OCZ Unveils PCIe-Based SSD Card

[exfileme]

OCZ announced today its Z-Drive, a PCI-Express based solid state drive that offers up to 1 TB of storage.

OCZ Unveils PCIe-Based SSD Card : Read more

 

[joebob2000]

But, they didn't answer the all important question...

WILL IT BLEND!

Ooops, sorry, my mistake...

WILL IT BOOT! Can this thing finally provide me with the instant-on experience I crave from my PC while still allowing me to turn it off each night to conserve power?

 

[snotling]

a low profile drive would have made it great for blade servers...

 

[jpdykes]

Exactly what I was wondering joebob.

I just want my desktop.... now!

 

[NocturnalOne]

Hmm, the RAID thing throws a bit of a wrench in the numbers. I assume the capacity is listed as non-mirrored but performance with mirroring? I suppose they could do striping but striping over what? The implementation already depends on many discrete flash chips so in effect you're always striping.

Anyway, this is exciting stuff. I think they'd find a market for smaller units as well. It doesn't take *that* much room to have a full windows or other OS install. Just keep your most favorite apps and data on flash and the rest on HD. Come to think of it, my astro photo application PixInsight would really benefit from putting swap files on this thing.

 

[gwolfman]

They should have gone with a PCIe x8 slot instead!

 

[halcyon]

I think THG's initial article on it said that it is not bootable.

 

[mrubermonkey]

I/O was never very good on those Vertex drives. I wonder how it will be on this Z-Drive.

 

[mrubermonkey]

Also is it PCI Express 2.0 x4 or PCI Express 1.1 x4?

 

[Spanky Deluxe]

[citation][nom]mrubermonkey[/nom]Also is it PCI Express 2.0 x4 or PCI Express 1.1 x4?[/citation]

It really doesn't matter. Even PCI Express 1.1 x4 gives a maximum throughput of 1000MB/s, roughly double the maximum throughput of these drives.

 

[tweak13]

Ok TomsHardware get one and test test test and post a review!

DO IT NOW!

PREASE!

 

[vgdarkstar]

IOPS?
Will it boot?
Pricing?

 

[ShadowFlash]

I sense a fusion IO vs. Z-drive article in the near future......I'm still confident that the fusion will provide better IO, but capacity goes to OCZ with lower price points.

My opinion is that this is just a "gimmick" item anyhow.
“Designed for ultra high performance consumers, the Z-Drive takes the SATA bottleneck out of the equation....."
Yeah....I doubt that. It's still just a good controller card with individual drives on a sata interface in pretty packaging, not that it matters, as a single SSD cannot (yet) max out a SATA channel ( Intel X25-E's are getting close though ) thus having no such "SATA bottleneck". Any enthusiast or IT pro worth there weight in salt could easily custom build these with mid to high end controllers supporting more than just 4 drives and not sacrificing a valuable double wide PCI-E slot in the process.
With that being said, it does have a "coolness factor" along with a 1TB capacity that could make it appealing to those who prefer to buy instead of build.
Anything that moves SSD technology forward gets a "thumbs up" in my book. In fact, I count on "early adopters" to buy things like this to lower the price of future generation solutions.

 

[curnel_D]

"Today"? I know for a fact that statement is completely false.

 

[pharge]

"The Z-Drive is also compatible with a wide range of operating systems including Windows XP (32 and 64), Windows 7 (32 and 64), and even Mac OS X 10." hmmm... how about VISTA? lol

Wondering how much will it be for a 1 TB Z-drive and how much power will it dran.

 

[thepinkpanther]

so if u want raid 0 would u need a sli connector? BRING SSD PRICES DOWN!

 

[maigo]

Why? Just WHY?

 

[scryer_360]

Hmmm, missing something here. Isn't the SATA interface faster than the PCIe we are looking at? What makes this so cheap and so fast?

 

[Tindytim]

I don't understand the "instant" boot idea.

But maybe that's because I have GRUB, and if I want to boot into XP or Vista I have to use the Longhorn bootloader after GRUB.

 

[Crazy-PC]

I am not sure how this PCI-E SSD work in RAID 0, seems the motherboard should with at least 3 PCI-E x16 port where 2 for the PCI-E SSD for Raid 0 and only 1 for display card lol.

 

[Guest]

Amazing 1Gb a second.True HD must be near.Just imagine a 3 meter (10 feet) monitor

 

[rambo117]

wow!! that thing is GOREGEOUS!
imagine putting two of those in RAID....
*drools*

 

[Harby]

[citation][nom]scryer_360[/nom]Hmmm, missing something here. Isn't the SATA interface faster than the PCIe we are looking at? What makes this so cheap and so fast?[/citation]

Of course sata is slower. Thats why its not use for such a device.

Sata 3Gb/s (gigabits) translates into about 300MB/s. So this thing would be severely bottlenecked and couldn't even remotely reach its max transfer capabilities.

 

[ShadowFlash]

[citation][nom]Harby[/nom]Of course sata is slower. Thats why its not use for such a device.Sata 3Gb/s (gigabits) translates into about 300MB/s. So this thing would be severely bottlenecked and couldn't even remotely reach its max transfer capabilities.[/citation]

that is a per channel limit, and my belief is this card DOES use the SATA interface for the individual SSD's. No such bottleneck exists right now other than the PCI-E x4 bus itself. You apparently are thinking that this is of similar design and construction to the IO fusion drive, which I am relatively certain it's not, hence the controller card functions. It only makes sense that they would use there existing line of SSD's in this hidden under a pretty cover. I'de be willing to bet it you opened it up, you would find 4 SSD's mounted to a controller card on SATA interfaces. They're just attempting clever marketing. I hope I'm wrong, but I seriously doubt it.

 

[zdzichu]

What about most important parameter, namely I/O Operations per second number?