SSD Cache (SanDisk ReadyCache)

I just read this review over at [H]ard|OCP on the SanDisk 32gb SSD ReadyCache. Interesting idea...and affordable. Basic idea is to use a 32-gb SSD as high-speed cache for existing traditional hard disks. Simple installation without reinstalling Windows. Price is around $50.

I was wondering if John or Shane, or some of our other Gurus would care to offer an opinion. Heck, I'm sold on the 13-second boot time!

Darrel

Biggest problem I see is no XP compatibility, probably due to the the key marketing point being that you don't have to reinstall the OS to use it. Also, Samsung has an 830 for just $20 more that is 128Gb, and is a full-blown SSD. It's interesting, but not competitive.

http://www.amazon.com/SAMSUNG-2-5-I...cs&ie=UTF8&qid=1350569897&sr=1-3&keywords=ssd

FYI, Sandisk and the article boast that that a major advantage of the SSD cache is that you don't have to reinstall the OS. To that, I have two comments: First, you don't HAVE to reinstall the OS with a traditional SSD either; you can use it as a data drive to hold Trainz and whatever else. It's BETTER to have the SSD hold the OS as well as speed-critical applications like Trainz, but by no means is it mandatory. Second, reinstalling the OS is not necessarily a bad thing. I typically reinstall my gaming OS every several months or so. It gives me a chance to start with a clean, unfragmented disk, clean registry, etc. And, it can actually take less time than a disk defrag, though I recommend not using a quick format. I keep Trainz in a separate partition that won't be affected by an OS reinstallation.

Only thing I will say about SSD cache drives (after reading one of the major UK computer magazines) is that if it is to be removed for some reason, the associated software must be uninstalled prior to removing the drive from the system. Also, it may interfere with backup software.

Apart from that, they normally do help speed things up by storing information about frequently used files so the speed of these files can be improved.

Shane

It's an interesting idea and I have been looking into it recently. The main snag is that the software used to setup the cache drive is OEM and is not freely available. There is some free software but apparently not very reliable and also there is the risk of ssd write burn out.

I think it needs a bit more work/research before this can be made into a viable system set-up but having said that, the cost of bigger capacity ssd drives is coming down.

e.g.

http://superuser.com/questions/390071/how-can-i-use-my-small-ssd-as-a-cache-for-a-larger-hard-disk

There is nothing new about this technology, by the way, and appears to be trickling down from the high-end server market. Sun (Oracle) already does this with their database appliance the ODA as they call it.

I can say that this is a great idea, but the fact that you need a third-party driver for the device is a pain, and the driver is specific to that particular manufacturer. Maybe eventually these devices will be supported natively in the OS like hard drives are today. Way back in the old days, hard drives needed special controller drivers in order to work just like these things do now.


John

Isn't this effectively what Seagate and OCZ have incorporated into their hybrid SSD / mechanical drives?

Regarding SanDisk.
It may well work with your normal run of the mill software however we are talking Trainz.
I'd wait for some in depth reviews and benchmarks before wasting any money. The technology exists, however this is a different company providing SanDisk with the software which being limited to Win7 makes me a bit cautious, something like this shouldn't need to be OS dependant, unless they are tapping into the OS in some way?

I can't help thinking of certain diskcache programs, memory optimisers, speeded up dialup connections and other such rubbish from a few years back, most of which actually did nothing much other than produce fictitious performance improvement figures and collect money from those easily impressed by hyped up marketing blurb and phoney reviews.

Personally I think just using an SSD for Trainz would be a better option.

Malc,

This most likely is the same that is incorporated into the hybrid drives. In Oracle's sytem, they had 1TB SSDs for caching. Could you imagine on or two of those for Trainz!

I agree this setup sounds too OS specific. I too remember programs like Q-RAM and others to spead up the computers. The only program I fell for was this one and removed after I installed it because there wasn't any difference in system speed. It's like the old story "The Emperor's New Clothes".

John

Before getting one read up on the what to do's and don'ts for example don't defrag an SSD.

I have my OS on the SSD but Trainz on my hard drive. To much data in Trainz to keep it on the SSD. It works fine for me. Also if you use Steam then it will always install on the SSD but you can redirect it with a freeware program.

Do the research. A good place to read is http://www.anandtech.com/ or http://www.tomshardware.com/

Depends on how big the SSD is, I'm using a 240GB one, it's nowhere near full. also have one for the OS however that has zero effect on my Trainz installs on non SSD drives.

