I've made a mistake. Advise needed (SSD related)

[Chariot Of Mars]

Hi,

First off here is my rig:-

i7 920 @3.6Ghz

6Gb of Ram

Rampage Extreme ii Motherboard <------- my problems are here

Boot drive is a Samsung 830 (256Gb) <---- and here

Other drives are HDD (4 of them)

Ok, so I just received the Samsung 830 SSD yesterday and swapped it for old HDD. Did fresh install of windows from DVD and then used disc that came with the SSD.

It has software called Samsung SSD Magician. I went to OS Optimization and ticked the box and 'tuned' it. All the red boxes turned green. So that was ok.

BUT at the bottom it says 'Non AHCI mode (System should boot in AHCI mode for best performance)'. I do not know if i can fix this.

I did some checking on forums and it seems my old mother board has only SATA 2 connectors on it. The SSD is SATA3.

Have I wasted £149.97 on the SSD as it will not go into right 'mode'? also will it be slower then my very old WD 74Gb Raptor (10,000rpm)?

I mostly will be using the SSD for boot drive with stuff like anti virus and all drivers on it. I will also be using it for downloading to then Parring (PAR2) files then unzipping them. Will all that stuff be quicker on the SSD even though it is only SATA 2 or should i go back to HDD?

I feel like a bit of a twat for assuming the motherboard supported SATA 3.

Finally i have read that my SSD should be in TRIM mode?!? I have no idea where to even look to see if its on or off?

Please give me your advise. Should I just go and buy a new motherboard?

 

[rogigor]

From what I've read your motherboard does not have SATA 3. It actually is bad news because you won't feel the full read speed because of the sata 2 limits.

Still I wouldn't say that you've wasted your money. I don't know how about your raptor performance, but I'm pretty sure your SSD will be faster even if it's connected to sata 2. The thing is in access time and that's where the SSD shines.

AS for the trim mode... there are many different opinions but as far as I know your ssd MUST be in AHCI in order to trim work properly. Go to the bios and check if you can manually set SATA mode to AHCI (I think another installation would be needed). If not then... you can install Windows 7 and check if the trim is working while your drive is in IDE mode.

If I were you I would simply test the drive - if the booting is fine, overal system performance etc. If you're satisfied then I don't see a point in buying a new motherboard...

On the other hand you WILL notice a difference between SATA 2 and SATA 3.

 

[Chariot Of Mars]

Thank you for your quick reply,

It does seem faster then the HDD with what I have been doing today so far. If I don't switch on AHCI or TRIM will it break my SSD or have a very negative result?

 

[rogigor]

It won't berak your SSD but you may want to switch to AHCI for TRIM. TRIM allows your OS to inform your drive which cells are no longer in use and can be wiped for further usage. It will make your SSD last longer.

http://benchmarkreviews.com/index.php?option=com_content&task=view&id=505&Itemid=38&limit=1&limitstart=9 -> you can see a comparison of AHCI and IDE here

To check if TRIM is working run "cmd" and type

fsutil behavior query DisableDeleteNotify

If the result is '0' TRIM is enabled.

 

[Chariot Of Mars]

Hello again,

Ok, I checked my bios and sata is set to IDE, there is the option to turn it to AHCI. But, I think it changes it over for all drives. I have 4 standard HHD,s and one SSD as my boot. I also found this article:-

http://superuser.com/questions/4020/why-should-i-choose-or-not-ahci-over-ide-in-my-pcs-bios-settings

And have changed the registry in Windows 7. Will AHCI negatively effect the HDDs?

 

[rogigor]

Yes - it'll change settings for all your drives. AHCI shoudn't have any effect on your HDD since they are not your boot drives.

I think you'll have to reinstall just the OS on your SSD - I'm not sure but when I had my system installed in AHCI mode and due to bios update it change my settings to IDE I got BSOD - changed it back to AHCI and works like a charm.

 

[Chariot Of Mars]

Ok, quick update.

I changed it to AHCI in BIOS and so far everything seems ok. I can see and access all the drives from windows. Also the Samsung SSD Magician has recognized that the SSD is in AHCI mode now. Just gonna enable TRIM next.

 

[rogigor]

Good to know everything's alright.

 

[Chariot Of Mars]

Good to know everything's alright.

You seem like you know a fair bit about this stuff. I'd like your advice on the best upgrade for me.

My current rig:-

i7 920 @ 3.6Ghz (on air with a Coolmaster V6)

Extreme Rampage II (I Never loved this board due to the dodgy 'x-fi' sound solution) also only SATA2

6Gb of the Ram that goes with this set up.

