Three PCI Express-Based SSDs: When SATA 6 Gb/s Is Too Slow

Features
By Patrick Schmid and Achim Roos
published

When it comes time to hunt down the ultimate in storage performance, you simply cannot settle for standard SSDs. Instead, look to PCI Express-based drives that circumvent the limitations of SATA. We have products from Fusion-io, LSI, and OCZ on the bench.

Benchmark Results: Web Server And Workstation I/O Performance

Our Web server test pattern is based on 100% read operation and 100% random operation using the following block sizes: 512 bytes: 22%, 1 KB: 15%, 2 KB: 8%, 4 KB: 23%, 8 KB: 15%, 16 KB: 2%, 32 KB: 6%, 64 KB: 7%, 128 KB: 1%, 512 KB: 1%. The results are similar again: LSI's WarpDrive dominates.

The workstation test pattern is based on 80% reads and 80% random operation at 8 KB block size. One more time, the LSI WarpDrive pulls ahead.

Patrick Schmid and Achim Roos