EQ2 on SSD ? An update [Archive] - EQ2 Forum Archive @ EQ2Wire

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Faenril

03-03-2009, 06:22 AM

I'm currently planning some system upgrade, and considering different options. One of the major bottlenecks on my current system is IO throughput. So I'm considering upgrading to a velociraptor or a SSD drive and would like to get some hint what would be the recommended choice. This has already been discussed here and I read those discussions, but as you know technology evolves fast and what was true few months ago may not hold anymore.So how do SSDs fare compared to a good 10k rpm drive nowdays ?Did anyone actually try running eq2 from a SSD, and what was the impact on the performance ?

Derrmerth2

03-04-2009, 12:06 AM

While in the performance on an SSD would in theory be better, you have to think about a few things. First is cost per gigabyte, which is terrible on a SSD. It's fair on a Velicaraptor class drive. The best V-rap drive is 300Gb, and unless you have deep pockets, you probably won't be getting more then a 128Gb SSD drive. If either of these options provide enough space for you, then we look past it. In thoery you could get a larger, slower drive as a secondary for your data.Next we have to take a look at I/O through put. Now the question is, outside of this game, what are you doing that needs really fast drive access? Really in the course of a system running your two big drive pull times are turning the system on and loading your OS, and loading a level (in this case "zoning"). It is possible to get drives with massive capacity AND quick times. Hard drive have come a long way in the past 18 months. What drive are you using now and on what type of interface? You may very well be able to find yourself doing just fine with a somewhat less speed focused drive. Mainly with model and interface we/I can get a picture on what kind of performance you have now.Next keep in mind of one thing. SSDs are not universally better at performance. The main dig on them is the random read write times. This is when data is being read or written in random spots on the flash memory. You will find these time to actually be slower then a good magnetic storage style drive. This relates to fragmentation of the drive. In theory if you defragged it all the time, it may not be as much of an issue, however this beings to eat in to the write/erase lifespan of the flash memory. Even the best and most expensive SSDs have a limited lifespan.In this case I think the SSD might come up short. I'd think that you'd have to much data hopping around maybe, plus the durabilty for a gaming drive is somewhat questionable. For now I'd leave them only for laptop use or as strictly a boot drive for your OS. That operation is pretty much a straight data pull where the SSD can excel. Now of course I sadly have no real data on running EQ2 on a SSD to back it up, only general knowledge. Soif your really bent on high performance get the V-rap drive, its safe bet.However, I've said this before. Look in to the Western Digital Black edition drives. Your peformance isn't too far behind the V-rap, but you can get way higher capacities. The 1TB ones I have can do read/write speeds of 90MB a second, which ain't too bad. Less, money, more space and still very good numbers. I think in a lot of cases V-raps are a little bit overkill really, but if your looking to max it our, go V-rap.

Faenril

03-04-2009, 09:44 AM

Thanks for your answer. My plan would be to dedicate this new drive to the game(s), and keep the old drive for the OS and data storage. 64 or 128 GB would be enough for the time being as I would just install 1 or 2 games in there, so cost per gigabyte is not an issue as I already have a decent drive for storage. Boot time is not an issue either I don't want my system to boot fast, I just want the game(s) to load and run smoothly. Currently everything is running on the same drive, it's a 500 GB Samsung drive on SATA II interface, can't say the exact model. I suspect EQ2 to make a lot of non sequential read accesses to the drive even outside zoning process, to load textures and what not as you travel/fight/group. That's why I considered SSD in the first place. Maybe I should first run some file IO monitor program to figure out if my assumptions are correct. I thought maybe someone tried it before and could share his experience <img src="/smilies/8a80c6485cd926be453217d59a84a888.gif" border="0" alt="SMILEY" />

TSR-DanielH

03-04-2009, 04:40 PM

One of my friends tried installing Windows/EQ2 to an SSD drive at one point. He used it for about 3 weeks and seemed to like it, but ended up selling it to another person pretty quickly. He said he liked it, but the performance increase wasn't worth the price and he started worrying about the limited reads/writes.Keep in mind this was about 2 years ago and SSD/Hard-drive technology has come a long way since then. My experiences might not be representative of todays technology.

