New OCZ Firmware Boosts Vertex 4 Performance Up to 210%

[Marcus52]

[citation][nom]matt_b[/nom]Additionally speaking of writing and math, it's also how it's worded:1) A 200% increase = 3x your base2) 200% of something = 2x your base[/citation]

Very true.

This comes from advertising and political double-talk, trying to pump up the numbers to make them more fantastic than they really are. 420 is 210% of 200, but it's not a "210% increase", as others have said. That is a confusion of the facts, which I believe is intended, and ultimately being a confusion and lie, contributes mightily to the dumbing-down of our population.

 

[blazorthon]

[citation][nom]matt_b[/nom]The title definitely skews the facts presented. A definite improvement is noticed, but only on one spec and one of the models - not the entire Vertex 4 lineup as the title would have you think. Still, I'll take the 2.8% and 22% performance from the other drive with the updated speeds. Anything is better than nothing, just hoping reliability remains in check. Edit: In addition to the fuzzy number wording, this is also not the first Vertex without a Sandforce controller - correct me if I am wrong.......[/citation]

You are correct, it's not the first Vertex with a non-SandForce controller.

 

[blazorthon]

[citation][nom]mathnazi[/nom](420 - 200) / 200 = 110% improvement not 210%.[/citation]

100% of 200 going up to 420 is 210%. It's not a 210% increase, but 420 is 210% of 200.

 

[ProDigit10]

probably writing blocks at all available cells, fragmenting the files between several memory modules, instead of writing the file in one or two memory blocks.

 

[blazorthon]

[citation][nom]Marcus52[/nom]Very true.This comes from advertising and political double-talk, trying to pump up the numbers to make them more fantastic than they really are. 420 is 210% of 200, but it's not a "210% increase", as others have said. That is a confusion of the facts, which I believe is intended, and ultimately being a confusion and lie, contributes mightily to the dumbing-down of our population.[/citation]

How is this dumbing people down? Several people here learned something today, the difference between increasing 200 by 210% and 210% of 200. It's an important lesson.

 

[danwat1234]

[citation][nom]mathnazi[/nom](420 - 200) / 200 = 110% improvement not 210%.[/citation]

Yup 210% the original speed

 

[A Bad Day]

[citation][nom]freggo[/nom]As usual...Writers and Math clearly do not mix.100% increase = double the performance.200% increase = triple performance.How about reading a 5th grade math book ?[/citation]

I think some of them are preoccupied with toasting silicon chips and breaking Intel's heatsink push-pins.

 

[blazorthon]

[citation][nom]A Bad Day[/nom]I think some of them are preoccupied with toasting silicon chips and breaking Intel's heatsink push-pins.[/citation]

We've already figured out that the article's title is correct and that freggo and the others saying that it isn't misinterpreted the title. I guess you missed that memo that was stated over and over again in the comments?

 

[Zclyh3]

Wait isn't the Vertex 4 still slower than my Vertex 3?

 

[Guest]

blazorthon said:
"We've already figured out that the article's title is correct and that freggo and the others saying that it isn't misinterpreted the title. I guess you missed that memo that was stated over and over again in the comments?"

It has nothing to do with the article's title. The article itself says "If you own the 128 GB model, you'll see a 210 percent increase in performance." That's clearly false. It's 110% increase in performance.

 

[blazorthon]

[citation][nom]mathnazi2[/nom]blazorthon said:"We've already figured out that the article's title is correct and that freggo and the others saying that it isn't misinterpreted the title. I guess you missed that memo that was stated over and over again in the comments?"It has nothing to do with the article's title. The article itself says "If you own the 128 GB model, you'll see a 210 percent increase in performance." That's clearly false. It's 110% increase in performance.[/citation]

The article's title says that the new firmware boosts performance up to 210%. Nothing says that anything get's increased by 210% and nothing says that the 128GB model gets boosted by 210% either. The chart says that it gets boosted up to 210% and that is absolutely correct. 420 is 210% of 200 and that is what it says. Some people don't know the difference between an x% increase and x% of something. You're absolutely wrong and it is because you are misinterpreting the math words.

 

[blazorthon]

[citation][nom]Zclyh3[/nom]Wait isn't the Vertex 4 still slower than my Vertex 3?[/citation]

That depends on a lot of factors such as the queue depth and how compressible the data is. The Vertex 4 already won in non-compressible and slightly-compressible performance, but the Vertex 3 might still win in highly compressible performance and low queue depths. However, it's now a lot closer in the situations where it lost and it probably does even better in the more common situations in which it won. The Vertex 4 is probably the faster drive to own for most people. It's also probably a lot more reliable too.

 

[blazorthon]

[citation][nom]mathnazi2[/nom]blazorthon said:"We've already figured out that the article's title is correct and that freggo and the others saying that it isn't misinterpreted the title. I guess you missed that memo that was stated over and over again in the comments?"It has nothing to do with the article's title. The article itself says "If you own the 128 GB model, you'll see a 210 percent increase in performance." That's clearly false. It's 110% increase in performance.[/citation]

The title also never said that you will see a 210% increase in performance and it doesn't even specifically mention the 128GB drive.

