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Review: OCZ Vertex 120GB SSD - big and speedy

by Tarinder Sandhu on 2 July 2009, 08:53 3.55

Tags: OCZ Vertex 30GB, OCZ Vertex 120GB, OCZ (NASDAQ:OCZ)

Quick Link: HEXUS.net/qastn

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Iometer read performance

As we mentioned on the previous page, each drive is secure-erased before benchmarking, to ensure maximum performance. We refer to this as 'clean' numbers.

IOMeter - 64KB sequential read speed
OCZ Vertex SSD 120GBOCZ Vertex SSD 30GBIntel X25-M SSD 80GBSamsung Spinpoint F1-DT 750GBCorsair P256 SSD 256GB
196.5187.13212.3678.5173.97


Big-block sequential read speed is very tasty.

IOMeter - 4KB random read speed
OCZ Vertex SSD 120GBOCZ Vertex SSD 30GBIntel X25-M SSD 80GBSamsung Spinpoint F1-DT 750GBCorsair P256 SSD 256GB
28.1928.0157.970.4855.48
 

IOMeter - IOPS (read)
OCZ Vertex SSD 120GBOCZ Vertex SSD 30GBIntel X25-M SSD 80GBSamsung Spinpoint F1-DT 750GBCorsair P256 SSD 256GB
7216.387171.5214839122.3814204.1


The drive's not exceptional when it comes to the random reading of small files, coming in at about half the speed of the other two large-capacity SSDs, according to Iometer.  However, run the same test with the drives in a well-used state, and the two leading drives' performance drops to around 30MB/s 4K random read and 7,500IOPS. The OCZ's stays roughly the same.

IOMeter - average read latency
OCZ Vertex SSD 120GBOCZ Vertex SSD 30GBIntel X25-M SSD 80GBSamsung Spinpoint F1-DT 750GBCorsair P256 SSD 256GB
0.420.420.224.510.21


IOMeter - maximum read latency
OCZ Vertex SSD 120GBOCZ Vertex SSD 30GBIntel X25-M SSD 80GBSamsung Spinpoint F1-DT 750GBCorsair P256 SSD 256GB
1.421.410.7746.461.07


Yet all wipe the floor with the mechanical drive with respect to latency.

Performance in the read tests is eerily similar to the 30GB model. Unlike mechanical hard drives, there's no areal benefit as the drive becomes larger; it's mainly down to the controller.