(another) 8 GB Voyager GT underperforming

[velho]

Hello to everyone on this forum, and many thanks to Ram Guy, providing great assistance to us users.

 

Anyway, the reason why I'm here is, I bought an 8 GB Voyager GT a week ago, and I've noticed that the performance I'm getting from it isn't really very close to the specified numbers of approx. 34mb/s read, 27mb/s write. I'm getting an average of 22-24 read, and around 19-20 write, which I thought was a bit low. I've tested the drive in HDBench, HDTach, Everest and a couple others, always getting the above values. Reading through other people's posts on this forum, I've realized that this is in fact below the factory spec, and users with these results have been advised to have their drives replaced.

 

Now, my question is this: I know Corsair replaces their product free of charge, but since I'm from Croatia (that's in Europe, for those who don't know :biggrin:), shipping the drive to the States is really not an option (the shipping cost would be around the price of the drive itself). So I'd like to know if the drive underperforming is really a valid reason to ask my retailer for a replacement unit. Anyone had experiences with this?

 

I'd appreciate any kind of response, thanks.

[RAM GUY]

You can always ask the reseller to help you, most will be happy to especially if its with in the fist 30-90 days. But it is up to the reseller.

However we would be happy to get it replaced, please use the On Line RMA Request Form and we will be happy to replace it.

 

And I would suggest contacting our customer service first before you ship it they might have another route for you.

[DisaV]

velho, I have read enough posts on this and other forums, and I can tell you, today you can't buy Voyager GT with speeds R/W 34/27 Mb/s. Only first parties of them have had such a speeds. Next, due to yearning for lower its cost price, Corsair become to use cheaper flash chips (and/or controller), and therefore now we have 24/20 consequent R/W speeds. My 8 Gb Voyager GT shows this values as well as yours. This is a standard for today's GTs, it's not a defect. May be the parts, intended for an american market, has higher speeds, but that's quite doubtful.

 

RAM GUY, why You (Corsair) won't fairly declare, that now mentioned speeds are norm, not a deviation? You get an unnecessary headache by renouncing the obvious fact. Users get disappointment, receiving less than they have originally expected.

Is expensive chips cost more then company's reputation and users' trust?

 

And yes, you provide excellent support here, respect...

[Yellowbeard]

RAM GUY, why You (Corsair) won't fairly declare, that now mentioned speeds are norm, not a deviation? You get an unnecessary headache by renouncing the obvious fact. Users get disappointment, receiving less than they have originally expected.

Is expensive chips cost more then company's reputation and users' trust?

 

And yes, you provide excellent support here, respect...

 

 

http://www.houseofhelp.com/forums/showpost.php?p=332086&postcount=2

[RAM GUY]

DisaV

2,4, and 8 Gig GT Flash Voyagers are no longer available so it is a mute point.

The cost to produce these drives using SLC Technology has made the price 2-3 times what you can build one using MLC technology and we are not the only manufacturer to make that change it is industry wide. I would suspect some smaller manufacturers will still be able to produce smaller SLC drives but the cost right now is prohibitive for any one.

Look at it from a resellers point they can buy 2Gig Flash drives for 15.00 USD or 2 Gig fast Flash Drives for 50.00 USD each.

Which one will you be willing to tie up you money in? I understand you as a consumer want the fastest drive but push come to shove when you all are going to the store to make the purchase 99 out of 100 people are getting the drive that costs 15.00 USD

While I am on your side here I have to also see the side of the resellers especially when they ask for returns of the faster drives cause they cannot sell them.

 

Maybe its a marketing thing or just because most people don't really know the difference, but that is how this market is.

But I know for a fact many people have found out the hard way what the difference is and are now willing to get more performance. My suggestion would be to make these requests to your resellers and push them to get the faster products.

Most resellers do not care anything about the performance only what they can sell. And right now that is the MLC based Flash products.

[DisaV]

RAM GUY, thank you for the informative answer. But some nuance here...

Initially conversation was about first and following GTs, both of them use SLC technology, but its speeds differs noticeably without any mention, I just think that it's unfair (i don't know, how differs its production cost, but suppose, not that much)... Well, you say, that type of drives becomes history now, so let them alone...

Then, when you say about 2-3 times price difference between SLC and MLC drives, at the same time we can see colossal speed difference between its, i.e., by writing of many small files on the drive, that more then compensate price. And, in respond to your question, I shall choose 50 USD drive. And so many others, who have seen the performance difference in real life. About resellers' dissatisfaction - I don't see much of the unsold GT drives on their shelves - this drives always found its buyer, IMHO... Of course, you know better...

