SSD = performance difference Vertex2 vs Samsung 830

[imorton]

Good day everyone, what would the performance difference be between a Vertex2 (Sata II) SSD versus the Samsung 830 (Sata III).

I have an Early 2011 Macbook Pro 13", with 8g Ram, and a 180gig Vertex2 SSD and running Lion 10.7.4

Since my Macbook Pro is capable of Sata III, and my current Vertex2 SSD is only Sata II, I am just operating a Sata II speeds. My current Vertex2 SSD does boot up in @ 18-19 secs from power button to useable desktop (auto login)

I wonder what "everyday performance gains" I would see by installing a 256gig Samsung 830 SSD (Sata III capable)?

HAs anyone here upgraded from a Sata II SSD to a Sata III SSD, and what did you notice speed/perfomance wise... EX: boot up time, snappiness, etc....?

Thanks for all your help and replies, IAN...

 

[user418]

While the 830 has faster read/write speeds I don't think you would see a huge difference in every day usage unless you were processing very large files. I'm running a Samsung 470 (SATA II) and my 15" MBP boots in 14 seconds (chime to log in window).

While I am perfectly ok with my 470 I do plan to get my hands on an 830 when the right deal comes along. Since my MBP will handle SATA III guess I just gotta have a SATA III SSD.

 

[jtcedinburgh]

Since my Macbook Pro is capable of Sata III, and my current Vertex2 SSD is only Sata II, I am just operating a Sata II speeds. My current Vertex2 SSD does boot up in @ 18-19 secs from power button to useable desktop (auto login)

I wonder what "everyday performance gains" I would see by installing a 256gig Samsung 830 SSD (Sata III capable)?

HAs anyone here upgraded from a Sata II SSD to a Sata III SSD, and what did you notice speed/perfomance wise... EX: boot up time, snappiness, etc....?

Hi Ian,

Funnily enough, I am in the process of selling my mid-2009 Macbook Pro, into which I had installed an OCZ Vertex 2 240Gb SSD. Rather than migrate all my content onto a spare drive and wipe, I decided I would sell the MBP with a brand new disk, charged at cost to the new owner. Originally I was budgeting fifty quid for a 500Gb HDD, but I suggested that the imminent new owner might consider one of the newer generation SSDs which have plummeted in price. He decided on the Crucial M4 256Gb SSD, which was duly ordered and installed.

The Vertex 2 is a SATAII and my MBP is only SATAII (I think) and I was very happy with the performance; quite a bit faster than a regular or hybrid HDD and with adequate capacity. I wasn't really expecting much of an improvement from the M4.

However, after installing 10.6 onto the MBP (from original discs) and doing some updates to latest versions of various things, I was only too aware how fast the MBP suddenly felt. For instance, with the Vertex, 10.7.4 would take around 20-22 seconds from off to login screen. With the M4, it is 6 seconds (albeit to a fresh install of 10.6.8 so that may have something to do with it).

The disk speed tool I have suggests that the Vertex 2 averages around 80MB/s write and 130MB/s read, and that's on a year-old SSD with around 1/3 free space. Not great figures, and lower than I expected, but then this could be due to fragmentation*.

I haven't tested the M4 but I would be surprised if it weren't at least double or even triple those figures.

The point of this rambling post is to let you know that provided the Samsung 830 is a current generation SSD (which I believe it is), then you might actually experience a quite profound speed bump by upgrading, even if (on paper) the difference should be quite subtle. My experiences run contrary to what many have written, and it could be due to the fact that it's a fresh Snow Leopard install on a 90%+ empty drive, as opposed to a year-old-and-migrated-to-Lion working install, or it might be due to improvements in drive tech. I can't really say.

Hope this helps. If the new MBPs come with a cheap HDD option (as opposed to all-SSD) I may splurge for an M4 for the new MBP rather than press my Vertex 2 into use; the Vertex would make a fine, very fast additional drive for media and in a USB3 caddy could be a really fast drive indeed.

john

* has anyone used iDefrag on an SSD in Lion? Safe? Recommended?

