SanDisk unveils ReadyCache SSD caching

[Hammer_Time]

http://www.wwpi.com/index.php?option=co ... erformance

SanDisk unveils ReadyCache SSD caching offering to improve PC performance

TUESDAY, 04 SEPTEMBER 2012

SanDisk Corp., provider of flash memory storage solutions, announced Tuesday a SSD caching solution that lets consumers improve their desktop computer’s performance. The SanDisk ReadyCache solution can boost a desktop computer’s boot, shutdown and application launch times, allowing consumers to enjoy a more responsive computing experience, while utilizing their existing hard drive’s storage.

The SanDisk ReadyCache product is a performance enhancing caching solution that combines a 32 gigabyte (GB) 2.5-inch SSD that resides alongside a desktop computer’s hard drive with ExpressCache software by Condusiv Technologies. The software, sold exclusively by SanDisk, is downloaded from the SanDisk website and can be installed on any desktop PC running Windows 7 operating system.

After installing the SSD and software, the SanDisk ReadyCache solution’s advanced caching algorithms automatically manage data by caching frequently used files to improve overall performance. The SanDisk ReadyCache hardware and software solution enables up to four times faster boot performance than a standalone hard drive, letting consumers boot their computer quickly and shut down the system in moments. The caching solution launches applications up to 12 times faster3, which is especially useful during gaming, business and multimedia applications.

Unlike most SSD caching solutions, the SanDisk ReadyCache solution can pull data from multiple hard drives, enabling a consistent performance improvement when utilizing more than one hard drive. The solution supports hard drives with any amount of capacity so users can enjoy maximum storage space. All data that resides in the cache also resides on the primary storage, which helps prevent data loss if the caching solution is later uninstalled. The caching solution enables consumers to smoothly run simultaneous applications, ideal when multitasking.

With the SanDisk ReadyCache solution, consumers do not need to replace their existing hard drive, clone their operating system, perform lengthy installs or migrate data. The product comes with an installation kit that includes a SATA 6Gb/s cable, a 3.5-inch mounting bracket and screws; and the software is simple to download and install. The caching solution allows consumers to enjoy the fast performance of a new computer without paying for an entire system

“The SanDisk ReadyCache is an easy, affordable way to turbocharge a desktop computer,” said Kent Perry, director, product marketing, SanDisk. “Our new SSD caching solution lets consumers enjoy the performance benefits of frequently used data coming from an SSD while retaining the storage capacity of their hard drive. It is an ideal combination of the benefits of an SSD and hard drive.”

The SanDisk ReadyCache solution is available and carries a three-year warranty and an MSRP of $59.99.

Yes, I know it is only 32 GB and you can buy a 128 GB SSD flash drive for around $60 these days, but it lets you add a fast cache to any system without having to reinstall the OS!! That alone makes it attractive for a lot of folks... I am interested in this product myself, but want to see a full review on it before buying one.. the price is certainly reasonable ( you are paying for the proprietary caching sw as well as the SSD of course ) all things considered, and if it actually performs like they claim it does...

[Sauron_Daz]

Interesting. Obviously you don't pay just for the drive, but the software as well.

I wonder, could one use that software using another SSD as well?

[DIREWOLF75]

Meh, what I want, is a hardware RAM-disk running DDR and maybe has a small SSD component that can store/restore from/to the RAM. If you run it through a fake RAID 0 with two SATA3 connections, you should get a NICE highspeed drive in between regular RAM and SSD or HDD, regardless how much RAM your MB or OS can handle.
If an external powersource is added, it could be used as the bootdrive.

[Hammer_Time]

Interesting. Obviously you don't pay just for the drive, but the software as well.

I wonder, could one use that software using another SSD as well?

Of course, but will Sandisk sell you their proprietary caching sw alone?? Without their own SSD bundled with it?? I doubt it... kinda sad but why would they do that? They are in business to make money of course, and at least by bundling their sw with their own SSD they ensure that there is no hw incompatiblity or other issues with their caching sw ... I like your idea, but doubt Sandisk will compromise here... I wonder if they will offer larger capacity SSD's for this caching solution in the future, or mebbe they figure 32 GB is "plenty" and one-size-fits-all for a caching solution... can't wait for full review on this!

[Stupify]

I would so much like to see PCIe 3.0 x16 slot (32GB/s) RAM disk supporting quad channel DDR3 - just 4 slots is plenty with a changeable battery. The only remaining component would be a software that can "flush" to the hard drive for more permanent storage on-demand.

