Will cloning + format bring back my SSD's performance?

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Hi there,

My SSD performance is completely shot lost 33% and im feeling it now. Can i clone my drive, then format it then drop it back on? will this give me performance back?

(since trim isnt available atm, and CC cleaner's wipe free space did the damage)

im not sure what options i have..

thanks in adv
 
What drive is it your using? I know some support "sanitary erase" which completey wipes the drive and sets it back to as new performance. Doing that then writing the original image back to the drive should help.

Really need to know what drive it is though for other available options :)
 
A normal format won't actually tell the drive to erase its blocks (unless you were using Win7+ Default Microsoft SATA drivers + TRIM supporting drive, which obviously you arn't or you wouldn't have a problem to begin with) so there wouldn't be any benefit to just formatting and restoring, the "free space" of the drive would still be full of unwanted old data that causes the performance hit.

What drive are you using? I think Intels and Indilinx based drives have tools available that can properly wipe them (sanitary erase as the poster above me mentioned). You could then restore your image and have your performance back.
I'm guessing you have a Samsung or JMicron drive though by the level of performance drop you're feeling.
 
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oh sorry, im an tool for not saying my hardware lol im using 80gb intel X25 34nm one. (not flashed yet for trim firmware)

But its in raid too even though its single drive (as i have a raid vista install that i havent broken up yet). From reading what you are saying and information i have read.


  • When intel fix their firmware.
  • Make an image of my drive using XXX (what softwares are good for SSD imaging?)
  • Disable the raid so my SSD isnt part of an raid. Just set to AHCI to flash my SSD with TRIM firmware.
  • Then copy the image back to drive
  • Then run Trim
 
i think an full format on Intel SSD does bring back performance but your better using HDDerase as that reset all parts of the SSD to an erased state

Trim for intel SSD has just been pulled as well i think due to loss of data http://www.legitreviews.com/news/6714/

once they do fix it make sure its set to AHCI mode and you do Not install the Intel matrix software as it disable the TRIM support
 
I'm not certain of this, despite asking ocz's forums. However I believe the unwritten state is a zero. If so, it's trivial to write a zero over all of the remaining space on the drive using linux [dd if=/dev/zero of=/mnt/disk/file.tmp will do this]. I believe there's a similar command in dos, though I don't know what it is.

If I'm right in thinking that all trim does is overwriting the previously written blocks with empty blocks, and that empty blocks are the same as blocks with a zero in, then the above makes sense. If empty blocks are some third state, then it wont help.

edit: On a similar note, an idea which their forums did clear was imaging the drive, mounting the image, defragmenting the image, then writing the image back. Avoids the potential issue of damaging ssds by running defrag.
 
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edit: On a similar note, an idea which their forums did clear was imaging the drive, mounting the image, defragmenting the image, then writing the image back. Avoids the potential issue of damaging ssds by running defrag.

interesting u can defrag an image ^_^ what programs are good for this?

/edit oh ofc i just realise defragging wont really imp performance once put back on SSD. just need the free space free. :/
 
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oh sorry, im an tool for not saying my hardware lol im using 80gb intel X25 34nm one. (not flashed yet for trim firmware)

But its in raid too even though its single drive (as i have a raid vista install that i havent broken up yet). From reading what you are saying and information i have read.


  • When intel fix their firmware.
  • Make an image of my drive using XXX (what softwares are good for SSD imaging?)
  • Disable the raid so my SSD isnt part of an raid. Just set to AHCI to flash my SSD with TRIM firmware.
  • Then copy the image back to drive
  • Then run Trim

Right, what you need to do is :
  • Image the volume
  • Change SATA mode from RAID to IDE/Legacy/Disabled (not AHCI)
  • Run Hdderase, one drive connected at a time
  • Recreate RAID array
  • Reimage volume (check that whatever imaging tool you are using doesn't mess up your partition offsets)
if you want to try the firmware update, just run that instead of the hdderase step, it doesn't matter if you use Intel's Matrix Storage Manager, with the SSD toolkit you can run a manual TRIM to fix your performance levels whenever you want, or schedule it to run once a day.
 
Zarf:
it doesn't matter if you use Intel's Matrix Storage Manager, with the SSD toolkit you can run a manual TRIM to fix your performance levels whenever you want

I have 2 x X25 M G2s in RAID0 flashed with the latest Intel firmware for TRIM support and running Win 7 (64bit), with Intel SSD Toolbox installed, however, when I open it I get the following screen:

2009-10-29_123809.jpg


I was under the impression that I needed an Intel updated driver for TRIM support to be able for it to be scheduled or run manually, hence C:\ & D:\ are greyed out, or am I missing something in that I should be able to run TRIM manually within SSD ToolBox on the 2 X25 M G2s in RAID0?
 
