OCZ RevoDrive X2 240GB Review ( Price )

£420 inc VAT Contact • ocztechnology.com Read more • tinyurl.com/63o4rwy Specification 240GB SSD; PCI Express x4 slot mount; MLC flash; 4 x Sandforce SF-1222 controllers; Raid 0; bootable; 181x22x125mm The latest solid-state drives (SSDs) are much faster than older models, with some capable of read and write speeds of up to 400MB per second (MBps) and beyond. That's around four times the speed of a hard disk. Some motherboards won't have the 6 gigabits per second (Gbps) SATA interface needed to move data that quickly; for these drives to run at full speed, you need an up-to-date chipset with native third-gen SATA support. Alternatively, you can buy a PCI Express card that adds these faster SATA ports to your computer. The RevoDrive takes a different approach: its a PCI Express card with embedded Nand flash chips, which work together under the control of four SSDs. Each SSD has a Sandforce-1200 controller, with the four configured in a Raid 0 array. OCZ says the X2 is able to read data at a staggeringly fast peak of 740MBps, and write at 720MBps. It starts to make the most of the circa-1GBps data-rate ceiling the PCI Express x4 bus can handle. 1 1 \f \6 www.pcadvisor.co.uk/revlew In tests it proved almost this fast, at least some of the time. While the drive coped brilliantly with large files, reading and writing at more than 600MBps, its performance with 512-byte files in HD Tune was only 6,878 input/output operations per second (IOPS). That's lower than an older OCZ Vertex SSD, which achieved 11,444 IOPS. We needed to download a driver before Windows 7 would install on the RevoDrive. An error message appeared the first time we tried, but forcing full-speed PCI Express in the Bios solved the issue. Windows then installed quickly, limited only by the slow USB media we were using. In use, our test PC felt snappy - not only at startup, but noticeably so when playing games and installing patches. Even web browsing felt smoother than on a PC using a hard disk or SATA 3Gbps SSD. The Sandforce controllers here don't support the Trim command for pre-erasing deleted data, but an idletime garbage-collection mechanism helps to maintain performance. The RevoDrive is limited to use in a desktop PC, although it doesn't require a spare drive bay. And it isn't compatible with every motherboard, so check OCZ's compatibility list on its website before you buy. Verdict The RevoDrive X2 is one of the fastest storage options available and only marginally more expensive than a standard SSD. However, the lack of Trim support, lower IOPS with tiny files and its limitation to desktop PCs means we'd prefer to use a motherboard with native SATA 6Gbps support and a standalone SSD.

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