sata 3 SSD running on sata 2 speeds ??? G53

[maej72]

hello guys
im having a bit of problem here, i bought mushkin enhanced chronos 120gb sata 3 6 gb/s SSD, so i installed it in my G53sw-a1, and installed a fresh windows 7 on it..... the problem is the intel 6 series c200 (HM65 chipset) supports sata 3 6 gb/s, but i get the sata 2 3 gb/s speeds (200 MB/s read/135 MB/s write) i dont know why??

the ssd speeds are up to 550 MB/s read and 540 MB/s write and i've read some reviews on it and other users get around 400 MB/s read and write.

* in case you're wondering it's installed on the second sata port which supports 6 gb/s speeds and the the original seagate 750gb 7200 rpm hdd is on the first port.

** and there is something i dont really get, intel says the chipset supports two 6 gb/s drives or six 3 gb/s devices.
i dont get this point at all. do they mean if i have three devices connected to the sata ports all of them are going to run on 3 gb/s speed or the first two ports support 6 gb/s speed and the other four ports going to run on 3 gb/s speed regardless of how many ports are being used???

by the way the third port is being used by the dvd drive.

and i dont know if im using the intel AHCI DRIVERS OR MICROSOFT AHCI DRIVERS, the "as ssd" program says "msahci", but i really dont know

[BrodyBoy]

The third SATA port (where most of us have an ODD, as you mentioned), is SATA 2. Practically, in a laptop, there is only going to be one SATA device per physical connector, so the specs related to multiple devices don't really have any bearing.

It sounds like your are using the Windows AHCI driver. Go into the BIOS and make sure that the SATA mode is set to AHCI, not IDE. Then try installing the Intel RST.

[maej72]

The third SATA port (where most of us have an ODD, as you mentioned), is SATA 2. Practically, in a laptop, there is only going to be one SATA device per physical connector, so the specs related to multiple devices don't really have any bearing.

It sounds like your are using the Windows AHCI driver. Go into the BIOS and make sure that the SATA mode is set to AHCI, not IDE. Then try installing the Intel RST.

thanks for fast reply, it's set to AHCI in the bios. i have seen someone's post had the same laptop and the same problem, but when he uninstalled the RST drivers and installed the MSAHCI drivers got the sata 3 6 bg/s speed. this is so confusing, but im gonna give it a shot. do you know how to install it, because some people say that you need to install the RST drivers while installing the windows


edit: i've installed the RST Drivers, I now get around 25 mb/s (read/write) less speed :S

[BrodyBoy]

Hmmm....that's obviously not what we were going for! A couple thoughts:

- Is the drive running the latest firmware?

- Did you install Windows on this as a brand new drive? Or had it already been used at all, for anything (even an abortive or failed Win install before the current one)? Misalignment can slow an SSD, but it shouldn't be a factor if Windows was writing to a disc that had never been used before.

[maej72]

Hmmm....that's obviously not what we were going for! A couple thoughts:

- Is the drive running the latest firmware?

- Did you install Windows on this as a brand new drive? Or had it already been used at all, for anything (even an abortive or failed Win install before the current one)? Misalignment can slow an SSD, but it shouldn't be a factor if Windows was writing to a disc that had never been used before.

yes sir latest firmware, but i've used the ssd as secondry drive first then i changed my mind and installed the windows on it of course i've deleted the partition and assigned it as a new partition before the installation and all was done through the windows dvd.

thanks for your patience

should i put the ssd on port 0 instead of 1 ??

edit: i checked the ssd alignment with diskpart and PAT 2.0 and it's aligned.

[BrodyBoy]

i've used the ssd as secondry drive first then i changed my mind and installed the windows on it of course i've deleted the partition and assigned it as a new partition before the installation and all was done through the windows dvd.

I don't think it matters which drive bay you put the drives in. (The drives bays, BTW, are not "hard wired" to any specific SATA port assignment. Bay #1 can be SATA port 1 or 2...same with bay #2.....and they can even swap when you reboot!)

But it's worth checking the drive's alignment, because of its history of previous use. Just deleting a partition doesn't assure proper alignment when new partitions are made. The Diskpart utility is the easiest way to check....the steps are listed below. All command line commands are in quotes...omit quotes when actually typing using them. (Let me know if you want more detail for any step).