Stinky123

03-09-2009, 10:57 PM

<cite>Derrmerth2 wrote:</cite><blockquote>While in the performance on an SSD would in theory be better, you have to think about a few things. First is cost per gigabyte, which is terrible on a SSD. It's fair on a Velicaraptor class drive. The best V-rap drive is 300Gb, and unless you have deep pockets, you probably won't be getting more then a 128Gb SSD drive. If either of these options provide enough space for you, then we look past it. In thoery you could get a larger, slower drive as a secondary for your data.Next we have to take a look at I/O through put. Now the question is, outside of this game, what are you doing that needs really fast drive access? Really in the course of a system running your two big drive pull times are turning the system on and loading your OS, and loading a level (in this case "zoning"). It is possible to get drives with massive capacity AND quick times. Hard drive have come a long way in the past 18 months. What drive are you using now and on what type of interface? You may very well be able to find yourself doing just fine with a somewhat less speed focused drive. Mainly with model and interface we/I can get a picture on what kind of performance you have now.Next keep in mind of one thing. SSDs are not universally better at performance. The main dig on them is the random read write times. This is when data is being read or written in random spots on the flash memory. You will find these time to actually be slower then a good magnetic storage style drive. This relates to fragmentation of the drive. In theory if you defragged it all the time, it may not be as much of an issue, however this beings to eat in to the write/erase lifespan of the flash memory. Even the best and most expensive SSDs have a limited lifespan.In this case I think the SSD might come up short. I'd think that you'd have to much data hopping around maybe, plus the durabilty for a gaming drive is somewhat questionable. For now I'd leave them only for laptop use or as strictly a boot drive for your OS. That operation is pretty much a straight data pull where the SSD can excel. Now of course I sadly have no real data on running EQ2 on a SSD to back it up, only general knowledge. Soif your really bent on high performance get the V-rap drive, its safe bet.However, I've said this before. Look in to the Western Digital Black edition drives. Your peformance isn't too far behind the V-rap, but you can get way higher capacities. The 1TB ones I have can do read/write speeds of 90MB a second, which ain't too bad. Less, money, more space and still very good numbers. I think in a lot of cases V-raps are a little bit overkill really, but if your looking to max it our, go V-rap.</blockquote>I agree WD black edition drives are rather awsome, and the 640 gig versions get read/write speeds of oover 110 MB according to HD Tune for me. Also a note SSD is not very expensive anymore, I know someone even running this game on an OCZ throttle drive, (was like 70 bucks for a 32 gig drive), its esata so he can move it around, and its got random access times of .2MS lol.

TSR-DanielH

03-11-2009, 03:30 PM

If you actually do this, make sure to post some information about the load times you are getting. That's always the best part about using an SSD.

Albrig

03-11-2009, 07:20 PM

IO throughputA modern super-fast HDD (and I mean the fastest in the world singularly) can do about 700 IOPS (in Raid) and 100Mb/sec in 10ms (average)I have two Intel X25-E SSDs on a Highpoint 3520 Raid Controller (with 256Mb cache) and achieves 25,000 IOPS at 4k (128k stripe) and 600Mb/sec in 0.1ms (sustained).In throughput alone, an SSD is 100x times faster in access time alone (100 divided by 0.1) correction 10 divided by 0.1*Sustained read performanced (which is all that matters, over write) is 20 times faster streaming large data files relating to textures and such.EQ2 doesn't stream data all that much because the game world (or the zone) fits entirely into memory and that any loading is the appearance of game models (character models I guess) that appear in view. Though an SSD would load them a hundred times faster than a mechanical HDD so you wouldn't even notice that occurring.SSDs are expensive if capacity is what you are looking, but an incredible addition to the PC architecture. More so than people believe, because as game worlds rely completely on streaming from a storage medium and the game world becomes seamless and bigger as time goes by, a mechanical HDD is the last thing you want loading gigabytes of textures without you noticing.

