Marvell 91xx Controller, 6GB/s & Trimm Support

stoofa · 10 Nov 2010 at 14:36

I believe there was an issue with this combination - basically the Marvell controller didn't support TRIMM with the current driver.
1.0.0.1034 I believe was the driver at the time.

I've been out of the loop for a while.
However this link:

http://www.station-drivers.com/page/marvell.htm

Appears to indicate newer drivers - 1.0.0.1045

Does anyone know if this driver now correctly supports TRIMM?

Ta

DragonQ · 10 Nov 2010 at 14:41

FYI, it's TRIM not TRIMM, and it's 6 Gbps, not 6 GB/s.

*Moangroan* · 10 Nov 2010 at 20:58

DragonQ said:
FYI, it's TRIM not TRIMM, and it's 6 Gbps, not 6 GB/s.

Isn't 6 Gbps exactly equivalent to 6 GB/s which is gigabytes per second.

DragonQ · 10 Nov 2010 at 21:29

No, Gbps = gigabits per second. GB/s = gigabytes per second.

6 Gbps = 750 MB/s = 0.75 GB/s

fordypaul · 10 Nov 2010 at 21:56

Despite the technical detail of the question, few of us did not understand it, a shame no one has yet answered the question but sought to be bit "anal" :rolleyes:

These forum are usually so better, lets hope its a blip!

DragonQ · 10 Nov 2010 at 22:08

Well I would've answered the question to if I knew the answer.

stoofa · 11 Nov 2010 at 10:03

OK - well thanks all for the lessons.
It proved really helpful in finding out if the Marvell controller now supports TRIM :-/

OK, lets try another question then.

If I update the drivers on the Marvell controller, is there anything I can run to see if TRIM commands are being passed onto the drive?

DragonQ · 11 Nov 2010 at 10:07

I don't believe so. I think it's up to the manufacturer to tell you whether TRIM is supported in a certain driver or not.

Cosimo · 11 Nov 2010 at 10:17

The general census is that it doesn’t. There are many threads about this on the Crucial SSD forum.

manishpatel80 · 11 Nov 2010 at 11:02

I don't think is does I have used this drive for about 2 weeks now and I am not sure its working, so I have switched back to the MS drivers so TRIM can work then I will switch back to the Marvell ones as they give me better performance but no TRIM.

Yellowbeard · 11 Nov 2010 at 21:54

Just a side note, in head to head testing with multiple drives, the Intel ICH10-R controller is faster than the Marvell in spite of the specifications.

Pers · 12 Nov 2010 at 08:27

I upgraded to an Asus U3S6 last night with my C300 64gb. I went with the MS drivers as many people advise for TRIM support. I have noticed since my 4k read performance is a tad low. I did read a post with someone comparing Marvel versus MS drivers and some read times were improved.

If I go with the Marvell drivers I need to run Garbage collection right?

Yellowbeard · 12 Nov 2010 at 09:20

There is no manual way to "run" garbage collection. It's an automated function of the controller inside the drive and is also independent of the OS.

stoofa · 12 Nov 2010 at 15:39

Yellowbeard said:
Just a side note, in head to head testing with multiple drives, the Intel ICH10-R controller is faster than the Marvell in spite of the specifications.

I didn't find that at all.
I ran various benchmarks on both the Intel and Marvell controller - I posted the results back here.
The Marvell controller showed improved performance in all tests.
Not night and day - but definitely an improvement.

Yellowbeard · 12 Nov 2010 at 17:18

Which motherboard? I was using Gigabyte X58A-UD7.

glenimp617 · 15 Nov 2010 at 22:45

stick with the intel controller

better chipset
better drivers
better 'long term' performance

Pers · 16 Nov 2010 at 08:31

I've gone with the Marvell driver 1036 on the Asus u3s6. I have found it performs a lot better for me. If I run the Asus u3s6 with the msahci driver I get freezes in Windows 7, which are rather annoying.

No freezes with the Marvell driver and 4k read performance is a lot better.