Intel SSD DC P3700 Enthusiast Report (800GB)

TESTING IN STEADY STATE METRICS – 4 CORNERS

Steady state testing consisted of running four tests for a period of one hour each with our goal being to obtain the absolute best throughput and IOPS possible.  For throughput, we started with a 128KB file at 100% read and write, 0% random with four workers at 64 OIO each, and expanded that to a 1GB file size at 100% read and write with 100% random data.  IOPS utilized 4K 100% write 100% random with the same worker setup.

The Intel SSD DC P3700 takes a healthy lead on the Kingspec MultiCore PCIe SSD with over 500MB/s lead on write speeds.

Listed specifications for the P3700 write IOPS are 90K IOPS and we are close to that, however, the read IOPS of 455K is simply unbelievable, although they do fall just below listed specs of 460K. It is important to remember that these results are ‘steady state’ and only realized after many hours of consistent activity to find those magic speeds where the SSD levels off and runs at its best under continuous load.  Having said that, the SSD DC P3700 is like a jack rabbit and, as soon as you give it time to breathe, performance jumps significantly.

If you take a look closely, you can see that we are pushing 700K IOPS from the P3700 and we were able to do this by adjusting the test pattern.  Most importantly though, this result identifies the test as being run 3 of 32 on the bottom right; it is still FOB (Fresh Out of Box) performance.

REAL WORLD TRANSFER SPEED TESTING

For this test, five PCIe SSDs were compared, as well as the Samsung 840 Pro SATA 3 SSD for a basis of comparison.  This test entailed placing 25GB files of video, ISO and OS data, on each drive and then copying them into another folder on the same SSD.

In conducting actual transfer tests of video, ISO and OS files, the Intel SSD DC P3700 was able to show off just a bit by transferring 25GB ISO and video files at well under a gigabyte per second.  As well, it cut our best OS file transfer speed considerably, at just over 3 minutes for the transfer.  This is pretty amazing, considering the total file count of the OS directory that was moved was over 65500 files of varying sizes.

PCMARK 8 EXTENDED STORAGE WORKLOAD

CONSISTENCY TESTING

For our last benchmark, we have decided to use PCMark 8 Extended Storage Workload in order to determine steady state throughput of the SanDisk Extreme Pro.  This software is the longest in our battery of tests and takes just under 18 hours per SSD.  As this is a specialized component of PCMark 8 Professional, its final result is void of any colorful graphs or charts typical of the normal online results and deciphering the resulting excel file into an easily understood result takes several more hours.

There are 18 phases of testing throughout the entire run, 8 runs of the Degradation Phase, 5 runs of the Steady State Phase and 5 runs of the Recovery Phase.  In each phase, several performance tests are run of 10 different software programs; Adobe After Effects, Illustrator, InDesign, Photoshop Heavy and Photoshop Light, Microsoft Excel, Powerproint and Word, as well as Battlefield 3 and World of Warcraft to cover the gaming element.

• PRECONDITIONING -The entire SSD is filled twice sequentially with random data of a 128KB file size.  The second run accounts for overprovisioning that would have escaped the first;
• DEGRADATION PHASE – The SSD is hit with random writes of between 4KB and 1MB for 10 minutes and then a single pass performance test is done of each application.  The cycle is repeated 8 times, and with each time, the duration of random writes increases by 5 minutes;
• STEADY STATE PHASE – The drive is hit with random writes of between 4KB and 1MB for 45 minutes before each application is put through a performance test.  This process is repeated 5 times;
• RECOVERY PHASE – The SSD is allowed to idle for 5 minutes before and between performance tests of all applications.  This is repeated 5 times which accounts for garbage collection; and
• CLEANUP – The entire SSD is written with zero data at a write size of 128KB

There had to be a cog in the wheel and we think these PCMark 8 results are misrepresentative of the Intel SSD DC P3700; however we felt it fair to post with our thoughts.  Of the ten user scenarios tested in PCMark 8, there is a low of 250MB/s and a high of 550MB/s, with the average being around 400MB/s.  As to the reasoning for such low scores, we have commonly seen incompatibility with new technology in the past, we are testing in Windows 7 when the P3700 is clearly listed as being compatible with Windows 8, the driver may also be incompatible, and then again, maybe the P3700 just doesn’t like being pushed as PCMark 8 does.  Not only does PCMark 8 fill the drive, but also, it continues ensuring even the over-provisioning is accounted for.  Regardless, IOMeter helped us along with some incredible steady state performance, as did  our ‘true to form’ file transfer testing.  We will also later test in Windows 8 and return with an update with respect to PCMark 8 results and compatibility.