Albrig

03-12-2009, 12:01 PM

<cite>Faenril@Nagafen wrote:</cite><blockquote>Did anyone actually try running eq2 from a SSD, and what was the impact on the performance ?</blockquote>EQ2 TSO is arriving tomorrow for me so I'll let you know how it performs (hope Amazon is reliable).As a side note, Windows 7 will very specifically work in a [fundamentally] different way than either XP or Vista with handling current 2nd gen SSD devices. I don't have Windows 7 so don't know exactly what to expect - as it is, I am one of the few with the world's fastest storage Read access setup for a consumer in the world - with the exception of any owning the following:Even the fastest raid cards in the world will buckle to the onslaught of 3x X25-E's, so the next step is an affordable PCI-E x4 solution on a card. You've probably seen it and know about it too, but they're doing a consumer version called the io-Extreme: 100,000 IOPS, 800MB/sec sustained read and 700Mb/sec write, 0.07ms access, sometime this year for approximately £500 for 80Gb; no separate Raid contoller needed. It's all on the card.They also do a duo Fusion-io (PCI-E x4 or x8 I think) for business: 1,600Mb/sec read and write, 186,000 IOPS, 0.07ms access. PCI-E has way more bandwidth than any Raid controller out there as far as I know.The mechanical HDD is officially dead sometime this year when it comes to gaming.If budget is a concern, just hang in there for awhile and use whatever mechanical HDD you have at hand. Newer HDDs will barely make a difference unless they have 32Mb cache (and even then... ) .

Nulad

03-12-2009, 04:10 PM

This should do it:<a href="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=96dWOEa4Djs&eurl=http://www.engadget.com/2009/03/09/24-samsung-ssds-get-strung-together-for-supercomputer-fun/&feature=player_embedded" target="_blank" rel="nofollow">http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=96dW...player_embedded</a>

Albrig

03-12-2009, 07:06 PM

<cite>Nuladen@Runnyeye wrote:</cite><blockquote>This should do it:</blockquote>Samsung SSDs do a fraction of the performance of an X25-E, but together- say about 8 of them -they would start to overtake very easily: probably not in IO, but very close.They had to use 2 Raid controllers (an Areca 1680 and an Adaptec 5 series) AND the onboard X58 raid controller with the AHCI enabled to unlock the full 6*Ch SATA bandwidth so that 24 SSDs didn't overwhelm it (which it does anyway); even 20 do it I think.I had the Adaptec 5805, but I had problems with SSD (some users of them don't, but I did and couldn't resolve them): so I tried the Highpoint RocketRaid 5320 *(edit 3520 always get that wrong) (you need SAS > SATA) and although I didn't get write over 300Mb/sec by much, the read can at some points knock at 700-800Mb/sec - the controller is much faster than Adaptec's simply because the firmware is more refined for SSD activity (but if writes to balance it are your thing, don't go this route).In case anyone needed to know, X58 boards that I have tested with SSDs that really work perfectly are Foxconn's Bloodrage and Asus' Rampage Extreme II. I've had them hit 600Mb/sec with SSD without any effort at all. Performance is of course, out of this world. X58's maximum capability is 660Mb/sec - that's as far as SATAII can provide with all channels unlocked. You don't need a £400 PCI-E raid controller in other words (you just don't get dedicated cache).If anything, the ICH10R X58 raid controller can better a £800 dedicated controller in some tests I've tried - I kid you not.

Scao

03-13-2009, 03:11 AM

Really glad I found this thread, I am in the process of building a new PC and was considering either (2) Western Digital VelociRaptors or (2) Corsair S128 SSD, both would be in Raid 0 using an onboard raid controller either on the EVGA x58 or the EVGA x58 Classified (Just depends on when the Classifieds get in stock).I'll have to keep an eye on this thread to see what others have to say, and if anyone can find any reviews on the Corsair S128 they would be greatly appreciated, from what I read there just a rebranded Samsung SSD, which seem to perform very well.

