Hi I've been testing my new SSD performace with 'AS SSD' and 'HD Tune Pro' on my fresh install of Windows 7 and I'm not getting SATA3 speeds using my new Rocket 620 Card. I've tried changing the cable to a new SATA3 one and it has made no difference. I have a Crucial C300 and I should be getting 350+ MB/s but I'm only getting (approx) 200 MB/s. I'm using Windows 7 and have the set the BIOS to configure SATA as AHCI. I haven't installed any driver for the Rocket 620 in Win 7 as the instructions say that none is needed. If anyone is using this card is there a way to verify that the correct driver has been assigned? I have not installed any Intel drivers as I read that this could cause problems also. I did try installing them after testing but again this had no effect. Can you suggest what the issue could be? Operating System: Window 7 Pro Motherboard Model: Asus Maximus Formula x38 (with Rampage Formula Bios) System BIOS version: Rampage Formula 1001 BIOS System memory size: 4GB SSD Model: Crucial C300 128GB HDD Firmware version: 0002 RAID Configuration: None Cheers, A
MB/s Any Firmware update available ? Install Crystal Disk Mark 3.0 to bench your SSD, set it to 1000MB.
Indeed - I meant MB/s and not GB/s (whoops!) The SSD has the latest Firmware on it (0002) and I'm not even sure you can adjust the firmware on the rocket card. I'll have a look at Crystal Disk tonight. Cheers, A.
Open the Prompt command Fsutil behavior query disable deletenotify to see if the TRIM is activated. 0 = Yes 1 = no Yes = Good No = Cry and dont ever defrag your SSD (I'm seriously serious, it can cut your SSD life and perf in 2) the Windows defrag is disabled by default when you install a SSD but be carefull if you have and Freelance Defragmentation software.
Yes I've had a look at that - Trim is active 0 = Yes = Good And thanks for the tip on defragging - I've just been reading about that.....
also you can use SSD TWEAKER to disable the indexation, prefectcher, Superfetch etc etc number of thing who slow down a SSD.
I tried Crystal Disk and it's showing the same slow results Highpoint (the company that make the Rocket card) have got back to me on this issue and confirmed that there's no need to install any drivers for the card when installing/using Win 7 with this card. So I'm thinking it's got to be something else - I going to try the intel rapid storage drivers now but would welcome any other suggestions.
So I just tried switching to a different PCI-e slot and still no luck. I've also tried using the Intel chipset and rapid storage drivers as well. Connecting the SSD to the SATA 2 port I got sequential read speeds of 266MB/s - what you would expect when using SATA 2.
I'm not sure - I'll check in the office tomorrow. The only thing I can think of now is to flash the motherboard back to the standard bios, the maximus and rampage boards are exactly the same though apart from the x38 is upgraded to the x48 on the rampage (both are PCIe 2.0). Also loads of people have reported better performace and stability when doing using the rampage bios on the maximus so this is a long shot really. Otherwise I'm out of ideas so any more suggestions are appreciated
i'm wondering whether the 1x pcie slots are only running at v1.0 for some reason...(?) Well, after the 8b/10b encoding overhead (20% off the 250MB/s), a single 1.0 lane would give 200MB/s as the max throughput which, unless it's completely coincidental, is the speed you're getting. Yeah, it's not overly clear from looking at the manual for this board as to what they're supposed to run at - the 16x slots are definitely 2.0, but... The way to test this theory would be to stick the card in the 2nd 16x slot & see if that corrects the issue. it may also be that, by flashing an alt bios to your mobo, this has messed with things, but without reverting there's no way to tell. Otherwise, 'arsing around' with the bios achi/raid/... settings is a complete waste of time as it only alters the on-board controller, having no effect in the slightest on the Highpoint card. Likewise, the intel rst drivers are again for the on-board controller - it'd kind of be like updating your sound card drivers where, whilst it might improve your audio playback, it will not have any effect upon your mouse or gfx card or... ...or a 3rd party controller that does not use them.
Thank you so much PocketDemon - I tried the other PCIe x1 slot and got the same results but when I tried the PCIe x16 slot I got sequential read speeds of 350MB/s. So it seems that on this board the PCIe x1 slots are running in PCIe 1.0 mode and the PCIe x16 slots are in 2.0. In a way it's a shame that I have to use the second PCIe x16 slot up as I was hoping to put an NVIDIA card in there (for an ATI/Physx hybrid setup). From what I can see in the bios though there doesn't seem to be any control over the PCIe x1 slot speeds. Now I'm still tempted to try flashing the board back to the original bios to see if fixes the PCIe x1 port speed - I have a feeling that it won't make any difference though.........
No worries & pleased that sorted you out - yeah, simply that i know the limits of pcie lanes off the top of my head then it seemed to be a sensible thing to try. Normally, the only slots you 'might' have manual control over are the 16x ones, but that tends to be when you have 3 or more of them... ...& i'm pretty sure it's not an option on your board. Yeah, so whether it's a limitation of the board, bios or chipset (i can't remember the max lanes for the x38 boards off the top of my head) i couldn't tell you, but at least it working properly on the 16x one is a start & eliminates any issue with either the Highpoint card or SSD.
I can confirm that flashing back didn't help - I tried all the previous configuration combinations with the Maximus BIOS and got the same slow results as before. Annoyingly I did try and research the speed of the x1 slots before I purchased the card but found information this very scarce. So now I'm back using the Rampage BIOS with the rocket card in the second PCIe x16 slot - all working fine! Thanks again
same setup as you ajfsound, sorry i didn't spot the thread. found out that only the blue pci-e x16 slots are v2.0, all the white pci-e x1 plus the black soundcard / pci-e are v1.1/v1.0 does the rampage bios help with your overclock? i've got a maximus formula SE and the best i can manage so far is 380mhz fsb, even after trying other people's 400mhz bios configs. not sure what i'm missing to hit 400 mhz and 3.6 ghz on my Q6600
Sorry about the delayed response WarMadMax Flashing to the Rampage bios exposes full control over the tRD settings or 'performance level'. (Great article about that here: http://www.anandtech.com/show/2427). I was aiming to reduce memory latency as much as possible so it was worth me doing this but I haven't found it to be particularly more stable for overclocking. It does add a few more skews for NB and CPU which might help reach higher FSBs. You should be able to reach 400mhz FSB though - I'm stable at a moderate 420Mhz FSB with RAM at 1119 Mhz CAS 5, Perfomance level 6 and CPU at 3.6Ghz. There's a good reference to overclocking with this board at Xtreme Systems (http://www.xtremesystems.org/forums/showthread.php?t=179580) and there's a link to the bios settings and what they do in that first post. There are some things you should disable like CPU/PCIE Spread Spectrum, and DRAM Static read control. Also see http://www.overclock.net/intel-motherboards/269840-asus-rampage-formula-maximus-formula-p5e.html You should try leaving the memory and CPU at the default frequency and then pushing the FSB up - see how far you can take it by itself first. The limiting factor here could be your RAM - you may need to relax the timings or up the DRAM voltage.
Cheers ajfsound, when i get chance i'll look into it again. sods law i'll not get round to it, give up and move onto an i5 / i7 or the next big thing at some point. got a lot of stuff on and a working 3.4 ghz q6600 will suffice for now
