- Jan 28, 2021
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I have performed tests in regards to my old question of "how much read and write speed will I lose if I decide to switch from using remaining SATA connections to USB - for the purpose of reducing the number of cables". That question was asked be me here: https://forums.tomshardware.com/thr...with-usb-getting-rid-of-power-cables.3685529/
The result are almost largely ambiguous and to some extent inconclusive - but also somewhat valid
The tests consistent of coping files with the usage of TeraCopy 3.6, on Windows 10 Enterprise 20H2 19042.746 installed from scratch on NVMe M.2 2280 Samsung 980 PRO 500GB PCle 4.0. The motherboard was Gigabyte X570 Aorus Ultra rev. 1.2
The files were always* copied to SSD 2"5 Samsung 870 QVO 4TB SATA III 560/530 MB/s drive. They were [in that order]:
1] single video files in the size of 75 GB, 20.5 GB, 10 GB, 5 GB and 1 GB - residing on SSD 2"5 Samsung 870 QVO 8TB SATA III 560/530 MB/s drive
2] various audio formats plus some JPGs and TXTs, 12378 of them, weighting altogether 64.2 GB, individually starting with weight from ~50 KB and ending with weight of ~100 MB but mostly [around 85% of them] in size between 1 and 10 MB - residing on NVMe M.2 2280 Samsung 980 PRO 1TB PCle 4.0 drive
3] various document formats but mostly PDFs, 2769 of them, weighting altogether 1.4 GB, individually starting with weight from under 1 KB and ending with weight of ~12 MB but mostly [around 86% of them] under the size of 340 KB - residing on SSD 2.5" Samsung 850 EVO 500GB SATA III 540/520 MB/s 512MB cache drive
Between each of sub-tests [i.e. between 5 GB video and 1 GB and then that whole set of audio files] I gave the drive dozens of second, to cool off itself and clear its cache and give the OS chance to release computing resources [all whatever is a possible benefit of being idle]. In summary: test started with huge files and ended with small and tiny ones, placed on three different drives
As I said, those files were copied to the same 870 QVO 4TB drive placed in:
A] newly bought NO NAME / AliExpress USB 3.0 enclosure [portable case] - and connected to USB-A 3.2 Gen 1 slot placed on the back I/O panel of mobo
B] old NO NAME SATA to USB 3.0 converter - and connected to USB-A 3.2 Gen 1 slot placed on the back I/O panel of mobo [the same one]
C] newly bought Unitek DiskGuard Limpid R USB-C to SATA Enclosure S1103D USB 3.2 Gen 2×1 - and connected to USB-C 3.2 Gen 2 slot placed on the back panel of mobo
D] free space on the desk because I do not have a PC case right now - and connected to SATA3 6Gb/s internal connector [one of those that I want to stop using along with the power cable coming out from PSU]
[*Plus there was also one extra copying done for comparison to SSD 2.5" ADATA Ultimate SU900 256GB SATA III 560/525 MB/s MLC drive utilizing the method "A". And that drive was the only one that has its cache-writing turned off with the option available at Windows System > Control Panel > Device Manager > Disk drives > (DRIVE) > Properties > Policies]
And finally the results: they were all over the place
Sometimes SATA was profoundly better even than USB 3.2 while with other files sometimes USB 3.0 was [illogically] faster than SATA. There were also numerous cases when transfer started steady but started to differentiate at alarming rate; or steady itself after 1/4 or 1/2 of file was done - with big video files and audio files I would get a range from 110 to 310 MB/s while that largest video and tiny documents would jump all over the place
The the only consistent and repeatable value, which I could spot early on, was the speed of verifying tests done by TeraCopy itself after the copying process had ended. For method "C" and "D" [i.e. conventional / ordinary SATA 6Gb/s method and high-end enclosure using fastest USB resulting with overall 10Gbit/s capability] it was 267-268 MB/s. While for method "A" and "B" [i.e. cheap hardware without specification provided by its unknown manufacturer] it was 235 MB/s. Those two values were establishing themselves quickly and did not change until TeraCopy was done with the chek-up. So based on that latter data, it seems that with older technology and when not paying attention to set-up I will achieve 86% of what I get with a traditional SATA or when switching to high-end workarounds with a proper connectivity
