SSD Performance: TRIM And Firmware Updates Tested

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Solid state drives can deliver exceptional performance, but they're not necessarily fire-and-forget upgrades. You'll only really get the best possible experience from them if you pay attention to details like TRIM support and available firmware updates.

Test Setup

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System Hardware
Hardware Details
CPU Intel Core i7-920 (45 nm, 2.66 GHz, 4 x 512 KB L2 Cache, 8 MB L3 Cache)
Motherboard (Socket 1366) Supermicro X8SAX Revision: 1.0, Chipset Intel X58 + ICH10R, BIOS: 1.0B
RAM 3 x 1 GB DDR3-1333 Corsair CM3X1024-1333C9DHX
Controller HighPoint Rocket 620
HDD Seagate NL35 400 GB, ST3400832NS, 7200 RPM, SATA 1.5 Gb/s, 8 MB Cache
Power Supply OCZ EliteXstream 800 W, OCZ800EXS-EU
Benchmarks
Performance Measurements PCMark Vantage 1.0.2.0
System Software & Drivers
Operating System Windows 7 Ultimate
Intel Rapid Storage Manager Version 9.6

Test SSD: Samsung 470 Series, 256 GB

We used Samsung’s new 470-series SSD, also known as the PM810, for this article. It is one of the newest SSDs available, so we were curious about its general performance characteristics. Therefore, we had to deliver a little torture test to really push the drive as hard as possible, hoping to show the differences with and without TRIM, and the 0601 vs. 0701 firmware versions.