[Hammer_Time]

As you know there already exists ramdisk type sw:

http://www.raymond.cc/blog/12-ram-disk- ... ite-speed/

My main problem with "Ramdisk sw" is that everything you want to run "fast" has to be placed on the virtual ramdrive manually of course, and it is volatile. By putting a battery on a PCI Express ram card you can avoid the volatility issue of course.

For those two reasons I much prefer to try out something like Sandisk's ReadyCache SSD. Data is copied so there is zero risk of losing data, a permanent copy of same data always stays on your hard drive or other SSD's you may have installed. Plus it automatically figures out which files you use the most, and automatically caches them intelligently to maximize the storage capacity of the Sandisk 32 GB SSD dedicated for this task. It's the lazy man's ramdisk... I have no doubt about Sandisk's performance claims, but I still want to see how well it actually works with a thorough detailed review on it before I buy one...

[Sauron_Daz]

Interesting. Obviously you don't pay just for the drive, but the software as well.

I wonder, could one use that software using another SSD as well?

Of course, but will Sandisk sell you their proprietary caching sw alone?? Without their own SSD bundled with it?? I doubt it... kinda sad but why would they do that? They are in business to make money of course, and at least by bundling their sw with their own SSD then ensure that there is no hw incompatiblity or other issues with their caching sw ... I like your idea, but doubt Sandisk will compromise here... I wonder if they will offer larger capacity SSD's for this caching solution in the future, or mebbe they figure 32 GB is "plenty" and one-size-fits-all for a caching solution... can't wait for full review on this!

Once someone said that 640 KB for memory was all people ever would need....

[Sauron_Daz]

Meh, what I want, is a hardware RAM-disk running DDR and maybe has a small SSD component that can store/restore from/to the RAM. If you run it through a fake RAID 0 with two SATA3 connections, you should get a NICE highspeed drive in between regular RAM and SSD or HDD, regardless how much RAM your MB or OS can handle.
If an external powersource is added, it could be used as the bootdrive.

Sounds good.

[DIREWOLF75]

As you know there already exists ramdisk type sw:

http://www.raymond.cc/blog/12-ram-disk- ... ite-speed/

My main problem with "Ramdisk sw" is that everything you want to run "fast" has to be placed on the virtual ramdrive manually of course, and it is volatile. By putting a battery on a PCI Express ram card you can avoid the volatility issue of course.

For those two reasons I much prefer to try out something like Sandisk's ReadyCache SSD. Data is copied so there is zero risk of losing data, a permanent copy of same data always stays on your hard drive or other SSD's you may have installed. Plus it automatically figures out which files you use the most, and automatically caches them intelligently to maximize the storage capacity of the Sandisk 32 GB SSD dedicated for this task. It's the lazy man's ramdisk... I have no doubt about Sandisk's performance claims, but I still want to see how well it actually works with a thorough detailed review on it before I buy one...

And exactly what use is a software RAM-disk when either 1. like me your running on Windows XP with a 4GB-GPU RAMsize limit, or 2. like surprisingly many, your motherboard RAM slots are filled to capacity and you need the currently installed RAM to be used normally?

More importantly, a good RAM-disk with an external power source means you can run the OS from it, which means you have an almost instant "on" system.
OR you can simply put the OS swapfile on the RAM-disk, and suddenly Windows becomes blazing fast much of the time.
Or you can put your favorite games on it, while booting the system you load up a saved image of the game from the integrated mini SSD or from a HDD(not the boot drive) and when Windows has booted, you have your games able to be loaded almost instantly. And with lots of games today loading 2+ GB of data, this means you can start a game in a few seconds instead of in 1-3 minutes.

And like Stupify noted, if you were to run this from a PCIe 16x slot, you can get speeds that normal HDDs or SSDs can only dream of. Realistic speeds easily in the 10-30 times faster than even an SSD.

I first used a RAM-disk on my first 286, 40MB or something, even though it ran over ISA it made the system wonderfully much faster. And the potential for similar has only become better since then.

[Hammer_Time]

Theoretically yes, but not to disregard your post and your own results with it, there are many caveats to a Ramdisk, please read the user comments in this review ( very bottom of page ) :

http://www.raymond.cc/blog/12-ram-disk- ... ite-speed/

Kacke at 6:44 pm
Yep, it has happened here also.
DataRam has’nt been that successful all times in my experience either when load and particularly save the image down to disk. It has a feature for load the image to RAM when booting up but I have’nt noticed yet it work.
For instance the process can’t work when having explorer.exe running orelse it wont save and stop.
CleanMem I’ve tried too but have decided to not use it as it don’t have any GUI which makes it simple to use it.
Secondly, if you have problems to remember small details in how to handle all logs and batch-files, yes maybe there are better solutions to use.
Third, it mention how effective it is to clean the disk cache and how much there is to winn by clean it.
That’s a myth, it wont make your computer faster in all situations out there.

