Passmark results for Samsung 840 Series SSD

[mset]

Hello

I recently installed a Samsung 840 Series 120 GB SSD . For reasons I won't go into here, this rig has a low end mobo in it

Asus P7H55-M LX .

The RAM is 8GB (2x4) DDR3 (Kingston KHX1600c9D3K2/8GX). CPU is an i5 750 @2.67.

I used Passmark to test the rig and it came back with a score of 1207. Quite low, but what really puzzled me were the scores the SSD got. Disk Mark was 1220, and Sequential read/write and Random seek were all way below the two SSDs shown for comparison (Samsung MZ7P064HADR-000 and Intel SSDSC2CW240A3).

Is this because of the mobo I am using? Or is it because the Samsung 840 Series SSD is just that much worse than these other two? I can't believe the latter, but something is causing this (relatively) poor performance.

I am decidedly not a tech expert. I know just enough to install this new drive and clone my old drive over and change the boot order in the BIOS. Any comments would be appreciated. I am more than happy to provide more info if necessary. I have a Gigabyte GA-P55A-UD3P mobo here that I will try out if this mobo is really choking the performance of the SSD.

Nick

[David (PassMark)]

Could be several reasons, but the most likely ones are,
1) You have it connected to a SATA1 or 2 port rather than a SATA3 port on the motherboard.
2) You didn't select ACHI mode in BIOS.

[mset]

Could be several reasons, but the most likely ones are,
1) You have it connected to a SATA1 or 2 port rather than a SATA3 port on the motherboard.
2) You didn't select ACHI mode in BIOS.

I see. Okay, thanks for the response. I'll check about those two things and post back here if it's not either of them.

I'm assuming that even though the SSD is installed and working, I can go into the BIOS and just change the setting to ACHI (if I find it's not set that way already) without messing things up.

[David (PassMark)]

If Windows has the ACHI driver installed, it will be OK.
If it doesn't, the O/S won't boot.

I don't know what O/S you are running. But Google Win7 ACHI for details if you are using Win7.

[mset]

If Windows has the ACHI driver installed, it will be OK.
If it doesn't, the O/S won't boot.

I don't know what O/S you are running. But Google Win7 ACHI for details if you are using Win7.

Okay! I Googled Win7 AHCI, followed the instructions for changing the registry (first time I ever tried that, since I've heard it's potentially dangerous) and then found AHCI in the BIOS, changed it over and restarted. The computer asked to restart itself once more, and did so with no problem. Now, the Passmark value for the disc is 1770. Still not as high as the values for the example discs, but better. I guess I now have to try the disc in another SATA port.

Thanks for the help.

[mset]

Just a follow up. Here is the mobo I am running

http://www.asus.com/Motherboards/P7H55M_LX/#specifications

It seems to say that the 6 SATA ports are all SATA 3.0 Gb/s ports. This means SATA 3, correct?

If so, I guess I have taken care of the two suggestions you gave. So does that mean that the performance of this Samsung 840 drive is simply limited to a fraction of the two other drives I mentioned?

It's not like the computer isn't booting up lightning fast - it is. I just want to optimize the rig with this SSD.

[David (PassMark)]

Disk Mark was 1220
Now, the Passmark value for the disc is 1770.

A 45% improvement !!

the 6 SATA ports are all SATA 3.0 Gb/s ports. This means SATA 3, correct?

No, not correct. See,
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Serial_ATA#Revisions

You are probably now maxing out the old SATA2 interface. As seeing as the motherboard is an older unit, it doesn't have any SATA3 ports. So you'll never see the full potential of the drive on this MB.

[mset]

You are probably now maxing out the old SATA2 interface. As seeing as the motherboard is an older unit, it doesn't have any SATA3 ports. So you'll never see the full potential of the drive on this MB.

Aha, I see. Okay, thanks so much for all your help, David. I guess it's time for a mobo upgrade.