SSD Raid0 running Vista, advice and concerns

jay2tall

November 26, 2011 7:53:27 PM

Just to start out with, I am new to SSD's and needed a winter project. I just ordered 2 Intel 80GB 320 series drives from Newegg. They have a great MIR now. I would like to run them in RAID 0 and reinstall Vista Ultimate 64. I do not want to purchase a new OS, Windows 7. I would like to get some input on my concerns and also any suggestions. I know only Windows 7 supports TRIM so I do not have that at my disposal, however, from what I understand TRIM is not yet supported in a RAID regardless. So my question is, what is the recommended setup for a machine running SSD's in a RAID with Vista. I've read that the newer SSD's have a better internal garbage collector than the past models, however, not a replacement for TRIM. Will I run into performance issues with my setup over time?I've read that people with Vista periodically run the optimization software in the Intel SSD Toolbox, however, that does not support RAID either. What are your thoughts and opinions? I know there are many out there running SSD's in RAID. I am just looking to keep performance optimal. Thanks in advance for any information.

More about : ssd raid0 running vista advice concerns

| E-mail me updates
| Report abuse

inzone

Storage Expert

November 26, 2011 8:10:30 PM

I just recently put two Corsair 180gb in raid 0and had them connected to the 6gb/s sata3 ports and had some problems with stability so I connected them to the sata2 ports and now they run perfect. Windows experience index is 7.9 and I have yet to benchmark them to see the read/write speeds. The problem I ran into is the Marvell controller , it would just not cooperate with these SSD's in raid. When installed individually they were fine. Right now I am happy with the setup but on the next upgrade I will be making sure that there are Intel sata3 ports to connect to.

| Report abuse

jay2tall

November 26, 2011 9:36:23 PM

Not sure how your post is in response to mine. I am looking for opinions/advice/facts on a RAID 0 SSD setup with VISTA. Since TRIM does not yet support RAID I don't think it truly matters whether it is on Vista or Win7. I know there are people out there with either setup and an SSD raid. Just looking for thoughts and advice on garbage collection so it is not wasting writes when writing over previously deleted portions of the drive.

My initial thought is just install the raid, do the normal Vista optimization things like disable defrag, super prefetch, disable or move the page file (opinions on this would be good, I'd move it to a standard HHD), etc.

| Report abuse

groberts101

November 28, 2011 4:05:03 AM

garbage collection is actually quite good if the care is taken to properly implement it. I started with 1 SSD and then jumped right to 2 and haven't looked back to single drives since GC is just so damned good. This requires either using S1 sleep modes to keep constant power supply to the drive/s(S3/S4 kills power).. or temp disabling sleep altogether for the SSD to stay powered on for GC to kick in.

All the major panic with moving the pagefile off the SSD was based on premature lifespan scares. Old news now and these things can definately take a lickin' so the pagefile can stay where it's going to be fastest when you run out of ram.

| Report abuse

jay2tall

November 28, 2011 2:24:00 PM

Thanks for the input. I am now contemplating returning the 2 80GB drives in exchange for a single larger faster drive. It seems the Intel's have the best reliability, however, are slower than most other. I am completely on the fence with everything. Another option is to get a PCI-E SATA6 card and get a faster drive. Not sure what though. Any thoughts are welcome. I am just not sure about the RAID items and my lack of real world experience with SSDs in general. Not sure if I really want to venture into the realm of SSD RAIDS yet. I am very comfortable with HHD RAIDs.

| Report abuse