I won't deny that Ramdisk sw is faster in "most" situations, but there are some situations where it is not...

I want to see how a " 32GB SSD cache" works in action first...

[DIREWOLF75]

Caveats caused by halfassed implementation, not because the concept is bad.

[Hammer_Time]

Up until the introduction of fast SSD flash drives, a sw virtual RamDrive was a good solution for a lot of folks demanding better i/o performance...but SSD's have sure lessened the need for a RamDrive ( for the average user that is, not a professional using many GB's of RAM in RamDrive for multiple VM's or working with very large datasets etc. ).

[Sauron_Daz]

Eventually SSD's will gain in speed maybe to the point RAMdrives are no longer to be considered.

[Hammer_Time]

Yep, they ( SSD ) continue to get larger, faster, and cheaper, and I hope this trend continues!!

http://www.techradar.com/news/computing ... ssd-920295

With the caveat that it is definitely not for sale, OCZ showed us the incredible 4TB IBIS XL.

The frankly huge storage numbers, not just huge in SSD terms but in spinning platter tech too, aren't the end of it. The performance numbers are quite something too.
Apparently posting figures of 1,800MB/s read and 1,700MB/s write speed the IBIS XL would probably be done copying any data you threw at it before you'd even thought about doing it.
This could be the first precognitive storage device ever.
But as we said this drive is not going to be for sale, unless you've got a huge overdraft facility available to you anyways. According to OCZ "it is purely to demonstrate OCZ's ability to customize their technology for virtually any application and maximize its potential."
But we've seen how fast the traditional IBIS HSDL is and that's enough for us at the moment.

Okay, I know its not for sale, but it is pretty cool as a concept... 4 TB with up to 1800 MB/s read and 1700 MB/s write ( sequential of course ) is pretty impressive, even if it has a proprietary HSDL connector...

You can buy this if you have $900 clams floating around though:

http://www.newegg.ca/Product/Product.as ... 6820227742

OCZ RevoDrive 3 X2 series RVD3X2-FHPX4-960G PCI-E 960GB PCI-Express 2.0 x4 MLC Internal Solid State Drive (SSD)

SINGLE HIGHEST PERFORMING SSD IN PROSUMER SPACE

The RevoDrive3 X2 family gets its edge by employing a PCIe x4 Gen. 2 interface and four SandForce SF-2281 controllers in RAID 0 design to maximize data access and bandwidth. The result is up to 3X faster performance than SATA 6Gb/s solutions - up to 1500MB/s read and 1300MB/s write speeds, and incredible random write up to 230,000 IOPS (4KB Aligned) under HPC or workstation workload with a single card solution. The RevoDrive 3 X2 can take full advantage of today’s multithreaded processors and software, and delivers an easy-to-deploy, OS bootable large storage capacity solution.

$899.99

[Sauron_Daz]

Now where's my $900.........

[Celt]

In the enterprise class arrays which I specialise in we are already at the point where we can easily flood multiple 16GBit Fibre Channel interfaces with large scale SSD arrays - actually the problem for us is the 6GB SAS backend loops inside the arrays! We need more loops, which needs more controllers, which needs a more complex crossbar . . . We have storage switches already with multi TBit backend bandwidth . . . Costs a lot more than $900 . . . More than $900k too! But what we have in the enterprise space eventually filters down . . .

[Hammer_Time]

Never a dull moment in the enterprise storage world I bet!!

Yes, the enterprise storage tech always "trickles down" eventually.. I remember my amazement at seeing the first "onboard RAID SATA controller" on a motherboard years ago...finally it became commonplace after so much time, where before it was strictly in the realms of the enterprise world and a few extreme enthusiasts... those with SCSI drives in their home computers etc back when 5400rpm IDE disk drives were the norm for desktops...

[Sauron_Daz]

I remember those SCSI drives... Very noisy!!

[Celt]

Errr how did the interface affect the noise?

[Hammer_Time]

not the interface, cuz as you know the SCSI drives themselves ran at faster 10,000 or 15,000 rpm... much louder and noisier than 5400rpm desktop drives of course...you had to wait a bit for those SCSI drives to spin up to speed, then they were rockin... well, for their time that is...

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XmUmPcbWFck

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rGTynofao1M

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=viLZKIMUaU4

SCSI drive noise in an old 486 computer FTW!! :

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=u8glT8kMXf0

This one is quite noisy too:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VYSq59cH1tg

Make it stop, make it stop...