OCZ Vertex 2 Pro SSD Review – The Sandforce Cometh

IOMeter v2006.07.27 – IOps

IOMeter v2006.07.27 

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Iometer is an I/O subsystem measurement and characterization tool for single and clustered systems. It was originally developed by the Intel Corporation and announced at the Intel Developers Forum (IDF) on February 17, 1998 – since then it got wide spread within the industry.

Meanwhile Intel has discontinued to work on Iometer and it was given to the Open Source Development Lab (OSDL). In November 2001, a project was registered at SourceForge.net and an initial drop was provided. Since the relaunch in February 2003, the project is driven by an international group of individuals who are continuesly improving, porting and extend the product.

Finally, a non-Intel drive properly scaling with Queue Depth!  Vertex 2 joins the ranks of those drives that can properly scale when hit with a bunch of requests in parallel.  Computers multitask, so it only makes sense for the primary storage device to do the same.  All of those other ‘flat line’ drives are uni-taskers, and can only service one request at a time, sequentially.  It’s plainly obvious from the above that an SSD with properly implemented NCQ firmware can trounce the competition even at a Queue Depth of 2 (meaning the drive is servicing 2 requests simultaneously).

With that out of the way, how did the new Sandforce controller fare against the now veteran Intel controller?  Very well indeed!  While it was unable to beat the lightning fast X25-M G2, it walked all over its predecessor – at least where it counts.  Most systems in operation, even under a heavy power user load, will rarely break above QD=8.

Something else to consider here – this is a pre-release drive on beta silicon.  There are still tweaks to be made both in hardware and firmware that should yield further improvements in speed and agility.