RE6 + VROC + SAMSUNG SM961 + 960 PRO + HYPER M.2 X16 Card

[Silent Scone@ROG]

Here's a Polaris 961 in CPU DIMM.2

[birdman941]

Here you go.
http://optane.weebly.com/

[Brighttail]

Simply put, the 900p when it comes to sheer low level 4k reads (basically what Windows does 24/7) is by far the best. For fun, here are my two 961s in RAID 0 as a non-boot drive using Windows software RAID.



It beats the 900p in RAID 0 in everything but Sequential writes and 4k Q1 reads, where the 900P in raid DESTROYS my RAID 0. Here are some raw numbers of my 900P and 961s in raid0. You can see that being in RAID 0, the two 900p actually suffer some latency with the low level writes as my single 900p trounces my 961s in the low level writes.

900p
Sequential Read (Q= 32,T= 1) : 2708.197 MB/s
Sequential Write (Q= 32,T= 1) : 2233.149 MB/s
Random Read 4KiB (Q= 8,T= 8) : 2390.772 MB/s [ 583684.6 IOPS]
Random Write 4KiB (Q= 8,T= 8) : 2260.428 MB/s [ 551862.3 IOPS]
Random Read 4KiB (Q= 32,T= 1) : 800.869 MB/s [ 195524.7 IOPS]
Random Write 4KiB (Q= 32,T= 1) : 738.521 MB/s [ 180303.0 IOPS]
Random Read 4KiB (Q= 1,T= 1) : 334.062 MB/s [ 81558.1 IOPS]
Random Write 4KiB (Q= 1,T= 1) : 301.224 MB/s [ 73541.0 IOPS]

961s in Raid 0
Sequential Read (Q= 32,T= 1) : 6486.190 MB/s
Sequential Write (Q= 32,T= 1) : 3019.021 MB/s
Random Read 4KiB (Q= 8,T= 8) : 1701.236 MB/s [ 415340.8 IOPS]
Random Write 4KiB (Q= 8,T= 8) : 2344.159 MB/s [ 572304.4 IOPS]
Random Read 4KiB (Q= 32,T= 1) : 922.540 MB/s [ 225229.5 IOPS]
Random Write 4KiB (Q= 32,T= 1) : 848.502 MB/s [ 207153.8 IOPS]
Random Read 4KiB (Q= 1,T= 1) : 56.420 MB/s [ 13774.4 IOPS]
Random Write 4KiB (Q= 1,T= 1) : 245.470 MB/s [ 59929.2 IOPS]

Bottom line, RAID is great when it comes to sequential read/writes and random read/writes in higher queue depths, but in every day usage for your OS doing its thing, opening browsers and programs, the 900p is the king.

[Marko911]

Here is the VROC key,at staggering 234$
https://eu.mouser.com/ProductDetail/...ZEWe5aC1Njtw==

[Abaidor]

Here is the VROC key,at staggering 234$
https://eu.mouser.com/ProductDetail/...ZEWe5aC1Njtw==

Hold on a sec? Is this correct? I have bought this key for $25 from Mouser previously (same code)?

[Marko911]

Hold on a sec? Is this correct? I have bought this key for $25 from Mouser previously (same code)?

Got it confirmed on their web chat...also they couldn't tell me if this key will even work on x299 platform.

[Abaidor]

Got it confirmed on their web chat...also they couldn't tell me if this key will even work on x299 platform.

Although I have not use right now for it I am glad I grabbed it back then when it was cheap and it was the one others here tested to be working on the the RVIE.

I wonder if they "brick" it though through some future BIOS update. Anyway the real trouble is that it is of no real use that makes sense to me especially considering that it needs 2-4X 900p drives and a cable mess to make any use of it.

Unless Intel releases cheaper M2 drives that fit the M16 card my key wil remain useless. Lol it does not even work as a paperweight..

[Marko911]

Although I have not use right now for it I am glad I grabbed it back then when it was cheap and it was the one others here tested to be working on the the RVIE.

I wonder if they "brick" it though through some future BIOS update. Anyway the real trouble is that it is of no real use that makes sense to me especially considering that it needs 2-4X 900p drives and a cable mess to make any use of it.

Unless Intel releases cheaper M2 drives that fit the M16 card my key wil remain useless. Lol it does not even work as a paperweight..

Yeah,agree ,it's useless...Do you maybe know,is it possible to RAID like 4 Samsung EVOs without VROC? (non bootable raid drive,non VROC)

[Abaidor]

Yeah,agree ,it's useless...Do you maybe know,is it possible to RAID like 4 Samsung EVOs without VROC? (non bootable raid drive,non VROC)

I really don't know first hand but should be possible. However, I doubt you will get the required bandwidth unless you get a hardware PCI-E controller. Not with the M16 card though but I might be wrong. Perhaps some more knowledgeable individuals could advise.

[Brighttail]

Just to add in here with Justin, I to have two Intel 900p and a Samsung 960. The only real purpose of VROC at this point is to create a BOOTABLE RAID drive, which up to this point, could not be done on the x99 or x299 platforms. The Z170/z270 platforms allowed it but as Justin stated it went through the DMI which bottlenecked the drives.

Quite honestly the Intel 900ps are best for the 4k read/writes which is what most of us users will notice. If you are transferring, transcoding or rending large files you may see some better times with the Samsung 960 Pro but for normal day to day activities, the Intel 900p blows everything away, including the new Samsung 970s.

All that being said, I do have my system currently running two Intel 900p in a bootable RAID 0. If I wanted to truly maximize their power I would load windows on the Samsung 960 pro and make an application drive using the two Intel 900p while creating the RAID 0 using good old Windows 10 software RAID 0. Right now about the ONLY reason I'm using the two Intel 900p in RAID 0 as a bootable drive is stubbornness. I bought into the x299 platform because this was promised to me and damned if I'm not going to use it for a while.

In the end I think what I probably will do is simply use my Intel 900p drives separately, one as a OS drive and one as a game drive. That way I get the 4k speed at max for things like normal every day usage on websites and email while having my games and applications on the other and use my Samsung 960 pro as a torrent or cache drive.

All the big hype amounted to THPTHPTHPTHTPHTPTH.