 

[dusk007]

In short there will be no noticeable difference in the feel.
Boottimes, app launches, repsonse time will be the same. Impossible to notice a difference.

Faster is only file copy on the same drive, unpacking archives that aren't compressed much.

In general really isn't worth it.
Applaunches
Real world Windows tests among them the vertex 2, with velociraptor 10000 rpm drive for comparison
http://www.computerbase.de/artikel/laufwerke/2010/test-ocz-vertex-2/7/
slightly different tests but easily comparable with a 830 among them
http://www.computerbase.de/artikel/laufwerke/2011/test-samsung-serie-830-256-gb/7/
boottimes
http://www.computerbase.de/artikel/laufwerke/2010/test-ocz-vertex-2/6/
http://www.computerbase.de/artikel/laufwerke/2011/test-samsung-serie-830-256-gb/6/
unpacking
http://www.computerbase.de/artikel/laufwerke/2011/test-samsung-serie-830-256-gb/8/
copy test
http://www.computerbase.de/artikel/laufwerke/2010/test-ocz-vertex-2/8/
program installs are also largely the same as they aren't all that write bound.

 

[jtcedinburgh]

So... how do you explain my findings, above?

 

[Donka]

The perception of speed to the user should be largely the same between both drives even though the Samsung should benchmark quicker. In real world, you may notice a second quicker boot up but general system responsiveness and app launching will feel much the same.
As for what John has experienced, this is most likely down to the clean install and also the fresh drive. If you took the Vertex and did a secure wipe on the full drive to 'reset it' and then did a clean install, it would be much closer in speed to the M4 although I would expect the M4 still to be the quicker drive.
Also, defragging an SSD is not necessary and definitely not recommended.

 

[jtcedinburgh]

As for what John has experienced, this is most likely down to the clean install and also the fresh drive. If you took the Vertex and did a secure wipe on the full drive to 'reset it' and then did a clean install, it would be much closer in speed to the M4 although I would expect the M4 still to be the quicker drive.
Also, defragging an SSD is not necessary and definitely not recommended.

Hi Donka, and nice to see another Scot on the forum.

Good point about the fact that it's not a fresh install on the Vertex 2.

I am hoping that the new MBP will come with two drive bays, one with a super fast modern SSD (500MB/s+) of maybe 120Gb capacity, and I'll wipe the Vertex 2 and use it in the second slot...

Well, hey, I can hope, no?

 

[Donka]

Hi Donka, and nice to see another Scot on the forum.

Good point about the fact that it's not a fresh install on the Vertex 2.

I am hoping that the new MBP will come with two drive bays, one with a super fast modern SSD (500MB/s+) of maybe 120Gb capacity, and I'll wipe the Vertex 2 and use it in the second slot...

Well, hey, I can hope, no?

A sun burned Scot at that!
I think wiping the Vertex would really help restore much of the performance as would a clean install. As for the second slot, they all have one if you don't need the optical drive. I still find the optical drive as a requirement for some of the things I use my MBP for though.

----------

I forgot to say, have you enabled Trim on the Mac with the Vertex? Not sure how good garbage collection on the Vertex is but if you are seeing poorer performance through time with your normal usage and you don't have Trim enabled then I would think it is worth enabling and running with that for a while to see how it performs although that would have more of an impact on write speeds as opposed to reading.

 

[dusk007]

So... how do you explain my findings, above?

I had a Vertex 2 and it booted in 15 secs. To the Desktop including autostart apps not only the login screen.
I got a m4 now and there is no difference.
You just had some differences in the setup. I heard from others that they had bootimes in the 22-25sec area and it never seemed related to the drive but rather some strange things with the OS not properly adjusting.

Unlike you I switched SSD with a perfect sys drive copy via CCC. No differences in setup and I guess I can judge the difference more accurately.

The vertex 2 does suffer if there is no trim. Enabling trim and deleting all free space will restore performance pretty well.
The m4 is even a little slower in some stuff I do for work because the IO of SandForce is better.
For the feel only random reads really matter and quick read/write latency. Otherwise the CPU limits far too much. The sequential stuff hardly makes any differences for that. Sequential only counts in level loading times in games, extracting, file copy on the same drive or to and from Ram.