As for the actual copying process speeds [i.e. all that what TeraCopy was dong before check-ups], they would usually start with middle value, go down, then speed up to a high and come down to middle value- at least with big video files. Because with small audio and documents the changes were more profound and happening much quicker and showing often very oscillating values that were hard to decide what was the average during a period of [lets say] 10 seconds; which was logical as the small and tiny files varied a lot. But once I repeated almost right away copying of some video file and got staggering different results that a minute ago. Plus 3 times TeraCopy for whatever reason decided no to perform [or just not to show me as a separate task] the process of verification [even despite me trying to see it by over-copying the files], which in the end resulted with no data
I know I could list here even more parameters [like my other PC components] - and that also I should repeat those tests but in a much stricter environment [like turn of the constantly playing audio player and disconnect drives that were not in use in a given variant of test]. But I just do not have the time and energy and I am not running a YouTube tech channel. But I did do what I could without disrupting my light work, i.e. turned off all of the unnecessary software and background tasks that I could thing of and made sure I am using the fastest USB slots as my mobo has many different ones. I also made sure that there was ~20% free space on the destination drive before starting a test. So these tests were more close to how I use those drives and not to some hypothetical and perfect set and settings from factories benchmarks, done with real life various data. I would also like to take the opportunity here and point out that my real life speeds were half or 1/3rd of those stipulated by the manufacturer of those various drives [i.e. Samsung company]
All in all I can now backup my educated guest from aforementioned old topic, that I can ditch SATA connection and switch entirely to USB without loss - assuming I will buy the proper [more expensive] equipment
Back then I predicted a ~17% loss with bad [not adequate enough] hardware being used - and now [the consisted part of ] my empirical data shows measured quite precisely loss in the value of 12.5%
Does anyone has some other thoughts, ideas or empirical data?
The result are almost largely ambiguous and to some extent inconclusive - but also somewhat valid
The tests consistent of coping files with the usage of TeraCopy 3.6, on Windows 10 Enterprise 20H2 19042.746 installed from scratch on NVMe M.2 2280 Samsung 980 PRO 500GB PCle 4.0. The motherboard was Gigabyte X570 Aorus Ultra rev. 1.2
The files were always* copied to SSD 2"5 Samsung 870 QVO 4TB SATA III 560/530 MB/s drive. They were [in that order]:
1] single video files in the size of 75 GB, 20.5 GB, 10 GB, 5 GB and 1 GB - residing on SSD 2"5 Samsung 870 QVO 8TB SATA III 560/530 MB/s drive
2] various audio formats plus some JPGs and TXTs, 12378 of them, weighting altogether 64.2 GB, individually starting with weight from ~50 KB and ending with weight of ~100 MB but mostly [around 85% of them] in size between 1 and 10 MB - residing on NVMe M.2 2280 Samsung 980 PRO 1TB PCle 4.0 drive
3] various document formats but mostly PDFs, 2769 of them, weighting altogether 1.4 GB, individually starting with weight from under 1 KB and ending with weight of ~12 MB but mostly [around 86% of them] under the size of 340 KB - residing on SSD 2.5" Samsung 850 EVO 500GB SATA III 540/520 MB/s 512MB cache drive
Between each of sub-tests [i.e. between 5 GB video and 1 GB and then that whole set of audio files] I gave the drive dozens of second, to cool off itself and clear its cache and give the OS chance to release computing resources [all whatever is a possible benefit of being idle]. In summary: test started with huge files and ended with small and tiny ones, placed on three different drives
As I said, those files were copied to the same 870 QVO 4TB drive placed in:
A] newly bought NO NAME / AliExpress USB 3.0 enclosure [portable case] - and connected to USB-A 3.2 Gen 1 slot placed on the back I/O panel of mobo
B] old NO NAME SATA to USB 3.0 converter - and connected to USB-A 3.2 Gen 1 slot placed on the back I/O panel of mobo [the same one]
C] newly bought Unitek DiskGuard Limpid R USB-C to SATA Enclosure S1103D USB 3.2 Gen 2×1 - and connected to USB-C 3.2 Gen 2 slot placed on the back panel of mobo