Ah right, sorry, forgot the toolbox doesn't work with TRIM yet. Hopefully when Intel release TRIM supporting Matrix Storage Manager this will work.

edit: that should be 'toolbox doesn't work with TRIM on RAID'
 
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TRIM works for drives that are running in IDE (and AHCI I think?) mode, it wont work for them running in RAID as its not supported yet. Hopefully it will be with more updates, but for now if your drive is set to RAID then it wont support TRIM :(
 
Noto, I have closed your other thread here since you don't really need two threads on a very similar topic.

Moving on though....

I wouldn't using any other tool that states it's similar to the TRIM command other than OCZ's Wiper Tool, Intel's Solid State Drive Toolbox or any other manufacturers tools that is dedicated for that particular task. CCleaner on the whole is very much a snake oil product in that it does very little to help improve the performance of your system. You can maintain your systems performance without such programs.

Now, If you don't want to wait till the issue around Intel's new firmware has been resolved, then you can create an image of your current Windows installation, restore your Intel X25-M G2 Solid State Drive to it's peak performance and then restore the image.

You can create an image by using the create system image functionality built in to Windows 7 already, which is extremely easy to use. Just start typing in Backup into the start menu search bar and then click on the Backup and Restore option when it comes up. Then on the left hand side, choose the "Create system image" option and it will then guide you from there.

Alternatively, you could use something like Acronis True Image 2010, which you can trial for 30 days. If you do intend to use Acronis True Image, then it's fairly simple to use. After you have installed have launched it, click on the "Backup" option on the left hand side and then under the "Disk Backup" heading at the top, click on the "Disk and Partition Backup" option. Select the partition you wish to crate an image for and then click "Next". Now select a location you wish to save the image too and click "Next" again. Before you go ahead and start the process of creating an image, at the bottom left hand side under "Optional steps", if you click on "Backup options" and then "Backup performance" in the middle pane, you can choose the type of priority you would like the backup process to be run at. All the other settings don't really need to be touched. Then, click "Proceed" to start the process.

Also, if you're going to use Acronis True Image to create an image, you will also want to create an Acronis bootable rescue media which you can either put on a CD/DVD or a flash drive. This is so after you have used the Secure Erase command using HDD Erase and thus wiping all of the data from your drive as well as restoring the drive back to it's peak performance, you will be able to restore the image by booting from the Acronis bootable rescue media. The "Create Bootable Rescue Media" option is located under the "Tools & Utilities" section on the left hand side of the main window.

Just to add to what Zarf mentioned regarding the offset. The Windows 7 create a system image functionality as well as creating an image using Acronis True Image using the method above will retain the correct alignment so you don't need to worry about the of process re-imaging changing the alignment of the drive to something which is slightly more undesirable.

The next step would be to download HDD Erase 4.0 (which is the latest version). If you have previously made a bootable flash drive, you can just copy the contents of the HDD Erase folder over to your flash drive. If you haven't currently got a bootable flash drive, if you follow the instructions on this page here, you should have one in a couple of minutes.

Once you have done the above, if you restart your system and go into your BIOS and set the SATA controller to IDE - Compatible or Legacy mode and restart your system. Then boot from your flash drive and once you have control over the keyboard type in HDDErase and then follow the on screen instructions. The Secure Erase command will only take a few seconds to complete. Though, you will need to do it twice since you have two Intel X25-M G2 Solid State drives.

Once the Secure Erase command has completed, restart your system and if you would like to put your Intel X25-M G2 Solid State Drives in a RAID array again, make the necessary changes to create a RAID array. Then, if you had created an image using the Windows 7 create a system image built-in feature, boot into the Windows 7 setup using your installation media. After you have selected your language, time and currency format and keyboard or input method, click on the "Repair your computer" option. It should be rather self explanatory from then on.

If you created an image using Acronis True Image, you will need to boot from the Acronis bootable rescue media you created earlier. Once you have entered the Acronis True Image rescue program, click on the "Rescue" option on the left hand side and then locate the image you created by clicking on the "Browse for backup..." option on right hand side. Once the backup is shown in the middle pane, right click on it and choose "Recover", it should then be fairly straight forward.
 
wow thanks for all the replies really informative :)

I think my best bet is to wait for the Trim firmware to be ready, so i dont have to do this twice.. I feel like a real zonk for doing that CC Cleaner thing it was almost too good to be true and it was ^_^.
 
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