Albrig

03-13-2009, 07:15 AM

<cite>Aculus@Nagafen wrote:</cite><blockquote>Really glad I found this thread, I am in the process of building a new PC and was considering either (2) Western Digital VelociRaptors or (2) Corsair S128 SSD, both would be in Raid 0 using an onboard raid controller either on the EVGA x58 or the EVGA x58 Classified (Just depends on when the Classifieds get in stock).I'll have to keep an eye on this thread to see what others have to say, and if anyone can find any reviews on the Corsair S128 they would be greatly appreciated, from what I read there just a rebranded Samsung SSD, which seem to perform very well.</blockquote>The best SSDs -and the only SSDs at the moment- I would look at in a Raid 0 Configuration attached to the X58 ICH10R are in order of recommendation:-- Mtron Mobi 3500 16Gb (x2 = 32Gb) - these are the best you can get. But they're expensive (£200 each).-- Intel X25-E (you only need x1 - it'll crush any HDD Velociraptor Raid configuration you can think of up to x4 (and then some; you think I jest, right?) - only problem: 32GB and £350 (I got two: are they worth it? No. How about once you went for it, paid for it, and expected big, BIG results? Yes, you will see a monumental difference).There is one other you could look at, but I don't recommend on a personal level -but it is far more affordable- and that is OCZ's Vertex; they have a 32Mb cache buffer (no other SSD has at the moment), so even though the Vertex is weaker than the recommended it makes up some ground with the cache buffer designed into them - they have been balanced very extensively by OCZ, so that you get good overall performance balanced with decent IO. The more expensive versions have 64Mb cache. 3x of them in Raid 0 will start hitting the limit of ICH10R AHCI (660Mb/sec).Do they perform as well as the Mtron or Intel X25-E overall? No. Not even close. However, 3x Vertex 32Mb cache SDDs will get you similar read+write performance of 2x X25-Es (for virtually *half the cost). But not IO. IO performance on the X25-E is through the roof. A single one in web server transactions hit anywhere between 8-12,000 depending on how large the file read transaction is and two will sail well over 20,000. Mtron get similar results (but even lower access times). Mtron are recognised for producing access rates right down to 0.07ms (Intel manage 0.09ms).Make no mistake, Mtron and the Intel X25-E (SLC variants), at the moment, for SSD, are a light year ahead of anything else at the moment. Anything else is just a taster show for SSD.If you see this, you'll probably wait it all out anyway (get saving):<a rel="nofollow" href="http://www.fusionio.com/" target="_blank">http://www.fusionio.com/</a>With regard to Corsair, Crucial and others (MLC), you will not find the performance you are looking for: if you went the Velociraptor raid 0 route you would (even though technically, they are much slower in comparison: but real world noticeability of that difference, you wouldn't see it).The difference between SLC and MLC is something more along the lines of cost than really caring what they are differentially.

Albrig

03-13-2009, 07:25 AM

<cite>Aculus@Nagafen wrote:</cite><blockquote>Raid 0 using an onboard raid controller either on the EVGA x58 or the EVGA x58 Classified</blockquote>Still don't know much about EVGA. But EVGA as a manufacturer appear pretty solid.Just be careful because some X58 Motherboards have different BIOS configurations and these BIOS configurations CAN or COULD limit the SATA channel bandwidth so that you don't get 660MB/sec. You could have top performaing Raid 0 SSDs and you notice that you are only getting 200Mb/sec out of them, propagating other problems by using SSD on them.But this is a BIOS issue. It can be changed. It's just an assignment of devices that use SATA bandwidth.My guess is that motherboards with Tri-SLI full 16x electrical designs or (16 x16 x8 will be completely immune to SATA limitations anyway. Things change [Removed for Content] fast, so I think my point will be redundant sooner rather than later.

Scao

03-13-2009, 05:34 PM

Alright well I have about a $600 limit, I was looking at the OCZ Vertex's but wasn't sure about them, they where the other drive I was considering...And I've seen the Fusion-io, its what dreams are made of.

Albrig

03-13-2009, 08:33 PM

<cite>Aculus@Nagafen wrote:</cite><blockquote>Alright well I have about a $600 limit, I was looking at the OCZ Vertex's but wasn't sure about them, they where the other drive I was considering...And I've seen the Fusion-io, its what dreams are made of.</blockquote>Don't blow that budget on SSD. Follow the advice of the other posters here with the Velociraptors.Still not sure about the Vertex's my side either. Hence I won't recommend them (they're MLC anyway).*updateI didn't realise that velociraptors are expensive over the standard (7200rpm) drives. Never had Velociraptors; specifically, they have 16Mb cache.The one thing I know as an absolutely certainty is that 32Mb cache HDD (7200rpm) are going to better £/per Gb(but not as fast in access time obviously). Velociraptors do have it down to 4.7ms (whereas a WD Caviar Black is twice that).Therefore, save even more on that tight budget, go for 7200/32Mb drives - meaning 1Tb capacities. Hold out for SSD 2nd/3rd gen pricing restructing later in the year.

