Ancient motherboard with SSD

[DuncanNZ]

Hi all,

Couple of questions. I am looking at getting an SSD (for a boot drive), probably a Vertex III or Crucial m4. I have a p965 board (Gigabyte P965-ds3p, E6600 at 3 GHz, AMD 5770, 4GB RAM). Yes I know I automatically nerf it by only having 3Gb/s SATA. Do I:

1) Lose significant performance by not supporting TRIM? (Yes I read the stickies that told me I would lose performance if I used an old drive on old firmware and filled it to the brim)

2) Have to re-install Windows when I eventually do buy a new mobo etc in order to then enable TRIM and 6Gb/s SATA? (I don't foresee any problem with the SATA)

Cheers,
Michael

 

[rolli59]

1 Loose or not you gain performance by adding the SSD over HDD.
2 At minimum you would have to do a repair install (correcting driver issues for the new hardware) and re activation of windows, A clean install is though recommended.

 

[JohnnyLucky]

Hmmm...interesting.....Your motherboard is listed as having a Gigabyte SATA II 3Gb/s controller which in reality is a JMicron JMB363.

The Intel ICH8 Southbridge chipset supports four SATA II 3Gb/s drives. That sounds good but I think there are several compatibility problems. The motherboard was released in 2006. Back then there were no consumer oriented solid state drives. The motherboard and chipset might not support SATA II and SATA III ssd's. You'll have to check for System BIOS, chipset, and driver updates to see if it is possible.

TRIM is a feature that first appeared in Microsoft Windows 7. By default it is enabled in Windows 7. It is used to complement a solid state drive's garbage collection. TRIM essentially sends a message to the ssd indicating that a user has deleted data. Most modern ssd's recognize Windows TRIM. However, there are situations where TRIM cannot be used. One example would be ssd's in a RAID array. SSD manufacturers compensated by creating aggressive garbage collection that works well without Windows TRIM. Generally TRIM should not affect ssd performance unless a user does something insane.

A clean fresh install of Microsoft Windows 7 is the preferred method. When compared to a hard disk drive Windows 7 installs fairly quickly on a new ssd. What doesn't change is downloading all the Windows updates, fixes, and patches. User's are still at the mercy of their Internet Service Providers.

 

[DuncanNZ]

Well I think under the SATA II and III standards all SATA devices regardless of being mechanical or SSD should work with even the older SATA II controllers.

It is interesting you say TRIM is a Windows 7 feature. Don't know why, but I had it in my head it was a MB related feature. I do run windows 7, so it sounds like TRIM should work regardless of my motherboard. Can anyone confirm this?

 

[JohnnyLucky]

A SATA hard disk drive is not the same as a SATA solid state drive. Rolli59 did mention drivers for new hardware. Your motherboard is so old you'll also have to check for BIOS and chipset updates too. If you go to the Gigabyte web site you will find quite a few updates for your motherboard. The latest update was issued just 2 months ago. You'll also have to check for Intel chipset updates. The easiest way to do it is with the Intel Driver Update Utility:

http://www.intel.com/p/en_US/support/detect?iid=dc_iduu

Yes, TRIM is absolutely, positively, guaranteed a Microsoft Windows 7 feature. The default mode is enabled.

Here is a link to one of the articles from 2008:

http://windows7center.com/windows-7-feature/windows-7-to-improve-on-solid-state-drive-ssd-performance/

 

[DuncanNZ]

Best answer selected by DuncanNZ.