D] free space on the desk because I do not have a PC case right now - and connected to SATA3 6Gb/s internal connector [one of those that I want to stop using along with the power cable coming out from PSU]
[*Plus there was also one extra copying done for comparison to SSD 2.5" ADATA Ultimate SU900 256GB SATA III 560/525 MB/s MLC drive utilizing the method "A". And that drive was the only one that has its cache-writing turned off with the option available at Windows System > Control Panel > Device Manager > Disk drives > (DRIVE) > Properties > Policies]
And finally the results: they were all over the place
Sometimes SATA was profoundly better even than USB 3.2 while with other files sometimes USB 3.0 was [illogically] faster than SATA. There were also numerous cases when transfer started steady but started to differentiate at alarming rate; or steady itself after 1/4 or 1/2 of file was done - with big video files and audio files I would get a range from 110 to 310 MB/s while that largest video and tiny documents would jump all over the place
The the only consistent and repeatable value, which I could spot early on, was the speed of verifying tests done by TeraCopy itself after the copying process had ended. For method "C" and "D" [i.e. conventional / ordinary SATA 6Gb/s method and high-end enclosure using fastest USB resulting with overall 10Gbit/s capability] it was 267-268 MB/s. While for method "A" and "B" [i.e. cheap hardware without specification provided by its unknown manufacturer] it was 235 MB/s. Those two values were establishing themselves quickly and did not change until TeraCopy was done with the chek-up. So based on that latter data, it seems that with older technology and when not paying attention to set-up I will achieve 86% of what I get with a traditional SATA or when switching to high-end workarounds with a proper connectivity
As for the actual copying process speeds [i.e. all that what TeraCopy was dong before check-ups], they would usually start with middle value, go down, then speed up to a high and come down to middle value- at least with big video files. Because with small audio and documents the changes were more profound and happening much quicker and showing often very oscillating values that were hard to decide what was the average during a period of [lets say] 10 seconds; which was logical as the small and tiny files varied a lot. But once I repeated almost right away copying of some video file and got staggering different results that a minute ago. Plus 3 times TeraCopy for whatever reason decided no to perform [or just not to show me as a separate task] the process of verification [even despite me trying to see it by over-copying the files], which in the end resulted with no data
I know I could list here even more parameters [like my other PC components] - and that also I should repeat those tests but in a much stricter environment [like turn of the constantly playing audio player and disconnect drives that were not in use in a given variant of test]. But I just do not have the time and energy and I am not running a YouTube tech channel. But I did do what I could without disrupting my light work, i.e. turned off all of the unnecessary software and background tasks that I could thing of and made sure I am using the fastest USB slots as my mobo has many different ones. I also made sure that there was ~20% free space on the destination drive before starting a test. So these tests were more close to how I use those drives and not to some hypothetical and perfect set and settings from factories benchmarks, done with real life various data. I would also like to take the opportunity here and point out that my real life speeds were half or 1/3rd of those stipulated by the manufacturer of those various drives [i.e. Samsung company]
All in all I can now backup my educated guest from aforementioned old topic, that I can ditch SATA connection and switch entirely to USB without loss - assuming I will buy the proper [more expensive] equipment
Back then I predicted a ~17% loss with bad [not adequate enough] hardware being used - and now [the consisted part of ] my empirical data shows measured quite precisely loss in the value of 12.5%
Does anyone has some other thoughts, ideas or empirical data?
Last edited:
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