 

[fil1p]

Wow that is quite a bit of improvement, and all from a firmware update. Now thats pretty cool

 

[blazorthon]

[citation][nom]fil1p[/nom]Wow that is quite a bit of improvement, and all from a firmware update. Now thats pretty cool[/citation]

OCZ seems to be very good at making excellent firmware.

 

[Guest]

blazorthon said:
"Nothing says that anything get's increased by 210% and nothing says that the 128GB model gets boosted by 210% either."

Are you blind? I quoted that the article SAYS:
"If you own the 128 GB model, you'll see a 210 percent increase in performance, as the data rate is now 420 MB/s."

That pretty much disproves everything you just said.

 

[jgarrow]

[citation][nom]syrious1[/nom]Pretty sure OCZ has worked out the destructive flashing, most firmware updates go smoothly, but it never hurts to get another copy of your data.[/citation]

Nope, this one is a Destructive Flash according to the OCZ sight.


Release Candidate

Updating the firmware from the toolbox is not supported when Windows is running off the drive you are trying to update.

WARNING: This is a Destructive Flash, back up all data on SSD. Proceeding with this update will result in complete loss of data on the SSD.

-Toolbox will not update a primary system drive (e.g. drive letter "C:"). You must run Windows from another drive and then update your SSD using Toolbox.

 

[Zclyh3]

[citation][nom]blazorthon[/nom]The title also never said that you will see a 210% increase in performance and it doesn't even specifically mention the 128GB drive.[/citation]

This is true. The 5 year warranty does make a difference, but then again, I probably wouldn't still use the same drive after a year or two.

 

[rocket sword]

[citation][nom]blazorthon[/nom]That depends on a lot of factors such as the queue depth and how compressible the data is. The Vertex 4 already won in non-compressible and slightly-compressible performance, but the Vertex 3 might still win in highly compressible performance and low queue depths. However, it's now a lot closer in the situations where it lost and it probably does even better in the more common situations in which it won. The Vertex 4 is probably the faster drive to own for most people. It's also probably a lot more reliable too.[/citation]

Based on the original review, there wasn't much that would make one want to choose the Vertex 4 over the Vertex 3 unless you are using a lot of incompressible data or if you don't like the reliability of SandForce controllers. It looked like Vertex 3 has better performance, power consumption and price (Could get a Vertex 3 120GB on Newegg for $84 using a code and rebate.)

It would be great to see an update to the Vertex 4 review using the 120GB model with new firmware to see if there is much of a performance increase compared to the Vertex 3 120GB model and see how this update really affects things.

 

[blazorthon]

[citation][nom]rocket sword[/nom]Based on the original review, there wasn't much that would make one want to choose the Vertex 4 over the Vertex 3 unless you are using a lot of incompressible data or if you don't like the reliability of SandForce controllers. It looked like Vertex 3 has better performance, power consumption and price (Could get a Vertex 3 120GB on Newegg for $84 using a code and rebate.)It would be great to see an update to the Vertex 4 review using the 120GB model with new firmware to see if there is much of a performance increase compared to the Vertex 3 120GB model and see how this update really affects things.[/citation]

To b fair, a huge amount of the data that we use isn't very compressible and reliability is perhaps the most important aspect of anything, especially computer hardware. Vertex 4 isn't the fastest in every synthetic benchmark, but it can reach it's higher speeds more often in the real-world than the Vertex 3 does. Also, Vertex 3 uses more power than Vertex 4. Vertex 4 also has much greater random throughput than Vertex 3 does. The Vertex 3 is cheaper because it is slower overall in the real-world, uses more power (trivially more power, but you mentioned this first), far less reliable (anyone whom thinks that reliability isn't important is fooling themselves), and has a shorter warranty.

All considered... The Vertex 4 is better in pretty much every practical way except for price and even then, it has just as much, if not more, value for it's price.

 

[rocket sword]

[citation][nom]blazorthon[/nom]Also, Vertex 3 uses more power than Vertex 4. [/citation]
According to the tests in the article, The Vertex 4 takes twice the power as the Vertex 3 when at idle, and under load took more power for every test except the "4 KB Random Read".

You are right about the importance of reliability though. I was thinking of getting the Vertex 3 for a while, but when I started reading about the failures people were having, that changed my mind (plus it would be nice for the prices to come down more compared to HDDs). I've been using my WD HDD since 2005, without failure and would like to have the same experience if I start using an SSD for the main drive.

 

[blazorthon]

[citation][nom]rocket sword[/nom]According to the tests in the article, The Vertex 4 takes twice the power as the Vertex 3 when at idle, and under load took more power for every test except the "4 KB Random Read".You are right about the importance of reliability though. I was thinking of getting the Vertex 3 for a while, but when I started reading about the failures people were having, that changed my mind (plus it would be nice for the prices to come down more compared to HDDs). I've been using my WD HDD since 2005, without failure and would like to have the same experience if I start using an SSD for the main drive.[/citation]

Article uses old firmware and is no longer applicable.

 

[bunz_of_steel]

Sounds like you guys need to get a life, lota comments bout the increase performance 100% or 200%. .... Really? It's called Marketing and it's not the first we have seen it. We all know the numbers advertised are hype and the real numbers were looking at is what we can actually use. Like our paychecks... after taxes is what matters. Doesn't matter how much I make, it's what I have left after taxes and what I can do with that. Either way it's a nice improvement and I appreciated the article and information, good Job Andrew!