New SSD seems slow?

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Finally got round to installing my shiny new 120gb Intel 520 SSD. :)
After installing Win7x64, I did all the usual stuff - removed System Restore, hiberfil.sys and pagefile - plus a few other tweaks. Ran ATTO, and was surprised with the outcome below. :(

Here's the expected result (from Andrew Moore's excellent ** SSD MEGA TEST **) :



But this is what I get :



My system is :
i5-2500K @ stock
GA-Z68X-UD3H
8gb Corsair Vengeance Blue @ 1600/C9

And before you ask, YES I am using the Intel 6gbps SATA port (NOT the Marvell).
The only difference I can think of is that my drive has the OS (13gb, 11% usage) against the empty drives in the Mega Test. But surely performance doesn't drop by 40% (520mbps vs 310mbps) on a 11% full drive?? :confused:
I also ran TRIM (via Intel SSDToolbox), but results were very similar before/after TRIM.

Any ideas? I don't want to RMA my new toy just yet (it IS significantly faster than my previous OS drive, a WD Green!), but can't think what I'm doing wrong to get such (relatively) poor results.
 
Have you re run the test to check it wasn't a glitch of some sort?

You're sure its in the Intel port?

I've run ATTO 3 times, with fairly similar figures each time.
It's definitely in the Intel SATA 3 port.

Did you try secure erasing it? It sets all blocks to 0 without writing to it
Makesure your using latest mb BIOS with latest Intel option Rom

Didn't secure erase it as it was brand new (and empty). Doesn't this wear out the NAND?
Using latest BIOS (F11), and latest Intel RST (10.8.0.1003). What's "Intel option Rom"?

Did you have any virus/anti-spyware software running while doing the tests ??

Or maybe windows was doing an auto update at the same time as your test

No AV etc installed yet. I've only been online to update Windows, and was offline when testing.
I always turn anything "auto" to OFF, but who knows what Windows is up to in the background?

Guess I could try setting SSD as non-OS drive, secure-erasing it, and repeating tests on the blank drive. But I actually bought this SSD to put files on. :D

Thanks for your ideas. Looks like I've got some more testing to do, as I'll need to DSR the drive on Monday if I can't fix it. :(
 
OK, so I've swapped SATA 3 ports round (so now I'm booting off the HDD) and tried a new cable (a round cable that came loosely coiled, as opposed to the supplied flat cable that was folded tight), and I now get :



Still not quite 520mbps write (reads are fine), but a major improvement. :)

But was it the port, the cable, or running as a non-OS drive?
It's now 11pm and beer is calling to me, so I may not get much more testing done tonight, but I'll keep you posted.
 
Well I've swapped the ports back (booting from SSD) but kept the new round cable, and I get the same(ish) results, so it looks like a bad cable. Doh! :mad:

I should have been suspicious when I saw how tightly it was folded and tied. It's also a cheap Foxconn, shame on you Intel!


Not that I'm too worried about 20mbps, should I be expecting ~4% speed drop on writes with only 11% disk usage? Does this extrapolate to ~20% drop at 50% usage?? I hope not, I do intend to use more than 11% of my drive at some point!
 
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