Do Intel's new RST AHCI/RAID drivers support TRIM?

[DZand]

Win7 users with an Intel chipset mainboard and Intel X25-M 2G SSD's, who successfully have flashed the actually withdrawn Postville SSD Firmware, want to take advantage of the TRIM command support, but there still are some restrictions:

1. Intel's Matrix Storage Manager drivers (last official v8.9.0.1023) do not support the TRIM command. The only available SATA drivers, which do fully support the TRIM command, are the Win7 generic MS IDE/AHCI drivers.

2. SSD's running in "RAID Mode" neither do support the TRIM command nor can be "cleaned" by Intel's new SSD Toolbox.

So here is my question:

Do or will the upcoming Intel AHCI/RAID drivers of the Intel(R) Rapid Storage Technology (RST) support the TRIM command?

I ask this, because I am already running the brandnew and WHQL certified RST driver v9.5.0.1037 (available at Station-drivers since 13th October) with my 2x160 GB Intel Postville SSD RAID0 system and got a really amazing performance boost.

Thanks in advance!

Fernando

My system:

MB: Gigabyte GA-EP45-UD3R (P45 with Intel ICH10R Southbridge)

CPU: Intel Core2Duo E8400 (no OC)

HDD's: 2x160 GB Intel X25-M G2 as RAID0

RAM: 4x2 GB J.Skill PC2-8500

[idata]

You can fill the drive up, and see performance degrade in benchmarks, some benches are better to use then others (PCMark Vantage HDD are among the best for this purpose), when you empty the drive, performance should return to fresh state when TRIM is working. However, Trim does not support Raid0 yet, in any shape or form, so if you are in raid0 configuration, you are out of luck.

TRIM will probably work in raid0 in a while, but not now, period... Enjoy your performance right now, TRIM will come soon enough..

[idata]

However, Trim does not support Raid0 yet, in any shape or form, so if you are in raid0 configuration, you are out of luck.

Does this only apply to SSDs in a raid array? What if I'm running in raid mode, but my SSD is running as a single drive?

I have 2 WD 500gb HDDs in raid 0, and want to run my X25-M (yet to arrive) alongside them as a single drive. For the WD drives to be recognised, I would have to set my bios to RAID since I don't have a raid card. I know I won't be able to use Windows 7's automatic trim, but can I at least use the Toolbox optimizer?

Cheers.

[idata]

dohk22, details from Intel are a bit sketchy at the moment but I have a similar config to your own. I have a single SSD but also running 2 WD Raptors in RAID0. With the Intel drivers (have used both Matrix and RST), the SSD Toolbox will allow for manual and scheduled TRIM. Automatic background TRIM is still a no according to the documentation. I dumped the RST driver however as it gave poorer performance versus the latest Matrix drivers according to synthetic benchmarks but may an issue that will be improved in an official release of the new drivers.

[idata]

Thanks Ziggy. I was considering maybe getting rid of my raid 0 array if keeping it meant I couldn't use trim at all, be it auto or manual/scheduled. Nice to know that the toolbox will allow me to use the optimizer while running intel raid drivers. Cheers!

[DZand]

@ dokh22:

It doesn't matter, how many and which sort of RAID systems you have.

The only important question regarding the Trim command is the following:

Which Controller and which driver is managing your SSD?

As long as the connection between the SATA Controller and the SSD uses either the generic MS IDE driver PCIIDE.SYS or the generic MS AHCI driver MSAHCI.SYS, everything will be fine regarding the Trim command support.