Scao

03-14-2009, 06:43 AM

Well, thus far the Vertex's are gaining a fairly good reputation from what i've read.If I were to buy a few any advice on what I would be better off with?(1) 120GB Vertex(2) 60GB Vertex - Raid 0(4) 30GB Vertex - Raid 0All would be on the onboard controller, and currently if I go the SSD route I need atleast 120GB

Albrig

03-14-2009, 11:12 AM

<cite>Aculus@Nagafen wrote:</cite><blockquote>Well, thus far the Vertex's are gaining a fairly good reputation from what i've read.If I were to buy a few any advice on what I would be better off with?(1) 120GB Vertex(2) 60GB Vertex - Raid 0(4) 30GB Vertex - Raid 0All would be on the onboard controller, and currently if I go the SSD route I need atleast 120GB</blockquote>The lower capacities are faster than the larger - that's a known on the VertexThen there is 32Mb cache on 30-60Gb and 64Mb cache on the 120Gb Vertex < but that is expensive...Since 120Gb is the minimum you want in Raid 0, 2x 60Gb (64Mb total cache) is the way to go. 4x 30Gb with 128Mb cache? It would slap your X58 SATAII bandwidth pretty badly. You don't want to go too fast here (because the Intel raid controller will heat up if it's used frequently; but EVGA should have a decent cooling system anyway).All that cache would give you stellar performance and would perhaps allow the X58 to relax more than a 64Mb cache combination with a 4x combination 128Mb cache.I don't know this for sure as I don't have these SSDs, but I reckon I'm very close on accuracy. Cache on a dedicated PCI-E Raid controller card (all 256-512Mb of it) allows a better relaxed state on the PC when the brunt of an SSD Raid 0 attack rockets at 600-1,100Mb/sec.

Scao

03-14-2009, 04:49 PM

Alright, so (4) 30GB Vertex's in Raid 0 = 128mb Cache and would perform great so long as my motherboard is cooling the onboard controller....and the (2) 60GB Vertex's in raid 0 would have 64mb cache and perform better than the single 120GB and not run the risk of having it cause to much heat, correct?Also the motherboard I'm waiting on is the <a href="http://www.evga.com/articles/00447/" target="_blank">EVGA x58 Classified</a>.

Albrig

03-15-2009, 12:30 PM

<cite>Aculus@Nagafen wrote:</cite><blockquote>Alright, so (4) 30GB Vertex's in Raid 0 = 128mb Cache and would perform great so long as my motherboard is cooling the onboard controller....and the (2) 60GB Vertex's in raid 0 would have 64mb cache and perform better than the single 120GB and not run the risk of having it cause to much heat, correct?Also the motherboard I'm waiting on is the <a href="http://www.evga.com/articles/00447/" target="_blank">EVGA x58 Classified</a>.</blockquote>4x will go well beyond 2x: way, way beyond. SSD's don't suffer a latency cycle like mechanical (they're well over a hundered times more responsive even at the bottom curve, and they will scale tremendously.My SSD's don't have cache, so I have a dedicated PCI-E raid. On the bright side, I've tested the X58 Intel Matrix Storage Raid Controller and it can deliver just as good results (which I was surprised at). Like Intel knew SSD would be the next big thing and integrated the design when that eventually came about mainstream. It's curious how the X25-E's are so advanced and compatible with their X58 design.Though I wouldn't call an X25-E mainstream and they do get silly with the pricing over 32Gb. Like, really dumb pricing.*Had a good once-over with the EVGA. I don't think you will ever run into a problem with that board (* meaning, 4x would not be a problem: that cooling system looks to be way better than my one). But just note, that I know nothing about EVGA experience-wise. They get good reviews and overall feedback. But there is a hint here and there of problems, but it's probably merely superficial due to their popularity.