1. In Windows, open a command window as administrator
2. type "diskpart" to open the Diskpart utility
3. type "list disk" to get a list of your physical disks, each assigned a disk number
4. type "select disk n" (where n is the disk number of your SSD)
5. type "list partition"

All partitions on the SSD should be listed, with the following data specified. Please report back with this data.

Partition #.....Type.....Size.....Offset


Type "exit" to close Diskpart, and then "exit" again to close the command window.

[maej72]

I don't think it matters which drive bay you put the drives in. (The drives bays, BTW, are not "hard wired" to any specific SATA port assignment. Bay #1 can be SATA port 1 or 2...same with bay #2.....and they can even swap when you reboot!)

But it's worth checking the drive's alignment, because of its history of previous use. Just deleting a partition doesn't assure proper alignment when new partitions are made. The Diskpart utility is the easiest way to check....the steps are listed below. All command line commands are in quotes...omit quotes when actually typing using them. (Let me know if you want more detail for any step).

1. In Windows, open a command window as administrator
2. type "diskpart" to open the Diskpart utility
3. type "list disk" to get a list of your physical disks, each assigned a disk number
4. type "select disk n" (where n is the disk number of your SSD)
5. type "list partition"

All partitions on the SSD should be listed, with the following data specified. Please report back with this data.

Partition #.....Type.....Size.....Offset


Type "exit" to close Diskpart, and then "exit" again to close the command window.

i checked the ssd alignment with diskpart, Paragon Alignment Tool v2.0, Paragon Alignment Tool v3.0 and it's optimally aligned.
the reason i asked about switching ports or bays is because RST tells me that the seagate hdd is the System drive and the ssd is the secondary drive and that's obvious because the program judges the drives by their ports.

partition 1 primary 100 MB 1024 KB
partition 2 primary 111 GB 101 MB

* another thing i dont know if it's worth mentioning, the seagate 750gb 7200 rpm drive is a 3 gb/s drive, but i never went beyond 109 MB/s read and write on that particular drive, i dont know if that's normal and the drive isnt capable enough or that there's some serious problem??


** infact when i installed the windows on the ssd another copy of windows was also present on the other drive (in case anything goes wrong), so i go to disk manager my ssd was disk 0 and hdd was disk 1, but after i deleted the recovery and windows partition from the seagate hdd and created simple drive i restarted the computer and found the seagate hdd became disk 0 and the ssd became disk 1, i dont know why??

[BrodyBoy]

the reason i asked about switching ports or bays is because RST tells me that the seagate hdd is the System drive and the ssd is the secondary drive and that's obvious because the program judges the drives by their ports.

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** infact when i installed the windows on the ssd another copy of windows was also present on the other drive (in case anything goes wrong), so i go to disk manager my ssd was disk 0 and hdd was disk 1, but after i deleted the recovery and windows partition from the seagate hdd and created simple drive i restarted the computer and found the seagate hdd became disk 0 and the ssd became disk 1, i dont know why??

I'm not sure what you mean about the RST judging drives by their ports.....a system drive is determined by the presence of certain system files, not the drive's location.

As I mentioned in my previous post, there's no set association between SATA port and drive bay and, therefore, disk number. And as you have discovered, the assignments can change without the disks being physically moved. (SATA devices are scanned and enumerated every time the computer boots, and the enumeration can change.)

Ultimately, though, SATA port and disk number aren't related to disk performance.

partition 1 primary 100 MB 1024 KB
partition 2 primary 111 GB 101 MB

As you said earlier, the SSD is aligned. Just a variable that was worth checking.

[maej72]

thank you i now get it, but still RST says the the system drive is the seagate !! it isn't a big deal as long as the driver does its job i guess.

do you think there is a solution ??
im saying that because i spent a lot of time doing the research, but nothing is really clear about this problem and i guess 0.01% of the ROGs have this problem.

[BrodyBoy]

I think there has to be a solution. But I'd have to do further research to know what it is, since I haven't seen this issue myself. I know there have been problems related to LPM (Link Power Management) in some SSDs, but I haven't read enough about it to know whether that's in play here.

I'll keep my eye open for more info about this. Perhaps another owner here who has already dealt with this problem will weigh in soon....

thank you i now get it, but still RST says the the system drive is the seagate !! it isn't a big deal as long as the driver does its job i guess.

Does DIsk Mnaagement report a single system partition, in the SSD, or does it also show a system partition on the HDD?