BTW, is new big GTs going to be MLC-based? Aren't GT suffix will be ridiculous then?

 

Sorry my bad English, i'm from Russia.

[velho]

Thanks for the info, DisaV.

 

But on the whole I guess I'm even more confused now than at the start. The reason why I even considered the possibility of getting a replacement drive wasn't that I was disappointed in it, but another user on this forum had exactly the same issue with his Voyager GT, and Ram Guy advised him to ask for a replacement, because the drive was actually performing below spec. Now, if the current situation has led to the decrease of the expected read/write speeds of the drives, that is what I would like to know.

 

Put simply: is it now normal for the GT to perform within the limits that I described, or is it still considered to be a sort of defect? DisaV, you say that your drive is performing identically, did you try to contact your reseller about this?

 

Anyway, my point is simply that if the drives are expected to be slower now, I would just like Corsair to tell me so, so that I don't feel disappointed because my drive is 10 MB/s slower than someone else's identical product. I've sent my GT to the official distributor for Corsair in my country, so I'll see what they tell me, and post back here.

[RAM GUY]

I am sorry as we do not have much control over what resellers post or publish, but we have never published performance data on our flash products. And the Speed may have changed from drives that were made two years ago to now but we are making drives with bigger densities and more features than we were before. So if you are trying to Compare a drive that was made two years ago with one that happens to made now there might be some performance difference but that would be because of technology and they way it has evolved. If we could make something for a longer time with out changing anything we would but that is not the trend of electronics. The average production life of components is about 6-12 months and flash memory has proven to a bit volatile over the last year or so.

[Doogie]

I am sorry as we do not have much control over what resellers post or publish, but we have never published performance data on our flash products. And the Speed may have changed from drives that were made two years ago to now but we are making drives with bigger densities and more features than we were before. So if you are trying to Compare a drive that was made two years ago with one that happens to made now there might be some performance difference but that would be because of technology and they way it has evolved. If we could make something for a longer time with out changing anything we would but that is not the trend of electronics. The average production life of components is about 6-12 months and flash memory has proven to a bit volatile over the last year or so.

 

While that may be technically true, you have publicized the testing by others with the knowledge that it sells your drives. For example on this forum you post the following sticky http://www.houseofhelp.com/forums/showthread.php?t=33550 which states "...the Corsair unit kicked the living crap out of the SanDisk".

If you're going to readily make such information available to the buying public, then you've got to expect disappointment when the drives don't perform "as advertised".

C'mon Ram Guy! We know you don't make the marketing decisions, so there's no need to hide behind platitudes :roll:

[Wired]

While that may be technically true, you have publicized the testing by others with the knowledge that it sells your drives. For example on this forum you post the following sticky http://www.houseofhelp.com/forums/showthread.php?t=33550 which states "...the Corsair unit kicked the living crap out of the SanDisk".

If you're going to readily make such information available to the buying public, then you've got to expect disappointment when the drives don't perform "as advertised".

That thread was started 12-20-2004 FYI :)

[Doogie]

That thread was started 12-20-2004 FYI :)

 

If it is misleading, then take it down and stop helping to create the impression that buyer should expect to achieve similar performance from the products you're now selling...if/when you leave it up for people to find and read on Corsair's own forum, you're being intentionally misleading...point made! ;):

[Yellowbeard]

Think about it this way. I can't go to a car dealership and buy a new 2004 model car and expect the same performance. It's 2008 now yet the new cars perform differently from the 2004 models. We also cannot erase all of the reviews, millions of Google hits, personal websites, and other forums that have this same type of information posted about our drives. What you are suggesting is simply unrealistic. We are not advertising a specification here so there is no intent to mislead anyone.

[velho]

Think about it this way. I can't go to a car dealership and buy a new 2004 model car and expect the same performance. It's 2008 now yet the new cars perform differently from the 2004 models.... We are not advertising a specification here so there is no intent to mislead anyone.

 

Well, maybe that's precisely the problem. If I want to buy a new car, then I know exactly what kind of specifications I'm getting from it; what the power of the engine is, top speed, etc. And of course every new generation of any product changes and evolves, I understand that. But I think that the end user should be allowed to know what he can expect from the product that he purchases. And nowhere have I seen official statements from Corsair which state that the newer models of the Voyager GT should be expected to perform slower than the older models. If that was simply published or stated somewhere, that would be enough for me.