2 x HD8570 in xfire mode.

Samsung 830 (256GB) SSD as boot drive/windows 7/ virus software/drivers/Steam (mostly ARMA II + add-ons) and download etc

4 HDDs (all either 1.5TB or bigger).

I have about £400-£500 that I would like spend on upgrading my pc.

I know my motherboard only supports SATA 2, so maybe I could get a new motherboard with sata 3 and USB3 and I think a new cpu is required for the newer boards. Would I need new memory as well?

I mostly play games (total basement dweller here) like Skyrim, ARMA II, EVE, BF3 & Shogun II: Total War. But want to be able to play everything.

I also use quickpar and unzip software a lot so would like to see improvements there.

I also want to use Blender with the physics as a 'toy' to make clips of things breaking and falling down. I think this takes a lot of memory to reduce time to render the scene not sure about CPU and graphics cards input.


Should I wait and just buy Windows 8?

Would a powerful single Nvidia card with higher memory mean I can play things on Ultra and would the card double up to work out physics in programs like blender?

Any suggestions please.

 

[noise]

Yes - it'll change settings for all your drives. AHCI shoudn't have any effect on your HDD since they are not your boot drives.

Just to add some clarity to this; there is no negative impact on your platter drives. There is positive impact however. Part of the AHCI specification is something called NCQ which in a nutshell allows storage devices to optimise (reduce) the number of spindle revolutions in retrieving or writing data X Y & Z. From personal experience I saw a 98% performance increase in benchmarks after switching to AHCI from IDE. This is of course highly dependant on the organisation and location of requested data on the disc but generally speaking there will usually be a speed benefit seen.

Regarding upgrading your rig - as you're already running xfire cards I think you'll struggle to get 'much' better with the budget you've got. Maybe hit the mobo/cpu/ram like you say - that will have more impact on your unziping ops and get the most out of your SSD.

 

[Chariot Of Mars]

Brilliant, thank you for the extra info. By the way, Im loving this SSD so much I think I'm gonna get another for my Steam games and keep the boot one just for apps.

 

[eXistenZ]

I am assuming you DID go through this sticky, right?

Useful SSD Articles - Part 2


Good move on the 830.

 

[rogigor]

I have about £400-£500 that I would like spend on upgrading my pc.

I know my motherboard only supports SATA 2, so maybe I could get a new motherboard with sata 3 and USB3 and I think a new cpu is required for the newer boards. Would I need new memory as well?

You could go for a Asrock Z68 Extreme 4 gen and i7-2600k. You wouldn't need new memory.

I mostly play games (total basement dweller here) like Skyrim, ARMA II, EVE, BF3 & Shogun II: Total War. But want to be able to play everything.

I myself have Asrock p67 pro 3 and 2500k @4Ghz and I use my PC mainly for games and everything works like a charm (my gpu is 560ti)

I also use quickpar and unzip software a lot so would like to see improvements there.

You will with the SSD and a newer cpu.

I also want to use Blender with the physics as a 'toy' to make clips of things breaking and falling down. I think this takes a lot of memory to reduce time to render the scene not sure about CPU and graphics cards input.

Mainly RAM and CPU. The more the better

Should I wait and just buy Windows 8?

Well to be honest I don't really know. There isn't much difference between 7 and 8 but I may be wrong.

Would a powerful single Nvidia card with higher memory mean I can play things on Ultra and would the card double up to work out physics in programs like blender?

I have never had any experience with sli or crossfire but usually it's better to have one powerful card than two weaker. And I ALWAYS go for Nvidia - don't know why. I just like geforce

 

[Chariot Of Mars]

Thank you for your advise, I've read about a billion various hardware reviews over the past few days and have decided to wait for a bit longer before changing PC. I've decided I need pretty much new everything reasons being:-

I need new motherboard for SATA 3

New Graphics card to support HDMI 1.4 as current ones only do 1.3.

New Sound card as the X-Fi one bundld with mother board is not real X-Fi

Want 32GB or ram.

Want to add another SSD.

BUT... Gonna wait for ARMA III to be released and see what I will need to get the best out of it.

Also I used to use NVIDA but been using these ATI card and not a massive fan of x-fire due to micro stutter in some games and NO support for new games until a few weeks/months after release when ATI/AMD pull their thumb out and actually release new drivers. The straw that broke the camels back was waiting so long for drivers for Skyrim. So I will go with a single Nvidia card next time.