OCZ Vertex 4 128GB SSD Review and 1.4RC FW Comparison – SSD Steroids for Your Vertex 4

ANVIL STORAGE UTILITIES PROFESSIONAL

You may not see this for long (and its definitely not common) but you get a freebee simply for reading! Over the last little while, we have been assisting with beta testing new benchmark software called Anvil Storage Utilities which is an absolutely amazing SSD benchmarking utility. Not only does it have a preset SSD benchmark, but also, it has included such things as endurance testing and threaded I/O read, write and mixed tests, all of which are very simple to understand and utilize in our benchmark testing.

1.3FW:

1.4RC:

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Once again, the difference is stark. Between the two firmwares, performance results in ASU is borderline magical. Sequential 4MB reads and writes go from 443MBs/187MBs to 493MBs/415MBs. The total score balloons from 3,573 to 4,803 and the 1.4RC  is pulling 82K random write IOPS at a queue depth of four. Inexplicably, QD1 4K randoms increase by 50%.

1.3FW:

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Using ASU’s multi-threaded read/write testing, we can see if random performance measures up. The 1.3FW gets close to it’s 90K rated read IOPS with 86,328. Random writes are a different story though: out of the 85K spec, the 1.3FW doesn’t even get to 50K, just 49,022 IOPS at a queue depth of 32.

1.4RC:

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The 1.4 release candidate bumps up random reads a bit, but random writes are now where they should have been given the 85K OCZ specifies the drive as being capable of. There was no way the drive could get anywhere near that until 1.4RC, and 82,720 is a great random write score. The Vertex 4 almost hits it’s rated 90K read IOPS at 89,144 with the new FW.

18 comments

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    i wanted to see some updates on 256gb drive lol but this is great. the HD tune showing a weird behavior though, would probably wait for the releases of next firmware, which no one knows when..

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    “once you’ve upgraded to 1.4RC. Flashing to 1.4RC involves a destructive update (all data is wiped in the process), and the drive must not be the primary system drive.”

    im understand why. flashing to 1.4RC involve destructive update,
    but im not understand, why the drive, cant act as the primary system drive?
    pls explained?
    thanks

    • blank

      You cannot upgrade while it is a boot drive or it will destroy your system. You can upgrade and then use it as a boot drive.

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      I think the author was saying if you’re running this drive right now, and it’s running 1.3, and your operating system is running on the drive running 1.3, you can’t update to 1.4, because flashing it would wipe out everything on the drive running 1.3, including the operating system.

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    Many people reporting Vertex 4 is having issues being detected on cold boot which is also causing waking from sleep bsod.

  4. blank

    Way to be punctual and terse about it! 🙂

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    also i still dont get how firmware seems to boost the performance up for everything, its clear in CDM as well as ATTO or ADSSD, but not the vantage.. is it something to do with that issue with HDtune?

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      This has us a bit stumped as well but, in testing as many SSDs as we have over the years, we have seen variances where SSD compatibility was an issue for on reason or another without a clear understanding of why.

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        im wondering if its because the latency tripled as shown in the picture AS SSD and that probably cause the poor performance on the overall realworld vantage

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    Is there any difference between 1.4RC and 1.4? (I’m wondering if they fixed the slow write speeds on the 2nd half of the disk.)

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    Are there any considerations to running a pair of these in Raid0? The intent is performance. I saw a comment about 3 months ago that you were better off running the biggest ssd you could afford instead of 2 smaller in Raid0. Any truth to that?
    Thanks!

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    Raid 0 Setup with Vertex 4 (Firmware 1.5) 512GB SSD in HP Elitebook 8570W i7- Failed
    To potential OCZ SSD buyers,
    I posted the above matters to OCZ forum and got no solution from them after many email in and out in a week time. They want me to write an email to HP for help. They even deleted my reply and make the post like I did not reply their request or reply their mail. Furthermore, they blocked my post. They wanted me to send them a personal email instead of on the public forum.
    They moved my post to ForumOCZ Support ForumCompliments, Complaints, & SuggestionsVertex 4 512GB BSOD in RAID 0 setup.
    or
    https://www.ocztechnologyforum.com/forum/showthread.php?104396-Vertex-4-512GB-BSOD-in-RAID-0-setup
    That’s why I totally agree with the post here on the first page:
    “It’s still a drive from OCZ, a company that has repeatedly and blatantly used its customer base as unpaid beta testers, and lambasted them when they dared to complain about it. No thank you. The fastest drive in the world is of no use to me if it’s causing my computer to BSOD constantly. I’ll be spending my money and that of my many clients on drives with proven track records for reliability and excellent customer service, both sadly lacking in OCZ products.”
    I will walk away from this OCZ unreliable SSD. Luckily I am able to return the drives and asked for refund instead of following their steps to do the beta tester in a week time.
    Think twice before you buy it.
    Thanks you.

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    The OCZ SSDs got a lot of compatibilities and reliable issue. Just heading to their technical forum and you will know what I mean. The fastest drive in the world is of no use to me if it’s causing my computer to BSOD or other problem.

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