 

But as it is, when I posted my original question, I was advised to get the drive replaced. That implies that my product is not performing as it should, and that the replacement would be a faster drive.

And ultimately, if the performance of the GT is its main selling point, then why doesn't Corsair publish official specs of the drives? That to me seems the logical thing to do. Even if you stated that the expected performance varies from 34 MB/s to 24 MB/s, at least it would be a reference point for the potential buyer. As it is, the only reference for the speed of the drive are various reviews on the web, and the claims of the resellers, all of which say that the read/write speeds of the Voyager GT are approx. 34/27 read/write respectively. And it's this fact that causes dissatisfaction with the customer.

[Doogie]

Well, maybe that's precisely the problem. If I want to buy a new car, then I know exactly what kind of specifications I'm getting from it; what the power of the engine is, top speed, etc. And of course every new generation of any product changes and evolves, I understand that. But I think that the end user should be allowed to know what he can expect from the product that he purchases. And nowhere have I seen official statements from Corsair which state that the newer models of the Voyager GT should be expected to perform slower than the older models. If that was simply published or stated somewhere, that would be enough for me.

 

But as it is, when I posted my original question, I was advised to get the drive replaced. That implies that my product is not performing as it should, and that the replacement would be a faster drive.

And ultimately, if the performance of the GT is its main selling point, then why doesn't Corsair publish official specs of the drives? That to me seems the logical thing to do. Even if you stated that the expected performance varies from 34 MB/s to 24 MB/s, at least it would be a reference point for the potential buyer. As it is, the only reference for the speed of the drive are various reviews on the web, and the claims of the resellers, all of which say that the read/write speeds of the Voyager GT are approx. 34/27 read/write respectively. And it's this fact that causes dissatisfaction with the customer.

 

...and it would be disappointing enough for a company like Corsair, with a reputation for high performance hardware, to stand by passively as the their current porducts were widely mischaracterized by old performance posts and buyers mislead into believing that performance of the curent products should be at least as good as the older products...but it is worse than that! By posting links to older performance tests, quoting the performance reviews ("...the Corsair unit kicked the living crap out of the SanDisk")and not changing the product name of the current drives. This all looks like an intentional process designed to sell a lesser product under the mantle of a superior product that is no longer available...OK, you didn't create the performance data, but you still post links to it and you've done nothing to refute it. Remember that old saw about "If you're not a part of the solution, you must be a part of the problem"?

Does anyone believe that if the old performance data was poorer than what your drives are currently capable of, that you guys wouldn't clear that up immediately and that you would post links to the older performance test??? I don't think so...:roll:

[Yellowbeard]

. And nowhere have I seen official statements from Corsair which state that the newer models of the Voyager GT should be expected to perform slower than the older models. If that was simply published or stated somewhere, that would be enough for me.

 

You mean like it is multiple times in this thread by RAM GUY?

 

Or, clearly documented in the recent reviews we linked here: Voyager Reviews

 

Or as it is explained above?

I am sorry as we do not have much control over what resellers post or publish, but we have never published performance data on our flash products. And the Speed may have changed from drives that were made two years ago to now but we are making drives with bigger densities and more features than we were before. So if you are trying to Compare a drive that was made two years ago with one that happens to made now there might be some performance difference but that would be because of technology and they way it has evolved. If we could make something for a longer time with out changing anything we would but that is not the trend of electronics. The average production life of components is about 6-12 months and flash memory has proven to a bit volatile over the last year or so.

Remember, the facts you are tossing about here stem back from 2004. You just can't go buy a new Roadrunner with a 426 hemi any longer.

[Doogie]

You mean like it is multiple times in this thread by RAM GUY?

 

Or, clearly documented in the recent reviews we linked here: Voyager Reviews

 

Or as it is explained above? Remember, the facts you are tossing about here stem back from 2004. You just can't go buy a new Roadrunner with a 426 hemi any longer.

 

You're right about that, but since when has anyone bought or sold an automobile without specifying the year that the model was manufactured? They do this because the market expects and anticiaptes changes from year to year.

 

Do I have to actually say this? TAKE OFF THE STICKY WITH THE LINKS TO THE OLD PERFORMANCE DATA! It doesnt do anything for your current products except mischaracterize them! :mad:

[RAM GUY]

Doogie

The page is current and past reviews and the date is one of the first thing that is listed. But your request is a bit unrealistic. One of the first things I look for when looking at a review of any product is the person who wrote it and the date they wrote it.

