P128 is VERY SLOW

I Bought the drive and installed Windows 7 64bit. It was freezing all the time and I got tired of it and did not want to spend the time to fix it so I canned it and loaded XP 32 bit. On windows 7 with CrystalDiskMark I got 220 MB read and about 190 write. So yesterday I formatted the drive and loaded XP and the drivers for my PC and all works great. No errors and no issues. But I noticed it was slow so I ran CrystalDiskMark 2.2 and 3.0 beta and HD tune and all are the same. 89.87 MB read and 64 Write (are you kidding). My regular HD is faster then that. What the hell happened??? it is running at less them HALF the speed. I just bought it like 30 days ago. I changed nothing in the bios. The only difference is now I have XP.

 

Computer

 

Operating System Microsoft Windows XP Professional

OS Service Pack Service Pack 3

CPU Type QuadCore Intel Core 2 Quad Q9550, 2833 MHz (8.5 x 333)

Motherboard Name EVGA NF68 (2 PCI, 2 PCI-E x1, 3 PCI-E x16, 4 DDR2

Motherboard Chipset nVIDIA nForce 680i SLI

System Memory 2048 MB (DDR2-667 DDR2 SDRAM)

Display

Video Adapter NVIDIA GeForce 8800 GT (512 MB)

Monitor Dell E228WFP (Digital) [22" LCD] (KU31171L4V4M)

 

Multimedia

Audio Adapter C-Media CMI8738/C3DX Audio Device

 

Storage

IDE Controller NVIDIA nForce Serial ATA Controller

IDE Controller NVIDIA nForce Serial ATA Controller

IDE Controller NVIDIA nForce Serial ATA Controller

IDE Controller Standard Dual Channel PCI IDE Controller

Disk Drive CORSAIR CMFSSD-128GG SCSI Disk Device (119 GB)

Disk Drive WDC WD10 01FALS-00J7B SCSI Disk Device (931 GB)

Optical Drive HL-DT-ST BDDVDRW UH08LS10 SCSI CdRom Device

SMART Hard Disks Status OK

 

Partitions

C: (NTFS) 119.2 GB (108.8 GB free)

D: (NTFS) 931.5 GB (655.7 GB free)

Total Size 1050.7 GB (764.5 GB free)

If you didn't tweak windows xp for SSD your drive will degrade very quickly also windows xp doesn't support TRIM so unless your regularly running garbage collection it will degrade. I would try windows 7 again. If its crashing all the time put in the windows 7 disc, click repair and run a memory test.

Did the windows 7 repair and mem test. The ram is good. The thing is on 7 I found that if I unplug my mouse and put it back that will unfreeze it sometimes. But like I said I killed 7 and am now on XP. My Mother Board doen't have AHCI mode either.

run a dos based secure erase utility first, then try Windows 7 again, I had a major slow down like you too, they seem to degrade very quickly, the reason behind this is because if you are installing things, or downloading things to your SSD, your SSD will use empty blocks before it uses blocks marked as free space, ie deleted data, sooner or later they get all clogged up with deleted data hence the slow down, thats what TRIM and garbage collection is going to be for when they get it right.

 

I have a 2nd Generic hard drive attached to my computer which I download everything to etc to stop my SSD's getting clogged up, the only thing installed on my SSD's is Windows 7, programme files and the latest game im playing for faster loading, other than that everything else runs off my generic.

 

you can get a very very fast secure erase utility, freeware and very easy to use, just make sure you set your drive as IDE in the bios : http://www.iishacks.com/index.php/2009/06/30/how-to-secure-erase-reset-an-intel-solid-state-drive-ssd/

Why 7 again, yes I did spend money on it, but XP is faster and I am a gamer, I don't care about features. Won't trim work on XP or something like trim? what can I use on it to speed it up. I don't know much about this stuff.

XP doesn't support TRIM, too old. Only thing you can do on XP to restore performance is to clear out the drive.

Clear out the drive/, meaning to back it up then reformat it, then ghost it back?

I thought the current SSD firmware had a function built in that would perform automatic GC during idle time, or was that shortly after power was applied and no disk access operations are going on? I know I read something like that many months ago and it was not TRIM, just a function of the firmware. I don't know if anyone could elaborate on that.

 

Edit: Found the posting in the firmware Q/A:

Q: Will the performance of my P-Series SSD reduce over time?

A: P-Series SSDs with firmware VBM18C1Q offers a “Performance Recovery” feature, which allows the controller to maintain optimal performance over time. For this feature to function the SSD must have at least 15% free space available and be formatted using the NTFS file system. The PC or laptop must then be cold-booted (i.e. turned on from a full power-off state, not a ‘reset’) and left in an idle state for one hour, after which time full performance will be restored.

 

So, if you turn on your computer and enter the BIOS settings or hit pause, something to stop the computer from booting, then return to your computer a few hours later (do this at night before you go to bed), and of course you have at least 15% free space, you should be golden if you are running an NTFS formatted drive. Actually that's not too bad and beats backing up and reloading images all the time.

 

-Joe

I want to use XP Professional on my P128 Drive. This PC will be a workstation for various creative programs (graphic design/music/video). This PC will not connected to the internet except for updating. The projects will be worked on and saved onto a second drive (not the P128).

 

If the P128 will only contain XP and the programs, what tweaks will be needed (as mentioned above)? Also, garbage collection was mentioned. Does this mean defragmenting the drive, or does it refer to using maintenance software like System Mechanic?