RRSignal said:

Biggest problem I see is no XP compatibility, probably due to the the key marketing point being that you don't have to reinstall the OS to use it. Also, Samsung has an 830 for just $20 more that is 128Gb, and is a full-blown SSD. It's interesting, but not competitive.

http://www.amazon.com/SAMSUNG-2-5-I...cs&ie=UTF8&qid=1350569897&sr=1-3&keywords=ssd

FYI, Sandisk and the article boast that that a major advantage of the SSD cache is that you don't have to reinstall the OS. To that, I have two comments: First, you don't HAVE to reinstall the OS with a traditional SSD either; you can use it as a data drive to hold Trainz and whatever else. It's BETTER to have the SSD hold the OS as well as speed-critical applications like Trainz, but by no means is it mandatory. Second, reinstalling the OS is not necessarily a bad thing. I typically reinstall my gaming OS every several months or so. It gives me a chance to start with a clean, unfragmented disk, clean registry, etc. And, it can actually take less time than a disk defrag, though I recommend not using a quick format. I keep Trainz in a separate partition that won't be affected by an OS reinstallation.

Click to expand...

Addendum: The SSD listed in the link went up $30+ in the 6 hours since I posted this. Hope you were quicker to the punch than I was, but the moral of the story is, shop around.

OK, Newegg's got it on sale for $39.99 + free shipping. I just placed the order & it should be in by Monday. I'll run some tests and post results. Most opinions I've read are positive, and the price is right until I build a new rig and spring for a full-blown SSD (sometime around the first of the year).

Darrel

Stagefright said:

OK, Newegg's got it on sale for $39.99 + free shipping. I just placed the order & it should be in by Monday. I'll run some tests and post results. Most opinions I've read are positive, and the price is right until I build a new rig and spring for a full-blown SSD (sometime around the first of the year).

Darrel

Click to expand...

Not a bad price, but to put things in perspective, I bought an OCZ Vertex 3 120Gb, which is a full SSD - not a cache -., last night for $69.99 after rebate. Not quite as good as the Samsung 830 I missed last week, discused upthread, but not too shabby. Tigerdirect has an OCZ Agility 4 256Gb on sale for $129.99 after rebate. Had I ordered today, I would have gotten that. The point being, SSDs are coming down in price fast.

Edit: Amazon still has the 256Gb version of the Samsung 830 available for $169 as of this writing. That's a great price. This specific drive ranks as a Tier 1 on Tomshardware.

The ReadyCache arrived yesterday. Installation took 5 minutes. Had to download software from SanDisk. Restarted three times. Boot time to usable Windows desktop dropped from ~2 minutes to 15 seconds! Programs & Trainz loads a lot faster. Whole system seems a lot more responsive. I didn't notice any difference in how Trainz feels or looks; framerates are unchanged. I have no experience with a full SSD drive so I can't compare. Bottom line: if you're looking for an affordable solution to put new life in your hard-drive based system, I highly recommend the ReadyCache.

Darrel

Glad it's working, seems some of the more expensive Intel boards are including an adapter on the mother board to fit an mSSD which can be used for the same purpose.

clam1952 said:

Glad it's working, seems some of the more expensive Intel boards are including an adapter on the mother board to fit an mSSD which can be used for the same purpose.

Click to expand...

I saw thos too on some of the motherboards I was looking. The one I got doesn't have one of those, though. At this point I don't think I need it either.

John

BD1: I saw that video once and thought it was a very good idea if you really want to game on a laptop. You can only do that if your laptop has an expansion slot. I believe the kit comes with a power supply and some cables. From there, you can probably purchase your own monitor and graphics card. At first, this idea seemed great but I thought, for just a little more, you can build your own computer. Even though frame rates may be smooth like glass, remember that trainz+laptop=heat. Laptops are not designed for gaming even though some are capable of handling all the workload with graphics and processing.

malikrthr said:

BD1: I saw that video once and thought it was a very good idea if you really want to game on a laptop. You can only do that if your laptop has an expansion slot. I believe the kit comes with a power supply and some cables. From there, you can probably purchase your own monitor and graphics card. At first, this idea seemed great but I thought, for just a little more, you can build your own computer. Even though frame rates may be smooth like glass, remember that trainz+laptop=heat. Laptops are not designed for gaming even though some are capable of handling all the workload with graphics and processing.

Click to expand...

There are "gaming" laptops such as the Alienware M17x which I have. They're not bad machines; just very expensive and very, very hot. They also eat batteries quite rapidly so the machine always has to be plugged in. On mine the battery is fine, but there's a warning that comes up on the boot screen (BIOS) recommending that the machine remain plugged in while in high-performance mode.

There are also the workstation-class laptops but they seem to come with low-end video cards. These aren't exactly cheap either, but their video chipsets are a mere subset of the full Quadro. The video circuits come with the smallest amount of video RAM I've ever seen. It's like they're 10 years behind the desktop chip they're based on. At least the game-version of these laptops, such as Dell's Alienware and XPS laptops, come with a full set of video RAM similar to what the desktop version would have.

Those old slots, I think were called Z-slots and are available way back in the old days. The slot actually plugged into the PCMCIA slot, remember those? I'm not even sure if PCMCIA slots still exist on laptops anymore. These devices are extremely expensive add-ons, and the video cards sometimes cost as much as the laptop its self. A former manager of mine had one, and that was way, way back in the mid-1990s. We used special software that required a special MPEG-capable video card. The device was about $2500 which at the time cost the same as the laptop.