Shots of OCZ's Z-Drive PCI-Express SSD

[tipoo]

Wow...Realy goes to show that current SSD's are limited by SATA-II.

 

[Supertrek32]

All of the sudden those boards with 6 PCI-E slots make sense....

 

[False_Dmitry_II]

[citation][nom]tipoo[/nom]Wow...Realy goes to show that current SSD's are limited by SATA-II.[/citation]

Not necessarily, just that this one would be.

 

[matt_b]

[citation][nom]tipoo[/nom]Wow...Realy goes to show that current SSD's are limited by SATA-II.[/citation]
How, when this reaches less than a third of the maximum bandwidth of SATA II? I am sure that there are implementations out there yet to be put in place to make current SSD drives faster (not counting progressive technology).

 

[g00ey]

Why not use SDRAM/DDR as harddrives? The PCI-Express card could feature slots for say 12 modules (up to 4GB each) and a BIOS that reads the image-file into memory from a harddrive. Nothing expensive, nothing fancy really, and sequential reading from a harddrive is usually pretty fast. Throw in a Li-Ion pack and you don't have to worry about power surges.

 

[mikepaul]

[citation][nom]g00ey[/nom]Why not use SDRAM/DDR as harddrives? The PCI-Express card could feature slots for say 12 modules (up to 4GB each) and a BIOS that reads the image-file into memory from a harddrive. Nothing expensive, nothing fancy really, and sequential reading from a harddrive is usually pretty fast. Throw in a Li-Ion pack and you don't have to worry about power surges.[/citation]

I want a RAM drive. Swap file and IE8 temp files go there, then when I power down (no UPS for me) the junk goes away. Problem is the available RAM drives are way too small (4GB or so) and no updates on the technology in quite a while.

But it DOES sound nice doesn't it?...

 

[cctchristensen]

[citation][nom]Matt_B[/nom]How, when this reaches less than a third of the maximum bandwidth of SATA II? I am sure that there are implementations out there yet to be put in place to make current SSD drives faster (not counting progressive technology).[/citation]

I was just about to say that, but I think the real limitation with SSD on a SATA connection is the size. This OCZ drive looks like a small video card, so I am sure they can pack more memory controllers in there, which would account for the speed increase. Did you see the Z-drive "concepts" from a few months back? The thing was the size of an HD4870 or GTX280.

 

[redgarl]

Hehe 1000$ minimum... probably 2000$...

 

[ALANMAN]

The maximum bandwidth of SATA II is 300MB/s.

the 1 TB drive capable of a read speed of 878 MB/sec. and a write of 781 MB/sec

So how is this drive "less than a third of the maximum bandwidth of SATA II?"

 

[j_chatelain]

Wow.

 

[tipoo]

[citation][nom]Matt_B[/nom]How, when this reaches less than a third of the maximum bandwidth of SATA II? I am sure that there are implementations out there yet to be put in place to make current SSD drives faster (not counting progressive technology).[/citation]

What? The drive has a read speed of 878 MB/sec and a write of 781 MB/sec, SATA-II tops out at 300mb/s.

 

[tipoo]

[citation][nom]Matt_B[/nom]How, when this reaches less than a third of the maximum bandwidth of SATA II? I am sure that there are implementations out there yet to be put in place to make current SSD drives faster (not counting progressive technology).[/citation]

You must be confusing Gib/s for Gb/s...The top speed for SATA-II is only 300mb/s, commonly marketed as 3Gib/s.

 

[Shadow703793]

Biggest question is, can it boot?

 

[cjl]

[citation][nom]Shadow703793[/nom]Biggest question is, can it boot?[/citation]

It has nothing to do with GiB vs GB. It's bits vs bytes. SATA is capable of 3 gigabits per second, which is 375 megabytes per second. Because of the error correction and encoding used with SATA, each byte actually takes 10 bits to transmit, reducing the throughput of SATA to 300 megabytes per second maximum.

 

[khenke]

[citation][nom]Matt_B[/nom]How, when this reaches less than a third of the maximum bandwidth of SATA II? I am sure that there are implementations out there yet to be put in place to make current SSD drives faster (not counting progressive technology).[/citation]

The only thing this show is that after 30 years of computer history people still dont know the difference between bit and byte. So here it goes: a Byte (most often a uppercase B) is 8 bits (most often a lowercase b).

SATA II is a 3Gbit/s maximum and that is 375MB/s, and it's a LOT less than this SSD.

To be able to handle this speeds you need at least PCI Express 4x with a 1000MB/s rate. So a future drive wont be that far off when we hit a PCI Express 16x maximum of 4000MB/s

Even the Intel X25-M G2 are not that far from maxing the SATA II with its 250MB/s.

And in reality you can never use the maximum bandwidth either.

 

[ravaneli]

These are nothing new. There is internal RAID0 in the drive. The bigger drives are just more RAIDs.

Itel G2 is still far superior, and you can make the raid yourself. You can buy as many as you need. G2 $/GB is supposed to be no higher than OCZ

 

[asgallant]

Does anyone else find it strange that there is a molex power connector on the card? Is 75 watts off the PCIe bus not enough for this monster?

 

[aspireonelover]

oh man, looks like I'll have to take out one of my video cards just for this baby

 

[crashmer]

[citation][nom]warmon6[/nom]"878 MB/sec. and a write of 781 MB/sec"0.0 man that's fast.[/citation]

I'd be happy with 1/3 of that.

 

[apache_lives]

need those random read/write speeds Intel is so damn good at

 

[christop]

what is the point if you can't boot from it????

 

[hok]

Am I crazy or is this not meant for home computing... even with "enthusiasts" this is not really meant as an option.. this is for enterprise servers and what not. not so much about booting and vid card replacements.

 

[r0x0r]

[citation][nom]ravaneli[/nom]These are nothing new. There is internal RAID0 in the drive. The bigger drives are just more RAIDs. [/citation]

Damn got in before me

It's true though, it is "just" a bunch of drives in a RAID0 config.

 

[razor512]

if they can sell them for under $200 then I will get one

 

[mi1400]

better more will be if they keep the mounted casing (as visible above) like conventional SSD with SSD connector and added PCI special socket and mounting to cling to PCI card. when needed in laptop just detach from PCI-card and throw into the laptop!