 

[jtcedinburgh]

I forgot to say, have you enabled Trim on the Mac with the Vertex? Not sure how good garbage collection on the Vertex is but if you are seeing poorer performance through time with your normal usage and you don't have Trim enabled then I would think it is worth enabling and running with that for a while to see how it performs although that would have more of an impact on write speeds as opposed to reading.

No, it's not on. When I got the Vertex there was a lot of misinformation as to whether it was necessary or not so I just left it off. Write speeds aren't spectacular but they're still (IMHO) pretty decent - all above 60MB/s and often 90MB/s.

At this stage I'm not desperately worried; whatever MBP I end up buying in a few weeks time will come with a new SSD I would think, so I'll get a chance to wipe the drive (once I've moved data, apps, etc. off of it) and hopefully it will perform a bit better. My iMac has the SSD+HDD BTO option, and so I'm happy with the idea of a dual disk in a laptop.

----------

<snip>
The vertex 2 does suffer if there is no trim. Enabling trim and deleting all free space will restore performance pretty well.
The m4 is even a little slower in some stuff I do for work because the IO of SandForce is better.
<snip>

OK, I'm convinced. I'll be delighted if I am wrong on this

I shall enable Trim and then delete all free space.

Is there an idiot guide for how best to do this on a 10.7.4 install?
(I have approximately 60Gb free at present if that matters)

 

[Donka]

Here is an older article but well worth reading - especially the first 5 pages as that will illustrate how Trim even helps read speeds - I know it is Windows 7 but the same findings apply with OSX with Trim enabled.

http://www.bit-tech.net/hardware/storage/2010/02/04/windows-7-ssd-performance-and-trim/1


As for enabling Trim, I used the terminal method as it is transparent what changes are being made and it is easy to revert back. It just requires copy & pasting a couple of lines of text into terminal:

http://www.storagereview.com/how_enable_trim_nonapple_ssd

 

[Donka]

Another source for Trim on OSX with good info...

http://digitaldj.net/2011/07/21/trim-enabler-for-lion/

 

[Weaselboy]

I shall enable Trim and then delete all free space.

Is there an idiot guide for how best to do this on a 10.7.4 install?
(I have approximately 60Gb free at present if that matters)

Here is the best way to TRIM free space on your SSD with Lion. Install the TRIM hack then boot into single user mode. You will get a black screen with white text and a prompt. Type in "fsck -fy" (without the quotes). It will run the command and you will see a message that all unused blacks have been TRIM'd. Type in reboot. Done.

 

[jtcedinburgh]

Thanks - duly done and working. Feels a bit quicker although bizarrely now takes longer to boot. C'est la vie...

 

[Weaselboy]

Thanks - duly done and working. Feels a bit quicker although bizarrely now takes longer to boot. C'est la vie...

Reboot a couple times. When you install the TRIM enabler is wipes out the system cache and that has to be rebuilt when you boot the first time. After the second reboot the cache will be all rebuilt and you should be back to normal boot times.

 

[alphaod]

It will be faster, but it won't really feel much faster.

I upgraded from a Vertex 2 to an OWC Mercury Pro 6G. Benchmarks, testing, etc. say this SSD is very fast. I couldn't tell the difference when I upgraded and now it feels as fast or as slow as the Vertex 2.

 

[Donka]

Reboot a couple times. When you install the TRIM enabler is wipes out the system cache and that has to be rebuilt when you boot the first time. After the second reboot the cache will be all rebuilt and you should be back to normal boot times.

Yip, my first boot with the new SSD took 30 secs. Subsequent full boots take around 10 secs.
Did you confirm Trim is enabled under About this mac?

 

[jtcedinburgh]

Yip, my first boot with the new SSD took 30 secs. Subsequent full boots take around 10 secs.
Did you confirm Trim is enabled under About this mac?

Yep, everything went exactly to plan. Will try a second start from cold tonight and time that.