support still consist of "it's Apple's fault, go talk to them"?

These were issues I had with an OCZ Vertex drive from last year. It also died on me after 5 months. Took a month to get my money back from them.

Very happy intel G2 user ever since.

I'm not trying to hate on the OCZ drive, but it was just so unreliable for me that it was laughable. I felt that they used us as beta testers basically. The intel drive definitely has much lower sequential write speeds but that isn't a big deal for my usage. And it's reliability has been terrific. Has run 24/7 without a hiccup since I installed it over 7 months ago.

I'd be happy to know that they've got their act together for when I look at SSDs in the future. Although I probably won't stray from intel. Can't wait to see what they've got up their sleeve for the G3 drives :)
 
MBHockey said:
Can you reliably sleep your Mac with the Vertex 2? Does Boot Camp work? Does their Mac support still consist of "it's Apple's fault, go talk to them"?

These were issues I had with an OCZ Vertex drive from last year. It also died on me after 5 months. Took a month to get my money back from them.

Very happy intel G2 user ever since.
Click to expand...

I had the same issues with the vertex 1 in my previous MBP. Sleep issues, bootcamp issues and I had 2 die on me. I switched to an intel after that.

As you can see above, I benched it in windows using boot camp. No issues at all with boot camp or sleep. The only problem is boot camp puts the drive in IDE mode and you don't get full performance. There's no way to turn AHCI mode on.
 
Thanks for the bench marks OP, ordered the 120GB Vertex 2E today and getting it Saturday and can't wait for my first experience of a computer with a SSD drive.

Reading your benchmarks makes me even more excited :D
 
I am running 2 of the Vertex 2 SSD's in my MBP and really like it so far. Freakin fast but the only drawback I found was the battery life running raid got worse. I figure about 20% worse running raid with the 2 Vertex SSD's. What was odd was that it got better battery times with 1 Vertex 2 SSD but after I installed the second one it got worse.
 
Well mines now installed, just finishing off getting it the way I want, must say I can see why people rave about them, can't believe how much more responsive it is now opening programs and files, boot times have been cut by at least half.

Did the geeky thing and timed boot, plus some app opening times with a stop watch on the old drive, plan to do the same with this once it's settled in. I'll post them once I've done that.

Anyone else notice an increase in temperatures? Would have thought it'd been cooler.
 
And I thought it was just me that noticed an increase in temperature:( If you want to see temperatures rise just go to a website like gsmarena and just lit sit there at idle for a few minutes:rolleyes: Before you know it those fans will be spinning.:eek:
 
Thanks for posting all these results, Bugout. I'm thinking of doing a similar thing, replacing the SuperDrive with an SSD + Optibay and then making it the bootdrive. I'll leave the original HDD in place, unless anyone sees an advantage to having it be in the Opitbay.

I don't think this was answered, so I'll ask it again. If my SSD + Optibay is the bootdrive, will I be able to eject and hibernate the HDD? Battery life is pretty important to me.
 
stylinexpat said:
I am running 2 of the Vertex 2 SSD's in my MBP and really like it so far. Freakin fast but the only drawback I found was the battery life running raid got worse. I figure about 20% worse running raid with the 2 Vertex SSD's. What was odd was that it got better battery times with 1 Vertex 2 SSD but after I installed the second one it got worse.
Click to expand...

See that's why I'm running OWC 240GB for boot and apps and 512GB Apple SSD for storage in a NON raid setup. This way I KNOW i'll always have the best customer service and they'll never tell me "it's apple's fault call them".
The performance that you gained are hard to justify when your battery get's drained faster, and you still have to lug external HDD for projects, raw files, samples etc.
 
rckstwrz said:
Thanks for posting all these results, Bugout. I'm thinking of doing a similar thing, replacing the SuperDrive with an SSD + Optibay and then making it the bootdrive. I'll leave the original HDD in place, unless anyone sees an advantage to having it be in the Opitbay.

I don't think this was answered, so I'll ask it again. If my SSD + Optibay is the bootdrive, will I be able to eject and hibernate the HDD? Battery life is pretty important to me.
Click to expand...

You have to have your boot drive in the normal HD bay in order for hibernate to work. Put the SSD in the HD bay and the apple HD in the optibay and you'll be good to go.
 
So I switched today from my X25-M G2 to a Vertex 2 Extended and hibernate doesn't work. Has the Vertex 2 always been like that? I do have my Vertex 2 in the normal HDD bay. I don't use a HDD caddy and still have my SuperDrive.
 
I did it!

OK, so I installed a OCZ Vertex 2 in my MacBook Pro's main hard drive bay, and then cloned over a copy of Snow Leopard to it, however I can't get the Mac to boot to this drive.

It will boot from other drives (either external, or the original hard drive which now sits in an OptiBay) and I can read/write to the Vertex... just not boot from it.

Did anyone else run into this? Any tips? Thanks!

~Rick
 
The solution:

In case anyone else stumbles upon the same issue, here's the fix. A friend of mine suggested I do a SMC reset, and that did the trick. Here's Apple's kbase article about it: http://support.apple.com/kb/HT1411

UPDATE: Let me take that back. The actual solution was to have 10.6.4 cloned over the the SSD. Apparently, the latest generation MBPro's need 10.6.4 in order to boot. The Install DVD I was using was only 10.6.3.
 
WOW I just got my Vertex 2 last Friday and while the whole system feels TONS snappier, I noticed the benchmarks weren't even close to "standard" though…

Here's mine:
Screen%20shot%202011-02-06%20at%203.13.46%20PM.png



Any ideas? Should I return the drive? What should I do? :\
 
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