Bought 2 SSDs for RAID0--not even getting the (advertised) speed of a single drive in a benchmark...Edit: Updated!

So I've been at this for hours...my motherboard is an eVGA X58 SLI3 with the Marvell SATA3 controller and I'm using this [newegg.com] drive (x2 for RAID0). I used the preinstall driver before I installed Windows, and the benchmarks are pretty lackluster. I'm getting 260MB/s write and 420MB/s read...I was expecting significantly faster speeds...a single drive is advertised to operate at 550MB/s read and 510MB/s write, so in my RAID I was expecting around 1GB/s read/write. WTF am I doing wrong?



Edit: Switched the RAID to the Intel controller and the speed is definitely faster, but still not as fast as it should be...unless my math is wrong? I'm assuming since SATA ports are serial, that I should be getting the max speed of two ports combined--i.e. 3Gbps x 2, or 750MB/s. Is that incorrect?

That first gen Marvell SATA III controller is the bottleneck.

http://www.overclock.net/t/119859...lease-help
http://www.tomshardware.com/forum...-evga-sli3

Also, search for "Marvell" in newegg reviews for your board.

Quote from dhc014 : That first gen Marvell SATA III controller is the bottleneck. http://www.overclock.net/t/119859...lease-help http://www.tomshardware.com/forum...-evga-sli3 Also, search for "Marvell" in newegg reviews for your board.

Just got this response over on the eVGA forums:

"The marvell controller on the x58 boards are not "true" SATA3 due to being connected to the chipset through the pcie x1 lane. The pcie x1 lane severely bottlenecks the performance of SATAIII ssds, so either setup the raid on the intel ports SATA II controller or upgrade to a sandy bridge system which does not have this limitation."

...definitely sucks, guess I should've done a bit of research before buying these drives.

That said, I guess I'm in the market for a new motherboard, and thusly a new processor. Is the 3930K and LGA2011 worth the extra money over the 3770K and Ivy Bridge?

Do you really need SSDs in RAID 0 that badly? Cut your losses and return/sell one of the SSDs and enjoy the performance of a single SSD. Most RAID controllers won't pass the TRIM command to SSDs in RAID, so after a while, the benefits of the RAID lessen.

Quote from dhc014 : Do you really need SSDs in RAID 0 that badly? Cut your losses and return/sell one of the SSDs and enjoy the performance of a single SSD. Most RAID controllers won't pass the TRIM command to SSDs in RAID, so after a while, the benefits of the RAID lessen.

I'm no expert about trim and I also have two SSDs in RAID0, and what I would like to know is what are the losses that would occur with no trim and what is "awhile".
Are we talking a month, a year, several years?
BTW: In my case, the main reason for the RAID0 is for size. (2 X 80 gigs)
I don't want to have to watch myself all the time, as if I was on a digital diet.

Quote from RockySosua : I'm no expert about trim and I also have two SSDs in RAID0, and what I would like to know is what are the losses that would occur with no trim and what is "awhile". Are we talking a month, a year, several years? BTW: In my case, the main reason for the RAID0 is for size. (2 X 80 gigs) I don't want to have to watch myself all the time, as if I was on a digital diet.

Those are difficult questions to answer. First of all, some drives (Kingston V100+) have full-time garbage collection routines that run without TRIM. Some people have claimed that the speed boost from the drives in RAID 0 outweighs the loss due to lack of TRIM, I would tend to agree that this is true.

I was just encouraging the OP to save some money due to his specific circumstances. RAID 0 may be a great solution for others.

Quote from dhc014 : Those are difficult questions to answer. First of all, some drives (Kingston V100+) have full-time garbage collection routines that run without TRIM. Some people have claimed that the speed boost from the drives in RAID 0 outweighs the loss due to lack of TRIM, I would tend to agree that this is true. I was just encouraging the OP to save some money due to his specific circumstances. RAID 0 may be a great solution for others.

Understood.
I've heard about the trim issue with RAID0 several times, and as I have seen no direct evidence of deterioration across 2 1/2 years, it makes me wonder just how long it takes for the problem to become noticeable.

Quote from RockySosua : Understood. I've heard about the trim issue with RAID0 several times, and as I have seen no direct evidence of deterioration across 2 1/2 years, it makes me wonder just how long it takes for the problem to become noticeable.

We've already discussed this Rocky. There is performance degradation, but not much, maybe 20% at the absolute top end with 5% max being normal. Obviously the performance hit would increase as you came closer to filling both RAID0 drives. In either case the hit would not come anywhere near erasing the performance benefits of using RAID0.

The better question is whether or not you need the performance benefit. To me, prematurely upgrading your entire mobo and cpu just to hit that performance level is silly. Just use one drive and then wait for your next normal upgrade cycle.

Quote from brbubba : The better question is whether or not you need the performance benefit. To me, prematurely upgrading your entire mobo and cpu just to hit that performance level is silly. Just use one drive and then wait for your next normal upgrade cycle.

Agreed, unless the OP needs a lot of space.
If he's an avid gamer and wants to have all his games on the SSD's, then it could be advantageous to have two of those120 giggers.

Quote from RockySosua : Agreed, unless the OP needs a lot of space. If he's an avid gamer and wants to have all his games on the SSD's, then it could be advantageous to have two of those120 giggers.

That's the only reason I could see for it. Then again I never thought gamers were a rational bunch of people when they were out spending $400 for a video card.

Updated my OP...any thoughts?

I think that the advertised speeds for your SSD are seriously exaggerated and that you are in fact getting double the true speed with your RAID0 array.

Quote from RockySosua : I think that the advertised speeds for your SSD are seriously exaggerated and that you are in fact getting double the true speed with your RAID0 array.

If that's the case--then a single drive wouldn't even be maxing out a single SATA2 threshold...seems unlikely IMO.

Quote from prozac4312 : If that's the case--then a single drive wouldn't even be maxing out a single SATA2 threshold...seems unlikely IMO.

There's no way that a mechanical 7200 rpm is going to surpass half your single drive read speed, (420 divided by two is 210 mbps and you'd be lucky to get half that from a regular HD) and your SSD's random seek is probably 30 times as fast as a mechanical drive.
(I'm not 100% sure that I understood what you wrote, so if my reply doesn't make sense, it would be because I didn't understand your comment.)