SATA II or III SSD on a SATA II motherboard?

[imipenem]

I am considering a single 240GB SSD to replace my SAS RAID 0 on my CAD/CAM workstation.

Current System config:
Core i7-920
GA-EX58-UD5
12 GB RAM
areca ARC-1680i RAID card
Two 15K Cheetah 300GB SAS drives RAID 0
Nvidia Quadro FX3800


My motherboard does NOT support SATA III, so my question is: Would I benefit from a newer SATA III SSD on my SATA II motherboard or should I buy an older SATA II drive? I am a little worried about the SF22XX BSOD issues. I am also considering a PCI-E solution but they seem less reliable than the the SATA options.

Any advice or drive recommendations?

Thanks

 

[Diogenes2]

You might consider a SATA 3 add on controller..
Otherwise the SATA 3 drives will probably offer some advantage over most SATA 2's, even on a SATA 2 controller, since the technology is being refined as more SATA 3's reach the market place.

 

[imipenem]

By time I invest in the controller card and the drive, I may as well buy a PCI-E based SSD. Right?

My initial plan is to just go with a SATA III SSD, but I am a little concerned about the SF2XX BSODs. I am considering the Marvell based Intel/Crucial drives. Any reviews of those drives on a SATA II connection?

 

[razel]

Yes, if you were happy with your performance before with a RAID of HDDs, you'll be more than happy with a single SSD off your onboard SATA II.

 

[Michael Meio]

I clearly recall spending some hundreds on special drives. Industrial strength, 15000rpm, SCSI.. RAID, no RAID, hotswap, controllers... the list just goes on.

Most of them failed. A few within warranty, a couple replaced by manufacturer or vendor.. the thing is, for my job (yeah.. CAD/CAM), which relies most exclusively on my computers there is simply no reliable solution, so I opted for having a backup schedule and keep it organized.

Nowdays, I run on an ADATA 120GB SSD, which generates errors when loading files on some software simply because it's too fast for something in there to catch up. So, still I must open the program and then load the file. If I double-click some files, the program doesn't open them. So, I guess this drive is on the edge of some bottleneck which I truly don't have the time to figure out.

All important files go to 3 different places: my files disk (some WD 500GB), and external drive (Samsung 250GB) and to some cloud which I have no clue of it's location but keeps me safe.

Also, I have images of this 120G main drive somewhere and try to re-do it from time to time.

My recommendation is based on my experience, so I think you should go with the fastest drive (SATA III) which will delete one thing from your next upgrade list, even if your current setup doesn't fully rolls with it. Then, adopt a backup, image discipline with the help of some cheaper drives and enjoy!

I mean, look at me! I always walked on the safe ally and it simply did not pay. In the end I learned that less is more in terms of data safety: Always try your best on having the less number of components and spread the package wisely.

Good luck!

-----
>- MOBO: ASUS Maximus IV Gene-Z - mATX - Z68
>- CPU: Intel Core i7 2600k
>- Memory: 16GB G.skill Ripjaws X Series 1600
>- Drives:
OS/Programs: ADATA S511 Series AS511S3-120GM-C (60.000 IOPS)
FILES: Western Digital WDC 500 WD5002AALX
EXTERNAL: Samsung SP2514N (250GB)
>- GPU: EVGA 02G-P3-1469-KR GeForce GTX 560 (2GB) ... Uhuh.. tried some QUADROS but .. naaah!
>- PSU: CORSAIR Professional Series HX650
>- Cooled by a bunch of fans teamed up with Antec KUHLER H2O 920

 

[VirtualLarry]

Nowdays, I run on an ADATA 120GB SSD, which generates errors when loading files on some software simply because it's too fast for something in there to catch up. So, still I must open the program and then load the file. If I double-click some files, the program doesn't open them. So, I guess this drive is on the edge of some bottleneck which I truly don't have the time to figure out.

That's not normal. Either your drive is defective, or there is some software glitch.

 

[tweakboy]

Get SATA 3 to be future proof. The next rig you build will have onboard SATA 3 6gbps

Or maybe in the near future you will buy a RAID controller SATA 3. You will get some gains even tho your ports are 2.0 3gbps. thx gl

 

[Spikesoldier]

new gen ssds using the SATA III interface can offer higher transfer speeds due to having the latest tech, not necessarily the specification.

some SATAII ssd's cant saturate the SATAII bus, whereas SATAIII drives will almost always saturate the SATA II bus. there are performance gains to be had even though you are using the SATAII bus.

 

[biostud]

If you stay on your motherboard there's no reason to get a SATAIII SSD. But you could always RAID two 120gb drives if you want close to SATAIII speeds.

 

[sub.mesa]

People are too obsessed with SATA 6Gbps. They appear to think that they lose alot of performance if they connect a 6Gbps SSD to a 3Gbps controller. That simply is not true. The difference is about 10-20%; well under the threshold where you can notice the performance difference in realistic workloads.

The primary strength for SSDs on the desktop is their 4K random read performance, which is at about 25MB/s and it responsible for fast booting and application launch performance. The IOps will be 10-15% higher on 6Gbps SATA link even well below the bandwidth of 3Gbps SATA is exhausted, but that still means you don't lose much speed when connecting to your 3Gbps controller.

Also, I do not recommend an add-on controller. In most cases these are limited in bandwidth due to PCI-express 2.0 x1 interface, as well as use drivers that do not support TRIM. You simply should connect to your chipset SATA ports in AHCI mode. Yes it'll run at 3Gbps SATA, no you won't lose anything big.

 

[Old Hippie]

People are too obsessed with SATA 6Gbps. They appear to think that they lose alot of performance if they connect a 6Gbps SSD to a 3Gbps controller. That simply is not true.

:thumbsup:

IMHO the reason for this is many don't know the basics, never will, and don't want to know.

But why should they when we will answer the question?

That's the way it's always been and that's the way it will stay. LOL!

 

[groberts101]

yep.. most of these typical users don't even have fast enough storage to really make use of sata2 SSD's much less a 500MB/s sata3 SSD. Bottlenecks abound.

And look at it like this. If a Revo3 was actually changing your computers performance in line with the rated 1.4 gig reads?.. everyone would be flocking to buy them regardless of that mfgrs bad rep. Have to really be using massive workloads and have storage fast enough to even come close to using that type of transfer performance.

These are just "wow my system is fast now" e-PEEN perceptions and sub.mesa is about 98% correct in that generalization.