SSD in MP 5.1... not expected results

[JMVB]

I have the MP 5.1 of my signature.
It had a Crucial M4 512gb SSD

And I have the MBP 15@ of my signature.
It had a Crucial MX100 512 SSD

Both with Yosemite 10.10.5

For curiosity, I did a Blackmagic speed test

The MP about 250 mb/s in read and write :/
The MBP about 510 mb/s in read and write :O

I'd a research in the net and right, the MX100 is faster than M5
Ok, i'll swap the disk, I think to myself

Back up both SSD, swap it and clone it

The MP 260 mb/s in read and write.
The MBP 260 mb/s in write and 510 mb/s in read...

Ok, clean installation, I think to my self

And.... the same result, 260 mb/s in read and write.

Why the MP have worst performance than less powerful laptop?

The SSD is in the 1º slot, and I have a 1 TB HD in the 2º slot and a 2 TB HD in the 3º slot

 

[throAU]

Your Mac Pro has SATA 2 ports (not SATA3, which was new in 2011 i think?).

Those results are in line with expectations.

 

[JMVB]

ok, that was fast...

So, my results are ok?

 

[throAU]

ok, that was fast...

So, my results are ok?

Well "OK" is subjective.

Are they fast enough for you? Because it's all you're going to get with that setup.

SATA 2 tops out at 3 Gigabit/sec. Which is a theoretical 300 megabytes/sec without any protocol overhead. Real world throughput is what you are seeing, SATA3 is 6 gigabit and tops out around 500MB/sec, which is what you see in the more recent Macbook.

You are entirely storage controller throughput limited. Your only options from here to get faster are to get a SATA 3 PCIe card (or M.2 card, no idea if either option is supported by OS X or not though), or run a PCIe SSD. Or run RAID with multiple SSDs.

 

[h9826790]

100% normal, as the others pointed out, the SSD is caped at the SATA 2 speed, which is around 250MB/S in real world.

If you didn't feel any problem in real world usage, that most likely means everything is OK.

 

[Draeconis]

You are entirely storage controller throughput limited. Your only options from here to get faster are to get a SATA 3 PCIe card (or M.2 card, no idea if either option is supported by OS X or not though), or run a PCIe SSD. Or run RAID with multiple SSDs.

SATA-III and M.2 via PCIe adapter totally compatible. With M.2 ensure the SSD is AHCI though; some cards (SM951-NVMe, Samsung 950 Pro, Intel 750 series) use NVMe, a new storage protocol that Mac Pros don't support.

One chap did post a generic NVMe storage device driver, but this stopped working with more current OS X releases, he hasn't been around to offer a fix, and this still wouldn't allow it to be a boot device.

 

[JMVB]

It is there other sata iii option without using a pci-e slot?

I have not empty splots... I need it all..

SATA-III and M.2 via PCIe adapter totally compatible. With M.2 ensure the SSD is AHCI though; some cards (SM951-NVMe, Samsung 950 Pro, Intel 750 series) use NVMe, a new storage protocol that Mac Pros don't support.

One chap did post a generic NVMe storage device driver, but this stopped working with more current OS X releases, he hasn't been around to offer a fix, and this still wouldn't allow it to be a boot device.

 

[DPUser]

You probably won't notice the difference in boot drive applications, since reads are very small and SSD is the limiting factor. Large file read/write is another matter.

 

[throAU]

It is there other sata iii option without using a pci-e slot?

I have not empty splots... I need it all..

Unfortunately, no.

 

[flowrider]

Your results are as expected. My results on a cMP 5,1:

1. SSD in SATA Bay

2. SSD in Apricorn Velocity Duo

3. SM951 on WINGS PX1

Lou

 

[teeck2000]

Unfortunately, no.

Well you could possibly use the Mini PCie slot where the Airport card is, but then then no wifi if you needed that.

 

[scott.n]

There are USB 3 + SATA III combo cards, though I don't have personal experience with using one in a Mac Pro.

If one of your existing cards is an USB 3 card, then you could consider swapping it for a combo card.

 

[h9826790]

Well you could possibly use the Mini PCie slot where the Airport card is, but then then no wifi if you needed that.

That's a PCIe x1 Gen 1 slot, only 0.3GB/s bandwidth, Exactly the same as the SATA 2 slot bandwidth. Impossible to make it SATA 3.

 

[haralds]

I use two Caldigit FASTA-6GU3 Pro cards for my SSDs with good results - http://www.caldigit.com/Fasta-6GU3pro/
I also use their USB 3 slots, but like all of them for the cMP, they are not bootable.

The Caldigit boot both OS X and BootCamp.

 

[teeck2000]

That's a PCIe x1 Gen 1 slot, only 0.3GB/s bandwidth, Exactly the same as the SATA 2 slot bandwidth. Impossible to make it SATA 3.

Ahh okay I thought it was Pcie x2.