[Doogie]

Doogie

The page is current and past reviews and the date is one of the first thing that is listed. But your request is a bit unrealistic. One of the first things I look for when looking at a review of any product is the person who wrote it and the date they wrote it.

 

OK I'll drop it...clearly we think differently! I can't understand why you'd post anything that could mislead a buyer...guess I'll have to be satisfied with the fact you're comfortable with it :roll:

[RAM GUY]

Doogie,

I do not have control over anything that is posted or published out side of this forum. And if our marketing has posted or published something that is not correct please let me know what that is and I will do my best to address it but I don't see anything wrong with something that was published more than 2 years ago. How can I change the past?

[Wired]

I think he's upset because someone is not explicitly stating in the FAQ post that "this link goes to an old review, and new sticks may not perform the same as old ones", in spite of each post having a time / date stamp.

[Doogie]

I think he's upset because someone is not explicitly stating in the FAQ post that "this link goes to an old review, and new sticks may not perform the same as old ones", in spite of each post having a time / date stamp.

 

That's pretty much it...I would only add this...The sticky entitled "Flash Reviews!" contains links to performance data that the current drives are incapable of reproducing and since this information doesn't apply to what you now sell under the same name, there's no good reason to post it. I would take it down rather than risk misrepresenting what you now are selling.

Just because the post is old doesn't mean that the public will naturally assume that the drives you sell today won't do at least as well...most people anticipate that with time, technology performance improves rather than regresses. Given this and the fact that the links are found in a prominent post on Corsair's forum, some of us poor dumb customers are going to get the wrong idea! :roll:

[velho]

Just because the post is old doesn't mean that the public will naturally assume that the drives you sell today won't do at least as well...most people anticipate that with time, technology performance improves rather than regresses. Given this and the fact that the links are found in a prominent post on Corsair's forum, some of us poor dumb customers are going to get the wrong idea!

 

Yeah, I agree with Doogie completely, and while it may not be absolutely necessary to remove the older reviews from the 'Flash Reviews!' thread (that actually wasn't what threw me off), I would suggest mentioning the difference in performance between the older and newer drives, in the Performance Update Thread. I think that would clear things up for new customers (well, it would certainly have helped me :biggrin:)

 

Just one more curiosity: going through the Voyager Reviews, I've noticed that the most recent review of any Corsair flash drive there is the one on CNET (dated 12/11/2007), where they reviewed the 16 gig version of the Voyager (not GT, mind you), and they claim its read speed to be 24.5 mb/s. Ironically, this is a bit faster than my 8 gig GT and the GT versions of both the Survivor and Voyager that have been reviewed in 2007 (the oldest review I've read was dated July, 2007). Don't get me wrong, I'm not complaining, I just thought it was an interesting piece of information. :D:

[RAM GUY]

Yeah, I agree with Doogie completely, and while it may not be absolutely necessary to remove the older reviews from the FAQ thread (that actually wasn't what threw me off), I would suggest mentioning the difference in performance between the older and newer drives, in the Performance Update Thread. I think that would clear things up for new customers (well, it would certainly have helped me )

There is no such thread that has been posted by us. Please post a link to the thread you are talking about!

 

Just one more curiosity: going through the Voyager Reviews, I've noticed that the most recent review of any Corsair flash drive there is the one on CNET (dated 12/11/2007), where they reviewed the 16 gig version of the Voyager (not GT, mind you), and they claim its read speed to be 24.5 mb/s. Ironically, this is a bit faster than my 8 gig GT and the GT versions of both the Survivor and Voyager that have been reviewed in 2007 (the oldest review I've read was dated July, 2007). Don't get me wrong, I'm not complaining, I just thought it was an interesting piece of information.

 

Then it sounds like you have a faulty drive and we need to get it replaced, please use the On Line RMA Request Form and we will be happy to replace it.

[velho]

There is no such thread that has been posted by us. Please post a link to the thread you are talking about!

 

Sorry, I got mixed up. I didn't mean the FAQ thread, but the Flash Reviews! one.

 

As for the Performance Update thread, I was referring to the March 16, 2007: Flash Voyager and Flash Voyager GT Performance Update sticky. Just thought you could mention the difference in the performance of the newer drives as opposed to the older models. It seemed an appropriate thread for the subject. But it was just a suggestion

[RAM GUY]

That thread was a year old, but I have removed it just the same. We might post a new one or revise that one so it is more current. Flash Reviews are posted from reviewers that post reviews on our products. I will review the ones that are posted and try to make sure any that are not realistic get removed is the best I can do.