Intel Matrix Storage + SSD TRIM Pass-through?

[idata]

Hello!

I would like to know if Intel is aware of the issues with SSD's and RAID arrays regarding the lack of TRIM capability. More and more SSD drives support the block cleaning/optimising method aka. TRIM. Windows 7 has the operating system level support for it. As far as the user useres his SSD's in normal SATA/Legacy IDE mode this TRIM methid works because the OS can send the TRIM method calls directly to the drive itself. But if the user's SSD drives are in a RAID0 array TRIM capabilities are gone, because the Intel RAID controller does not pass through the TRIM method calls.

My question is that whether Intel is aware of this problem and if is there any effort to solve this issue? Are we seeing any driver updates soon?

Thank you indavance!

Regards

[PPapp]

Fernando wrote:

steppinwolf schrieb:

Fernando, thanks for the info on MSM and RST driver support (or lack thereof) for TRIM and the SSD optimizer toolbox. Also read your thread (74253). Hope Intel responds.

Obviously I need to do some more research. Will the new RST drivers work on Intel's DP55KG motherboard? I'd never heard of Station-Drivers before. Looks like a French website. Do they have a reputation for getting drivers before everyone else?

The v9.5.0.1037 RST drivers are WHQL and are running perfect with my 2x160 GB Intel X25-M SSD's in RAID0. I got a much better performance than with the latest MSM drivers. For further details you may look into this thread, where I have shown my results with these drivers (I'm sorry, it's in German language): http://www.german-winlite.de/wbb/index.php?page=Thread&threadID=3141 http://www.german-winlite.de/wbb/index.php?page=Thread&threadID=3141

Since your mainboard has a P55 chipset and the RST drivers do support all Intel Southbridges from ICH7 up, you will have no problem to get them installed.

And yes, Station-Drivers very often publish drivers, which are shown by other companies several weeks later.

Regards

Fernando

So are you saying that these RST drivers will pass TRIM through to a RAID array?

[DZand]

D749 schrieb:

So are you saying that these RST drivers will pass TRIM through to a RAID array?

I don't know, if the already available RST drivers v9.5.0.1037 do pass the TRIM command, but I expect, that we will see new RST drivers in the near future, which will support TRIM.

Since a lot of users with Intel Postville SSD's are interested in this question, I have startet this thread: /message/75320# 75320 http://communities.intel.com/message/75320# 75320, but I didn't yet get any answer from Intel.

Regards

Fernando

[idata]

This link may not be too relevant to our discussion, but it's certainly good to know that there are also other issues out there worth looking into.

http://techreport.com/articles.x/16979/2 http://techreport.com/articles.x/16979/2

[idata]

hi guys,

about TRIM, here is what i think: If the manufacturer in this case Intel delivers a TRIM program, it will work for stand alone disks, like in a portable.

In a raid config, not possible. So it will be impossible for Windows to overcome the controller to get to the cells needing to be erased, to be prepared as "virgin" again. At least not possible yet, right?

Why do companies like Perfectdisk not offer this in there programs. There should be a way that when consolidating free space (space that is deleted but not erased) would be erased, in fact why can Windows not do this?

This would be the simpliest way. Instead of deleting a record, why can't it be erased. You skip the delete and gain speed.

Saying that the SSD controller does not allow this, well then the software on the controller should be changed so this can happen.

Jeff

[idata]

jeff_rys wrote:

about TRIM, here is what i think: If the manufacturer in this case Intel delivers a TRIM program, it will work for stand alone disks, like in a portable.

In a raid config, not possible. So it will be impossible for Windows to overcome the controller to get to the cells needing to be erased, to be prepared as "virgin" again. At least not possible yet, right?

Passing TRIM through from the RAID controller to the drives should be trivial for RAID0 and RAID1 (and RAID10). But for RAID3, 5, & 6 it is far more complicated, and would probably be incompatible with some drives depending on how well they followed the spec, and be far more sensitive to partition alignment. Also, the only way you could do RAID 3, 5, or 6 with TRIM would require reading the beginning and end of each file fragment before it is TRIMed to calculate new data for the parity stripe based on the TRIMed data being zeroed, and a reWRITE of the parity stripe which isn't necessary without TRIM, yielding performance penalties that probably outweigh the performance gains from TRIM, and extra drive wear eating into the lifespan advantage of TRIM (but probably not enough to eliminate that advantage).

So while these other RAID configurations could be tweaked to be TRIM compatible, it really only makes sense to use it in a RAID1, RAID0, or RAID1+0 config.