What is the most important feature of a SSD for gaming?

[Guest]

What is the most important feature of a SSD for gaming? Read speed? Write speed? Random 4 KB (IOPS)? I heard read speed is.
By my own experience game-load time is really the only significant improvement (& a smoother feel during gameplay). I'm trying to figure out if there'd be any other real improvement by buying an OCZ Vertex 2 (read speed 285 MB/s).

I currently have an Intel X25-M G2 160GB (specifications below)

Sustained Sequential Read: up to 250 MB/s
Sustained Sequential Write: up to 100 MB/s
Random 4 KB Reads: up to 35,000 IOPS
Random 4 KB Writes: up to 8,600 IOPS

I loaded Crysis on the Intel & was very impressed. OCZ Vertex's read speed is only slightly faster, so I wonder.

My other question is even though we have TRIM, will regularly uninstalling old games/installing new games increase performance degradation over time? Thank you for any advice.

 

[CptCeeJay]

BrownShirt,
I don't have an answer for you but I am wondering exactly the same thing and am looking at the Vertex 2 as well. I've been researching the Vertex 2 ever since Maximum PC gave it a great review. Have you found any other info on this topic in your research? The only thing I've found was at the OCZ website. They offer the 2.5" version of the Vertex 2 in something called "extended capacity". Since the extended capacity isn't simply "bigger" I have no idea what it means. I've also noticed the 3.5" has similiar specs to the 2.5" except for the "Random Write 4k (Aligned)" is 5,000 IOPS faster. Do you know what that means?
Good luck in your search.
CJ

 

[Guest]

BrownShirt,
I don't have an answer for you but I am wondering exactly the same thing and am looking at the Vertex 2 as well. I've been researching the Vertex 2 ever since Maximum PC gave it a great review. Have you found any other info on this topic in your research? The only thing I've found was at the OCZ website. They offer the 2.5" version of the Vertex 2 in something called "extended capacity". Since the extended capacity isn't simply "bigger" I have no idea what it means. I've also noticed the 3.5" has similiar specs to the 2.5" except for the "Random Write 4k (Aligned)" is 5,000 IOPS faster. Do you know what that means?
Good luck in your search.
CJ

Someone at OCZ Forum answered > read speed, sandforce has very fast response times too. i don't know if the intel has garbage collection but the sandforce and indulinx controllers have it and you just need to log off and idle overnight a couple times a week to keep performance at peak "uninstalling old games"

It looks like the extended capacity SSD's are for servers. I notice their read/write speeds are lower than the Vertex 2 though. That's all I know about them, but it's enough to know those aren't for me.
The 3.5” actually has 18,000 IOPS, but that's still lower than the Vertex 2. I'm gonna wait to see Intel's 3rd generation SSD's in 2011. If you wanna buy now, my research points to the OCZ Vertex 2 (120GB 2.5”). Good luck to you too CCJ

 

[Rightfuldon]

What is the most important feature of a SSD for gaming? Read speed? Write speed? Random 4 KB (IOPS)? I heard read speed is.
By my own experience game-load time is really the only significant improvement (& a smoother feel during gameplay). I'm trying to figure out if there'd be any other real improvement by buying an OCZ Vertex 2 (read speed 285 MB/s).

I currently have an Intel X25-M G2 160GB (specifications below)

Sustained Sequential Read: up to 250 MB/s
Sustained Sequential Write: up to 100 MB/s
Random 4 KB Reads: up to 35,000 IOPS
Random 4 KB Writes: up to 8,600 IOPS

I loaded Crysis on the Intel & was very impressed. OCZ Vertex's read speed is only slightly faster, so I wonder.

My other question is even though we have TRIM, will regularly uninstalling old games/installing new games increase performance degradation over time? Thank you for any advice.

Hey BrownShirt.

The most important one by far is random 4k reads, followed by sustained reads. To put it in perspective 95% of all your OS activities are reads, games are similar.
Hope this helped!