Crucial C300 and over-provisioning questions

[finger00]

Hey all. I have just ordered a brand new Crucial C300 64 GB SSD and I've read a lot about tweaking it. The only thing I'm actually confused about is the over-provisioning. I've heard that it improves SSD life and performance, but every SSD incluedes some spare space already, doesn't it? So should I over-provision my drive to, let's say, 50 GB or should I just ignore it? The drive will be only used for my Win 7 OS and just a few programs.

Also, after over-provisioning to 50 GB can I fill all that space without any performance loss or should I leave some space free?

 

[randomizer]

There is no notable difference between paritioning a 64GB drive to 50GB and filling up the whole 50GB versus partitioning the drive to its full capacity and only filling it to 50GB. Wear leveling will occur using whatever free space is available, partitioned or not (the process is lower level than the filesystem).

 

[JohnnyLucky]

Each ssd already comes with over-provisioning. The over-provisioning can be anywhere from 5% to 29% of overall drive capacity. The percentage varies for each brand and model. Right now certain OCZ Vertex 2 ssd's with the new 25nm NAND have the highest percentage at 29%. SSD's with the new 25nm NAND require more overprovisioning than the SSD's with 34nm MAND.

You cannot over-provision a solid state drive. It is something that is done during the manufacturing process.

Performance loss can occur for a variety of technical reasons. It could be anything from incorrect installation, incorrect BIOS & Windows settings, a firmware problem, or deteriorating ssd components.

It is a good idea not to load your ssd to full capacity. You may have files or other items that you want save or software you might want to download and save. There's always something.

 

[ko888]

The space reserved for over-provisioning is not a user defined value. It is set by the drive manufacturer in the firmware.

 

[finger00]

Thanks guys, guess I'll be formating the whole 64 GB then and will just leave some free space while installing stuff.